When Te Tiriti o Waitangi / The Treaty of Waitangi was signed on 6 February 1840, the weather was variable. Had it been gloomy, with rain and winds, the missionary Reverend Richard Davis might have said it was “dirty weather”, his favoured phrase for stormy days. How do we know this? Because The Weather Diaries of Reverend Richard Davis, preserved in a two-volume set, are one of many treasures held by Auckland Council Libraries Heritage Collections.
A page from The Weather Diaries of Reverend Richard Davis showing temperatures, wind directions and ‘general remarks’ on weather conditions for each day in January and February 1839.
Thanks to Reverend Davis – who came from Dorset to Northland with his family in 1824 – more is now known about Aotearoa’s weather in the 19th century. In flowing cursive, he kept meticulous diaries of meteorological conditions, recording the daily temperature at both 9am and midday, along with additional remarks about wind, clouds and extreme weather. (On average, winters were cooler, summers warmer and, on the odd occasion, it snowed in Auckland and Northland.)
When scientists from the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) discovered these diaries, which span 1839-1851, they knew they’d hit real gold – this was a source examining weather and climate conditions to chart change over time before official records began.
This important historical document is part of the Heritage Collections housed on the second floor of Central City Library, which started when Sir George Grey (Governor of New Zealand from 1845-1854 and 1861-1868) donated his substantial manuscript and rare book collection in 1882 with the provision a new library was built. The library (now the Art Gallery building) opened on 26 March 1887. Grey was an avid collector, and because of this, Auckland Council Libraries has one of the most extensive collections of medieval manuscripts in the southern hemisphere, as well as a First Folio of William Shakespeare’s works published in 1623. The collection has grown, mainly thanks to donations, to include more than 3.5 million photographic items from the 1840s to the present, along with maps, rare books, heritage newspapers and magazines, oral history and sound recordings, community archives, manuscripts and ephemera – items like posters, programmes, invitations, tickets, postcards, pamphlets and flyers.
The library houses this 1601 copy of the late-16th century Maris Pacifici, the first printed map of the Pacific Ocean. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections.
Not all of the collections come through auction houses. Much of the Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections are the result of the generosity of individual bequest and donors and from the result of foresight by communities of place and interests whose albums, minutes books, letters, diaries, and recordings make up a significant community-based research and heritage collectionOne of the library’s most recent acquisitions is Ortelius’ Maris Pacifici, a 1601 copy of the 1590 map of the Pacific Ocean included in the first modern atlas, which was based on charts drawn up by Ferdinand Magellan who completed the first circumnavigation of the globe in the early 16th century.
Auckland Council Libraries Heritage Collections are housed in light, humidity and temperature-controlled rooms, with documents protected in acid-free archival folders and boxes. It is open to anyone and mainly used by researchers, scholars, authors and family historians.
As the librarians like to say, “Nothing starts out as a historic document.” The work they do is “collecting for the future to preserve the past for customers who are yet to be born”.
The Reading Room is open 12pm-5pm on weekdays (9am-12pm by appointment) and 10am-4pm on Saturdays. Email specialcollections@aucklandcouncil.govt.nz to book an appointment.
