How The Treasury Is Safeguarding Our Past
Summer is a great time for a clean-up of the family home or the holiday home. If you’re looking for somewhere to safely store photos and documents of local or family interest, The Treasury, in Thames, a charitable trust run by The Coromandel Heritage Trust (2004), is the only purpose built, temperature and humidity regulated, regionwide facility that houses and makes accessible paper-based historical documents of the Hauraki/Coromandel area.
The Treasury is housed within two buildings side by side at 705 Queen Street, Thames, each imposing in their own way and completely juxtaposed architecturally. The Thames Carnegie Library, built in 1905, was refurbished by the council in 2007 and reopened as The Treasury in 2009. Alongside it, the Archive is a bespoke designed, award-winning state of the art facility, stark in its architecture, which respectfully and artistically interprets aspects of the Carnegie Library design.
Founder, and patron, Geraldine Dunwoodie says, ‘It has been a team effort from day one, and we’re very lucky to have some of the original volunteers who started this journey still working with us today. Their cumulative knowledge of the contents of The Treasury is amazing, and different for each of us depending on our local interests, and the research we have each contributed to The Treasury.
I value their input hugely and without them, we wouldn’t still be here doing this 20 years later. There is a huge amount of information about The Treasury, and our collections, on the website, but the best way to find out what we have here is to come in and see for yourself. With a bit of time and effort, everyone who visits finds a person or a place they have a connection to in the pages here. The Treasury is our history, and our people.’
The collections consist of maps, family documents, business records, photos and published books, and acknowledgement is made of the presence of Māori on the land in the centuries before the arrival of Europeans. Our collection of interesting data about the pre-European days is growing. From the 1800s onwards, we have records of the gold miners, kauri millers and gum diggers, fishermen, farmers, industrialists, entrepreneurs and townspeople who inhabited all the settlements around the Coromandel/Hauraki.
And while it’s difficult to decipher the difference sometimes, our publications ‘True Tales’ of the Coromandel/Hauraki area are true ‘according to the author’.
The Coromandel Heritage Trust (TCHT) states it accepts ‘the material supplied by our contributors in good faith. The details are valid as the writers recall them’.
The ‘True Tales’ books are a truly collaborative and community effort. From the foreword of the ‘True Tales of Thames’ (2016), as written by one of the founders, the late Morrie Dunwoodie, then chair of the TCHT, “… A lot of work goes into preparing a book like this and finding the funds to print it. The format of this book follows the parameters set out by The Coromandel Town History Research Group who first thought of the idea of ‘True Tales’. They printed the first three very successful True Tales books, about Northern Coromandel. Their wish was to see ‘True Tales’ spread around New Zealand … These books tell stories which don’t get into the history books or newspapers and would otherwise be lost to future generations.”
To sum up, a few of the great reasons why you should visit The Treasury, in Thames:
· If you have an interest in finding out more about local family or local history, The Treasury Reading Room is open from 11-3pm Wednesday to Saturday. Our Reading Room Team can help set you up in the right direction to find out more information on your chosen subject and … who knows what you might find?
· If you have precious family or local history records and photos you would like to have stored in the best possible conditions, please email to book an appointment to visit us at kiaora@thetreasury.org.nz and we will show you through.
If you have artifacts you want safely stored – we’re not the place for that but we can advise you of your local museum who can attend to this area of heritage activities.
· If you can support us, either as a volunteer, a member or with a financial donation, please contact us – it all helps!
Access Anna Dunwoodie’s website and Harps Aotearoa Foundation.
Words by Anna Dunwoodie
