People who grew up during the 1920s and 1930s all had memories of the years
of the worldwide Great Depression which hit New Zealand from the late
nineteen twenties and continued till 1935. For thousands of New Zealanders
it was a time of enormous stress, hunger and despair.
The impact of this time of hardship affected the attitudes to life of many
families for many years. I interviewed some people who did not remember it
themselves but remembered vividly the comments of their parents about these
difficult years.
The Depression deprived many children of any education beyond the school
leaving age. They were compelled to leave school and take any work, at
however small a wage, to help the family to survive.
Most men who kept their jobs had cuts in salaries or wages. Many
businesses struggled to survive or were forced to close. Many farmers
unable to keep up their mortgage payments walked off their farms. Young
people finishing their training or an apprenticeship might get only three
months work in a year. Many people lost their jobs and men had to work for
a pittance on schemes for the unemployed.
Relief work for married men
Married men were usually given relief work near to their homes, but as the
depression grew more and more serious, even the relief days were rationed
and a stand-down week was introduced after four weeks' work so that the
meagre payments decreased still further.
In Christchurch during the Depression the
Christchurch Drainage Board
raised unemployment loans and relief workers cleared, deepened and widened
the Heathcote River which had caused some flooding, and improved the main
drains in the city and suburbs.
Some unique good results came from relief work. Skilled stone masons who
were unemployed built the Takahe,
the castle-like restaurant, originally
designed as a walkers' rest house, on the Cashmere Hills. Evidence of the
economies needed in those years is found in the huge kauri beams in the
ceiling salvaged from an earlier bridge over the Hurunui and the stone
quarried from rocky outcrops on the hills above. Pieces of packing cases
were used for unemployed men with artistic skills to decorate with coats of
arms to form the magnificent friezes.
Invercargill
Wallace remembers the impact of the Depression on his father in
Invercargill:
"The Depression hit all businesses in the 30s and my father worked in the
engineering industry that was one of the first to be affected. He was one
of the unemployed and because he had three children he was allowed three
days work at 15/- a day. His job was chipping weeds on the sides of the
street and was a far cry from the intricate work he had done making
patterns for the moulding shop. Once he was stood down he worked cutting a
long hedge on the north road. It was dusty and he often fell through the
top of the hedge. His shears broke and he welded them up. The owner then
told my father that the benefit had fallen to 12/6 a day. He felt really
down-trodden after all this long dusty work of cutting a six feet wide
macrocarpa shelter belt."
Relief work for single men
Single unemployed men were sent to camps in isolated areas and usually
lived in incredibly primitive conditions. Their huts had no floors and
were often in areas where there was heavy rain and the camp became a sea of
mud. There were usually no ablution facilities or washing and drying areas
for mud encrusted clothes. The relief work was on road construction or
drainage works, but there was no heavy machinery, just shovels and
wheelbarrows. The men were paid on a piece work system and as most of them
were unused to heavy manual work they often earned very little, sometimes
as little as five shillings a week.
The road from Te Anau to Milford
was one of the projects on which the men
in the camps were employed. Work began at Te Anau in 1929 and 200 men
built the road as far as Te Anau Downs Station. By 1934 the road reached
The Divide. The severe winters in this area must have made working and
living in the conditions provided for the relief workers almost
intolerable.
The situation for married women
Few married women could help by going out to work as there were no jobs,
except perhaps doing housework for the well-off. Most stayed at home and
made such economies as sewing articles
from sugar and flour bags, patching clothes, making new garments out of old ones, and preserving what
was grown in the garden. They tried to keep cheerful and organise
inexpensive fun for the children.
No relief for unemployed women
For single women or mothers with no husband to support them there was no
dole. Their situation was desperate. Jane remembers that families who
could afford to pay for it often had a woman to come and give household
help. When her mother was unwell they had to have help.
"Many women were glad to earn the extra money. The woman who helped my
mother was in a very sad situation, unfortunately not uncommon at the time.
She was living with two children in real proverty in a damp basement flat
in Tinakori Road, Wellington. She had no husband to provide for them. She
began her day at 4 am cleaning offices in the Government Buildings, ate her
breakfast and caught the tram to the foot of the zig-zag and struggled up
to save a penny on her tramfare. She arrived full of coughs. Her son
would walk regularly along the railway line to pick up coal."
A time of humiliating dependence
Church and community organisations ran soup kitchens and tried to help the
needy in other ways.
Some people looking back on life in the city remember men in shabby clothes
coming to the door asking their parents if there was any work they could do
to earn some money, some food or a meal.
Wellington
Roydon recalls, "My parents ran a boarding house in the inner city in
Wellington and we took mostly elderly people in four upstairs bedrooms.
"During the depression I remember visits from unemployed men tidily dressed
in shabby suits and ties asking for food. My mother would sit them on the
top step and give them a good feed. They would come again, perhaps in a
month's time."
Christchurch
Pat H lived in the Christchurch suburb of Riccarton. She remembers going
to each house in the neighbourhood and collecting a tin of food under the
Pound Scheme. Each family was expected to contribute a pound of some food
to be distributed to the poor.
Despair leads to violence
Unemployment increased until by the end of 1932 the number of men out of
work has been estimated at 100,000. There were no records kept of
unemployed women because they were not allowed to register for relief.
Many families experienced real hunger which either made them apathetic
through malnutrition or drove them to despair which ultimately expressed
itself in violence. In Christchurch there was a Labour City Council which
developed a policy of assistance to relief workers. This was the only one
of the four main cities where there was no rioting.
Dunedin
Frequent demonstrations, street marches and outdoor meetings and some
violent outbursts in Dunedin led to prominent citizens and grocers
supplying 500 food parcels after one incident and the mayor of Dunedin sent
a telegram to the Prime Minister urging the Government to end the stand
down week without delay.
Auckland
In Auckland in April 1932 there were two nights of rioting when unemployed
men fought police, mounted police, special constables and sailors armed
with batons. Many were injured and over eighty were arrested.
On April 13 there was a daytime march led by Jim Edwards, the Auckland
leader of the Unemployed Workers Movement. Edwards managed to control the
crowd so that a minor clash with the police did not develop into a major
confrontation.
At an evening demonstration on the following day Edwards again tried to
control the crowd, but with less success. Students and professional men
had been enrolled as special constables and were resented by the protestors
as they were reputed to have taunted them. When trouble began Edwards was
clubbed with police batons and injured. After that the crowd went on a
rampage of window breaking and looting. After two months in hiding Edwards
was tried and sentenced to two years in prison for being involved in a
riot.
Wellington
At the beginning of May changes were made to the scheme for relief work -
changes which left the unemployed even worse off. After meetings in
Wellington to discuss the changes to the scheme delegates were sent to meet
the Unemployment Board and ask for a return to the old scheme. This
request was turned down and on May 10 a large meeting called for a strike
of all relief workers. A crowd of some 5000 marched to Parliament and
were kept waiting till after dark for a response from Gordon Coates, the
Minister of Public Works. The response was that he would make an
announcement the next day. That night some of the protestors expressed
their frustration by smashing shop windows, but there was little looting.
When relief workers and their families gathered on May 11 for a report from
their strike delegates the police intervened during the second speech.
Witnesses said that police clubbed people in the crowd and many were
injured. The police were exonerated from blame for this incident although
there were many affidavits from witnesses of their brutality. The strike
lasted until May 21 and achieved nothing. Gordon Coates never gave them
the promised reply to their demands.
Watch for Life Not Easy For Most Families, Even Where The Bread Winner Had
A Job - Part 2 of "Impact and memories of the 1930s Depression in New
Zealand"
