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The Crystal Palace Opened – 6th April 1918
On 6 April 1918, New Zealand’s first cinema to screen British films, the Crystal Palace, opened in the north side of Cathedral Square. It was also well known for its 32 metre tower that dominated Christchurch’s skyline for 5 decades. In 1963, the theatre was renamed Carlton Cinema and remained popular into the late 1980’s. …
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Canterbury’s And The South Island’s Last Hanging – 5th March 1918
The moment Christchurch divorcee Elizabeth McMahon saw Fredrick William Eggers in handcuffs, she recalled him saying to her only days earlier, “I have made two terrible mistakes”. Fredrick William Eggers was born in Western Australia sometime around 1886. He began his adult life as a farmer but in 1909 was arrested for forgery and sentenced …
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Canterbury’s Prisoner Of War – 1918
Ripa (Ripper) Island – as most of us call it today – was known to the Ngati Mamoe and the Ngai Tahu as Ri-papa. ‘Ri’ means rope and ‘Papa’ means flat rock. As ropes made of flax were used to bring the Maori canoes – some the length of 24 metres – up onto the …
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The Sign Of The Kiwi Opened – 9th June 1917
Those amongst the ranks of the Christchurch City Council and the New Zealand parliamentary seats would have used the following words ‘…obsessed…focused…passionate…’ to describe their colleague and fellow councillor, Henry George ‘Harry’ Ell. And they would be right – Harry Ell let nothing and nobody put him off his project for the construction of the …
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