Frankie

Frankie Kinzett

 “We were living in the (sic) tents, …I went out in the morning and looked up the road, and I could see wisps of smoke, and no house! God!  So, I dived back and told them all, the house is gone!”[1]  At 92 Frankie’s mind is sharp, and her memory is clear, she says: “I remember everything, where we lived, what we did.”[2]

Figure 1. Frankie, far left and siblings swim in the Mangaotaki River, circa 1930. In author's possession.

Born in October 1918[3] at the close of WWI,[4] Frankie was the fourth child in the large family of Harry and Olive Kinzett.   Her father was a labourer, and the family lived an itinerant life[5] born of the need to find work through the difficult post war years of the 1920’s,[6]  and the Great Depression of the 1930’s.[7] Frankie says: “We were always moving on, one or two years was the most we ever stayed in one place”.[8] Frankie traces her childhood and her family’s journey through the middle part of New Zealand’s North Island by the names of the places she lived.  Names like Ngatamahine, Piopio and Mangaotaki, all in the rolling hills south east of Kawhia,[9] once important locations in the history of the pre-European Maori[10] of this area, are now little more than crossroads on a journey to somewhere else. 

The middle years of the 1920s were spent south of the township of Taihape on the Central Volcanic Plateau, in a place Frankie refers to as “Out in the bush”,[11] she recalls mornings of bitter cold walking to school through snow, and her father felling trees to clear farm land: “…there were no roads or anything just the railway, and they bought the logs down on the railway line to the mill  …Mum worked in the Cook House, and we had a big dining room and the men from the mill used to come and get their meals there”.[12]  

While her immediate family were central to her life, the ‘always moving on’ had a disruptive effect on her relationships with others, such that she did not maintain long term friendships with her peers and she had little or no contact with her extended family. She struggles to recall the names of her Father’s siblings, though she remembers meeting her Grandfather: “He came to visit Mum when we were living out of Taihape at that mill house…only time I ever saw him”.[13]

By 1929 the family were living in the district of Waitomo, now famous for its limestone cave systems.[14]  Here schooling was limited. Frankie says: “One place we were at, Mangaotaki, we went to school Thursday Friday and Saturday, just three days a week and the other school a few miles away they went the other three days, just shared the one teacher”.[15]  Because she went to six different primary schools she claims to have “certainly never learned very much”[16] though her neat handwriting and ability to write about her own life tell a very different story.[17]  She dismisses compliments and compares herself poorly alongside the writing abilities of a 90-year-old ex-school teacher she knows.

Frankie completed school at 14 in the village of Aria.[18] “There was no high school out there and no way of getting to one so when you finished primary school…. in those days girls didn’t get jobs so we just stayed at home”.[19] Though staying at home for Frankie and her sisters invariably meant working on farms or in the boarding houses run by her parents, and she has many tales of waiting tables, washing dishes, and preparing cut lunches for boarders.

The moves continued right up until she married in 1938 when family had left a Public Works ‘Relief Camp’ at Ngatamahine, and her parents took over the running of ‘The Delux Hotel’, a large boarding house in Te Kuiti.[20]

 

Living their lives in small country villages and on remote farms meant she and her siblings were rarely exposed to the events and unrest of the outside world.  Although she wore a black ribbon pinned to her blouse commemorating the death of King George V in 1936,[21] Frankie doesn’t recall being overly affected by the ‘Unemployment Riots’ of the Great Depression which occurred in the major New Zealand cities in 1932,[22] and the South African Rugby Tour of New Zealand in 1937 [23] is not even a dot on the horizon of her memory, but she recalls vividly climbing trees to escape having to do jobs, living in tents, and walking to school down country roads, and she also remembers that house that burned down.  

While attending a school reunion with her siblings in 1983, talk turned to the morning she looked up the road and saw wisps of smoke rising from the burned remnants of a house, she says with a chuckle that her older brother “spilled the beans”[24] on a 50-year-old secret about how he and their father had settled a score by going for a walk late one night and setting fire to a house.

Figure 2.  Frankie and Harry Kinzett, circa 1935, Waitomo District.  In author's possession

Figure 3.  Kinzett Family movements 1916-1938, Map of Central North Island, New Zealand.

Bibliography

Buick, T. Lindsay, ‘An Old New Zealander or, Te Rauparaha, The Napoleon of the South’ Whitcombe & Tombs, Ltd, 1911, p.23.

Ministry for Culture and Heritage, ‘Unemployed riot rocks Queen St', https://nzhistory.govt.nz/queen-st-riot-auckland, updated 9-Dec-2016, Accessed 3 December 2017.

Ministry for Culture and Heritage, 'Armistice Day', URL: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/war/armistice-day, updated 11-Nov-2014, Accessed 5 November 2017.

Morby, Caitlin, Stuff, ‘Waitomo Glow Worm Caves and Department of Conservation form partnership’, http://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/93177796/waitomo-glowworm-caves-and-department-of-conservation-form-partnership, Accessed 9 December 2017.

New Zealand Electoral Rolls 1853-1981, Aria, Waitomo, New Zealand, 1935, Ancestry, Accessed 5 December 2017.

New Zealand Electoral Rolls 1853-1981, Paparata Valley, Franklin, Auckland, New Zealand, 1919, Ancestry, Accessed 5 December 2017.

New Zealand Electoral Rolls 1853-1981, Piopio, Waitomo, New Zealand, 1928, Ancestry, Accessed 5 December 2017.

New Zealand National Film Unit, ‘The Years Back – 2, The Twenties’ (Episode Two) 1973, https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the-years-back-the-twentieth-century-1973, Accessed 5 November 2017.

New Zealand National Film Unit, ‘The Years Back – 3, The Thirties’ (Episode Three) 1971, https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the-years-back-the-thirties-1971, Accessed 5 November 2017.

O’Connor, Frankie ‘Just a few Memories’ 2009, original held in authors possession.

O’Connor, Frankie Interview by Author, digital recording, Hillsborough Heights Village, Mt Roskill Auckland, New Zealand, 18 July 2010.

Pollock, Kerryn, 'King Country region - Māori settlement and occupation', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/king-country-region/page-4 Accessed 3 December 2017.

Registrar of Births Deaths and Marriages, New Zealand.

Richards, Trevor Lawson, 'Dancing on our Bones, New Zealand, South Africa, Rugby and Racism' Bridget Williams Books, 1999, p.13.

Royal, Te Ahukaramū Charles, 'Waikato tribes', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/waikato-tribes, accessed 6 December 2017.

Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand ‘The First World War and the 1920s', from An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock, originally published in 1966, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/1966/history-economic/page-6 Accessed 03 Dec 2017.

Tout-Smith, D (2003) ‘HRH King George V (1865-1936)’ in Museums Victoria Collections, https://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/articles/2054, Accessed 03 December 2017.

Waitomo District Council, History, http://www.waitomo.govt.nz/council/our-place/history/, Accessed 9 December 2017.

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[1] Frankie O’Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, Hillsborough Heights Village, Mt Roskill Auckland, New Zealand, 18 July 2010.

[2] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[3] Birth Certificate of Frances Daphney Kinzett, born 25 October 1918, Paparata Valley, Registrar of Births Deaths and Marriages, New Zealand, Certificate Number 146717.

[4] Ministry for Culture and Heritage, 'Armistice Day', URL: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/war/armistice-day, updated 11-Nov-2014, Accessed 5 November 2017.

[5] See attached map, Figure 3; Ancestry, Electoral Roll Record for Harry Ernest Kinzett, Piopio, Waitomo, New Zealand, 1928, New Zealand, Electoral Rolls, 1853-1981, Accessed 5 Dec 2017; Ancestry, Electoral Roll Record for Harry Ernest Kinzett, Paparata Valley, Franklin, Auckland, New Zealand, 1919, New Zealand, Electoral Rolls, 1853-1981, Accessed 5 Dec 2017; Ancestry, Electoral Roll Record for Harry Ernest Kinzett, Aria, Waitomo, New Zealand, 1935, New Zealand, Electoral Rolls, 1853-1981, Accessed 5 Dec 2017.

[6] Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand ‘The First World War and the 1920s', from An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock, originally published in 1966, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/1966/history-economic/page-6 Accessed 03 Dec 2017; New Zealand National Film Unit, ‘The Years Back – 2, The Twenties’ (Episode Two) 1973, https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the-years-back-the-twentieth-century-1973, Accessed 5 November 2017.

[7] New Zealand National Film Unit, ‘The Years Back – 3, The Thirties’ (Episode Three) 1971, https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the-years-back-the-thirties-1971, Accessed 5 November 2017.

[8] See attached map, Figure 3; Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[9] See attached map, Figure 3; Te Ahukaramū Charles Royal, 'Waikato tribes', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/waikato-tribes, accessed 6 December 2017.

[10] Kerryn Pollock, 'King Country region - Māori settlement and occupation', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/king-country-region/page-4 (accessed 3 December 2017); T. Lindsay Buick, ‘An Old New Zealander or, Te Rauparaha, The Napoleon of the South’ Whitcombe & Tombs, Ltd, 1911, p.23; Te Ahukaramū Charles Royal, 'Waikato tribes'.

[11] See attached map, Figure 3; Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[12] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[13] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[14] See attached map, Figure 3; Waitomo District Council, History, http://www.waitomo.govt.nz/council/our-place/history/, Accessed 9 December 2017; Caitlin Morby, Stuff, ‘Waitomo Glow Worm Caves and Department of Conservation form partnership’, http://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/93177796/waitomo-glowworm-caves-and-department-of-conservation-form-partnership, Accessed 9 December 2017.

[15] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010;

[16] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[17] Frankie O’Connor ‘Just a few Memories’ 2009, original held in authors possession.

[18] See attached map, Figure 3.

[19] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.

[20] See attached map, Figure 3.

[21] D. Tout-Smith, (2003) ‘HRH King George V (1865-1936)’ in Museums Victoria Collections, https://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/articles/2054, Accessed 03 December 2017.

[22] Ministry for Culture and Heritage, ‘Unemployed riot rocks Queen St', https://nzhistory.govt.nz/queen-st-riot-auckland, updated 9-Dec-2016, Accessed 3 December 2017.

[23] Trevor Lawson Richards, 'Dancing on our Bones, New Zealand, South Africa, Rugby and Racism' Bridget Williams Books, 1999, p.13.

[24] Frankie O'Connor, Interview by Author, digital recording, 2010.