Cathedral Square hosted one of New Zealand’s most significant historic events after the armistice was signed by the Western Allies and the Central Powers on 11th November 1918 in Paris, Franc…
Christchurch has a frontier appearance about it in this photograph taken by Dr. Barker in 1860 from the tower of the Canterbury Provincial Buildings. With little beyond the immediate streets, it c…
Oscar von Sierakowski’s factory and shop was built on the corner of Colombo and Tuam Streets in 1906. It boasted that it was the largest wire work factory in the colonies, producing decorati…
An elderly man, dressed in a plum coloured suit and bow tie, stands gazing at his nearly completed home. It is September 1900, and this is no ordinary home, it is reputed to be the largest wooden r…
New Zealand’s largest and most iconic booksellers, publishers and printing company was Whitcombe & Tombs of Christchurch. It was established in 1882 by Mr. George Hawkes Whitcombe, a seem…
John Jauncey Buchanan and his Valuable Allotment Before arrival in Christchurch, the family of Scotsman John Jauncey Buchanan purchased land on what would become the centre of Christchurch. It was …
Whale at Sumner Provides Amusement for Trippers “Considerable excitement was caused at Sumner at about 3 o’clock yesterday afternoon, when it was reported that something like a large upturned boat …
There is great excitement in the households around Christchurch today. It’s the Labour Day holiday and many families are going to Wainoni Park for the opening of the season. Everyone has been…
Imagine an event so exciting, so spectacular, that 38 trains were required travelling at 28 minute intervals to convey curious sightseers to Lyttelton in order to witness it. The roads from Christc…
1884 Outside the City Hotel, a stream of Hackney and Hansom cabs wait for fares at ‘Cabstand Corner’ (later known as the ‘Triangle’.) The year is 1884 and it appears t…
It is the start of the second week of June 1919 and New Zealand’s Prime Minister, William Massey and the Minister of Finance, Sir Joseph Ward, are in Paris awaiting the signing of the Peace Treaty …
It was hard to avoid sinking up to your knees in wet weather in Market Square in 1862. This panoramic photograph shows Christchurch’s Market Place (later renamed Victoria Square) the damp ge…
It is ten days before Christmas, 1877 and two brothers, Frederick and James Trent, stand expectantly before the Reverend Henry Crocker Marriott Watson at altar in St John the Baptist Church, Latime…
It is midday on the busy intersection of Manchester, High and Lichfield Streets when this photograph was taken from the corner of Bedford Row c. 1904. The street is full of activity as shoppers mak…
Drunkeness was a serious problem in Christchurch by the late 1870s. It didn’t help that for a city of its size, there were 47 hotels and breweries as opposed to just 10 dentists and chemist …
It’s just before 3pm on a late summer day in 1914. Prolific Christchurch photographer, Steffano Webb is setting up his camera equipment inside the gents’ hairdressing saloon of well kno…
Christchurch was the last of the four cities to introduce electric trams. They had tried to introduce the system in 1902, but it was prior to the amalgamation of the boroughs, so with the advent of…
Marking Time in Sydenham In 1912, the impressive Sydenham Post Office stood as a sentinel on the busy corner of Colombo and Brougham Streets. It was a huge post office which served a large communit…
It is the year 1880 and Wilhelmina Arnst and John Christian Aschen have just married in the Deutsche Kirche, on the corner of Worcester and Montreal Streets. They stand outside on the street with t…
The health benefits, cleanliness and exoticism of the Turkish Bath so appealed to Canterbury settlers that it became the height of fashion in the 1880s. Today we enjoy city operated spa facilities …
The wooden church of St Luke the Evangelist, stood in Manchester Street, just north of the Avon, from 1858 until it was pulled down in 1908 to make way for a larger stone and brick structure, faced…
Christchurch’s newest and grandest hotel in the first decade of the 1900s was the Clarendon Hotel situated on the corner of Oxford Terrace and Worcester Street. It replaced the former two-sto…
During the past year or two it has been customary for a number of parties of young men to go into camp at Sumner for the summer months, and to come up to Christchurch during business hours. Special…
“To tell you is a great task, for I can assure you it is a most awful country,” wrote James Boot from Christchurch, New Zealand in letter to his parents in Nottingham, England in June, …
By Fabian Bell The Avon is a lovely river. Of course I know that many people will say that it is no better than a ditch, &c. I pity their want of taste. Of course the stream is narrow and does …
It was a warm fair day on the 16th December 1919, a light nor’easterly breeze was blowing through the city. Much the same weather was being experienced throughout the whole of the Dominion. T…