War, slump & reform
Gallipoli and Passchendaele cost a small country proportionally enormous losses, influenza kills about half as many in two months as four years of war did, and the Depression breaks the old order. Out of it comes the first Labour government and a welfare state.
13 events under way between 1912 and 1938
The Liberals take power
The world’s first organised political party to hold national office began two decades of reform that made New Zealand a byword for social experiment.
The Waihi strike
Six months of confrontation at the goldmine ended when police and strikebreakers stormed the miners’ hall and Frederick Evans was fatally injured.
WaihiThe Great Strike
Watersiders and miners struck nationwide; the government swore in mounted special constables — farmers on horseback — who cleared the wharves by force.
Wellington waterfrontNew Zealand enters the First World War
About 100,000 served overseas from a population of just over a million. Around 18,000 died and 41,000 were wounded — proportionally among the heaviest losses of any country.
The Gallipoli landing
New Zealand troops landed on the Gallipoli peninsula on 25 April. Of about 14,000 who served there, 2,779 died. The date became the country’s day of remembrance.
The raid on Maungapōhatu
Seventy armed police marched into the Tūhoe prophet Rua Kēnana’s community in the Urewera. Two men were shot dead, including Rua’s son.
MaungapōhatuPasschendaele — the worst day
An attack on Bellevue Spur in Flanders mud, against uncut wire and without effective artillery support, killed around 845 New Zealanders in a few hours.
The influenza pandemic
About 9,000 people died in two months — roughly half as many as died in four years of war. Māori died at more than seven times the Pākehā rate.
The Rātana movement rises
Te Hāhi Rātana
Tahupōtiki Wiremu Rātana built a faith and then a political machine around one demand: ratify the Treaty of Waitangi.
Rātana PāThe Hawke’s Bay earthquake
A magnitude 7.8 quake levelled Napier and Hastings and killed 256 people — still New Zealand’s deadliest natural disaster.
NapierDepression riots
Relief workers and the unemployed smashed shopfronts down Queen Street. Similar riots hit Dunedin and Wellington within days.
Queen Street, AucklandThe first Labour government
Michael Joseph Savage led Labour to a landslide and built the welfare state: state houses, guaranteed prices, free health care and a 40-hour week.
WellingtonSocial Security Act
Free hospital care, subsidised doctors’ visits and universal benefits from cradle to grave — among the most comprehensive welfare systems in the world at the time.