Preserving local memories: The Devonport Gazette and North Shore Gazette

14044 - North Shore Gazette Masthead

The Preserving Local History and Educational Trust (Te Pupuri I Nga Hitori o Te Rohe Trust) is making community newspapers available to a wider audience through its newspaper digitisation programme.

The Devonport Gazette and its successor the North Shore Gazette, a local record of an important period of the history of Auckland’s North Shore, are now available online. Published from November 1921 to May 1948, the Gazette was the major newspaper covering the North Shore generally, and Devonport in particular.

An almost complete run of the newspapers from its first issue of 3 November 1921 to 1 August 1930 exists, but only a few issues after that date have been located. Most physical copies are held by Auckland Council Libraries, recently supplemented by the Devonport Museum’s donation of 19 issues from between August 1934 and March 1947. The National Library of New Zealand holds issues from January 1936 to June 1938.

During the early 1920s most issues were of just four pages, printed on paper that was heavier than that of other newspapers of the time, that may have been chosen to better present promotional photographs for the silent movies being shown at Devonport’s Victoria Theatre in the same building as the Gazette’s printer and publisher. Initially the newspaper was distributed free across the Devonport area – and to non-residents of Devonport who came to the movies – but later it was sold for one penny an issue.

13765 - Devonport Gazette & Greater North Shore Advocate

At first the Gazette only reported meetings of the Devonport Borough Council, alongside some coverage of wider North Shore activities. In the 1922 General Election, it supported the unsuccessful local Liberal Party opponent to the sitting Reform Party MP for Waitemata. Both the printer, James Martin, and the editor, Thomas Walsh, stood, unsuccessfully, for the Devonport Council in 1923, but in the following year they went their separate ways. Martin went bankrupt in 1930, with ownership of his printing and publishing business passing to Frank Stanbury Proctor.

From 13 November 1924, the newspaper widened its focus to include Belmont, Bayswater, Takapuna, Milford, Glenfield, Northcote, Birkenhead, Birkdale and Chelsea, and it began to report meetings of the Takapuna Borough Council. The extended focus was reflected in its renaming as North Shore Gazette and Victoria Theatre Courier, and North Shore Gazette: the official Waitemata paper, among other titles used. Nevertheless, Devonport remained the North Shore’s largest centre until its population was surpassed by Takapuna in the early 1950s.

The digitised pages of the Auckland metropolitan dailies offer limited coverage of North Shore events of the 1920s to the 1940s. Access to more localised coverage of events across the harbour through the digitisation of Devonport’s newspaper, with its reporting of North Shore identities, businesses, social and sporting clubs, and entertainment options, is welcomed by local history researchers.

13777 - Northcote Athenaeum Meteor

The Preserving Local History and Educational Trust has brought all of the known existing holdings together to make the digital version as comprehensive as possible. There is still the possibility that some of the gaps can be filled, and we would welcome hearing about any stray issues - please contact the Trust at preservinglocalhistory@gmail.com  

During digitisation it was noted that the 1916 issue of the North Shore Gazette is misnumbered and appears to be for 1936. This has been noted on Recollect.

David Verran & Dr Ross Harvey