Joanna Orwin - Kauri. Witness to a Nation's History, Tauranga in Tauranga, Bay of Plenty for sale
This recent history of NZ's magnificent Kauri tree and its contribution to early settlement covers the botany of the species and its importance to the industrial and economic foundations of the nation. Apart from whales and seals, the Kauri tree was to provide the first major export commodity for the colony. This stemmed from the discovery of the value of its timber for spars, shipbuilding and eventually buildings throughout NZ, as well as a masssive lumber export trade. This is a history with a difference, covering botanical aspects, the first uses of its timber, its importance to pioneers and its traditional uses and mylogical recognition by the Maori people. Also, how this once vast resource throughout the area to the north of Auckland was reduced to the tree surviving mainly in a few reserves preserving some of the largest of these giant and iconic trees. Joanna Orwin's book can be regarded as a study in social history too, ecompassing its uses as a timber, then the exploitation of its by-product Kauri gum, which employed many diggers, both Maori and European and particularly the people from Dalmatia who remain prominant in the Northland community. By the 1940s the forests of the North reached a point of near extinction and the gum fields were largely replaced by farmlands. A campaign to save the last remnants of the Kauri forest was successful, but only a tiny remnant remained.The author has presented the story of the Kauri, its boom and bust days, its economic contribution to the new nation, is influences on people, places and poulations, in a readable and informative way. In some aspects the Kauri story parallels the gold-rush days of Otago and has the same threads of exitement, endeavour, hardship and pioneering. First edition of 2004 from New Holland, 208 pages including references and index, two colour illustrations sections with 30 images -- photos and art, b/w photos, art, maps diagrams, document reproductions throughout. Colour pictorial/art card covers are NF with French flaps, text block also NF, no inscriptions.
Author
Joanna Orwin
Title
Kauri. Witness to a Nation's History
Publisher name
New Holland, Auckland
Shipping cost
First book $1.81, each extra book $0.91
Shipping time
2 - 4 days
Publication year
2004
Edition
First edition
Binding type
Hard cover
Vendor name
BOPBooks
Vendor rating
Key words
New Zealand, Botanical, History, Industry, Economics, Trade
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