WELLINGTON

WELLINGTON More engagement needed to conserve our historic cemeteries

Historic cemeteries form a significant part of our New Zealand landscape, but many are not receiving the care they need.

WORDS: David Watt IMAGES: Friends of Karori Cemetery

TOP LEFT: PM Jacinda Ardern and Deputy PM Grant Robertson coming away from graves of victims of the 1918 Flu pandemic at Karori Cemetery. TOP RIGHT: School leavers from Karori Normal School on a day trip from the cemetery going up to the historic Crematorium. BELOW: Volunteers undertaking conservation work in an old part of Karori Cemetery.

Cemeteries provide a wealth of knowledge about our history, our early settlers and our ancestors, as well as information about prominent political and community leaders who played important roles in the development of our towns and cities.

For decades, families and friends have been the guardians of these final resting places. As the years have gone on, however, the process of protecting these places of rest has become exceedingly difficult. Barbara Mulligan, Vice Chair of the Friends of the Karori Cemetery, Wellington, has lived alongside the cemetery for many years. As New Zealand's second largest cemetery, after Waikemete in Auckland, covering an area of nearly 40 hectares, it is the final resting place for over 85,000 people including six former New Zealand Prime Ministers, Wellington Mayors, business and community leaders, services personnel, and others. It also includes the burial places for many hundreds of people who perished in several tragic events in our history. It was at the forefront of the movement away from burial to cremation. The crematorium Chapel (Category 1 listed), constructed in 1909 was the first to be built in Aotearoa New Zealand.

The Karori Cemetery reflects the development of Wellington city from 1891 onwards through two world wars, the 1918 Flu pandemic and the economic depression of the 1930s. A total of 9,000 people died throughout New Zealand during the Flu pandemic. In Wellington city, some 700 people died between November and December 1918. In one day alone, 63 funerals were conducted at the Karori Cemetery. Barbara, who has great passion for conservation, was determined to do something to commemorate the centenary of that tragic event in Wellington, leading the charge with fellow volunteers' support to repair and mark the graves of those who lost their lives with white crosses. It was a significant achievement. The Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister visited these graves before Christmas, to see the extent of this tragedy and loss of life. “This conservation work was a huge undertaking using all the resources we had on hand,” said Barbara. “I was pleased Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson, who has worked closely with us on our conservation objectives, wanted to see these graves on a quiet informal Saturday afternoon.” “We are following the guidance of Council and the Conservation Plan that conservation architect, Chris Cochran, prepared for the Karori Cemetery in 2003. I cannot stress enough the importance of following the right advice around helping to restore graves. You cannot cut corners doing repairs, otherwise significant damage will be done to these historic structures.” Chris Cochran is a Board Member for Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga and sits on Heritage New Zealand's Māori Heritage Council. “We have several priorities going forward, especially to clarify current legislation pertaining to cemeteries such as who can repair/restore a grave. This is a significant issue for all authorities and volunteer groups working in our historic cemeteries.” Ian Bowman, another prominent conservation architect, has considerable experience advising on cemeteries conservation. “Ian has seen some horrors in his travels, as I have too, around damage to gravestones by people not following proper procedures. Ian points to the principles of ICOMOS New Zealand, and to other well-established guidance and practice at historic cemeteries overseas.” Barbara wants to see a strengthening of relationships between volunteer groups and trusts working in cemeteries with Councils, with conservation experts, and with various other professional organisations who are linked with cemeteries.

“We need a national conference of minds around the future management and conservation of our cemeteries, to share our thoughts and to establish better working practices between our various bodies. I would also like to see opportunities for volunteers to be trained on how to better maintain and conserve our cemeteries. At the moment, for health and safety reasons, there is a barrier to this being achieved.” “We also need more support from funding institutions to help make our support count,” says Barbara. n

3D rendering brings rocks to life at Thames

A collection of three-dimensional virtual replicas from the world-renowned collection goes online at the Thames School of Mines.

WORDS: John O'Hare IMAGES: Vanessa Cocal-Smith

Auckland University of Technology Master of Science student, Vanessa Cocal-Smith, has been working on a project to digitise 30 rare rock and mineral specimens via photogammatry, making them publicly available on-line and accessible to people around the world.

“The collection at the Thames School of Mines is highly valuable – both scientifically and historically, and the school itself demonstrates the strong connection between geology and society,” says Vanessa. Many of the existing materials were collected and used as educational tools when the School was operational in the 1900s, and some even earlier. “The School presents the progression of educational, technological and scientific advances in the 19th and 20th centuries which is something I hope to continue into the 21st century with this research,” she explains. Photogrammatry involves taking a series of overlapping images which are then ‘stitched’ together using software designed for the task, producing a 3D rendering of the scanned object – complete with colours and textures captured in the images. The 3D images have been uploaded to the open-source website Sketchfab, allowing for a new form of cataloguing and the ability to share the collection virtually. The painstaking process of capturing the images involved setting up a purposedesigned temporary studio within the School. It also involved, surprisingly, a cake turntable. Each item was placed on the turntable and rotated at 10° intervals, then photographed to manually capture the images via Bluetooth connection to Vanessa's phone. “Nothing can replace the real deal, but with many specimens being very fragile – like epsomite which has tiny fibrous crystals formed by the evaporation of mineral water – these images allow the minerals to be ‘handled’ without causing degradation,” she says. “They also allow people to look at the minerals from different angles and to zoom in to identify features that may not be clear when they're on display. In years to come, the images of the specimens could even be linked to 3D mine crosssections and maps.” As well as close details, the collection also tells a big-picture story. “It's a beautiful story,” Vanessa says, explaining how the rocks inform us of the knowledge of the first iwi and their relationship to the whenua; as well as the Pākehā settlers who came from a global goldrush to settle in the Coromandel and make Thames, briefly, bigger than Auckland. “It also tells the story of how mining helped New Zealand gain its wealth for nation building – as well as the stories of women and men who made the mines and settlements possible. In more recent times it's also about how the School educated miners and the wider community, and how today it is the guardian and custodian of these natural treasures,” she explains. The specimens are part of the rich geoheritage of the area, linked to its over 50 epithermal gold deposits as part of the Coromandel Volcanic Zone.

Going forward, the Thames School of Mines will continue to feature in Vanessa's Masters project, incorporating both geological science and social history. “My research aims to establish links between local geology and mineral samples to specific mines and the stories that emanate from them, looking further into the connections with Tangata Whenua and women – two historically under-represented groups,” she says. Her research will also look at developing strategies for public outreach to create an accessible museum experience while also disseminating and integrating the photogrammetric models in ways that can enable them to be used as an educational tool.

Vanessa is particularly keen to look at links between rock specimens and the mine locations they came from – and from there, the families who supported the miners, the relationship between iwi and Pākehā settlers, the wealth mining generated – and how it shaped modern New Zealand. n

TOP: Augmented reality of Barite levitating over hand. ABOVE: An image detailing the photographic sequencing of individual images that are then ‘stitched’ together to form a 3D scan. LEFT: Vanessa Cocal-Smith.

To view the collection, visit: sketchfab.com/wzs1518/collections/ thames-school-of-mines