Newsletter 4: Sunday 26 January 2025

Anthroposophy in Hawkes Bay          

Calendar of Coming Events-- Diary Dates

In the Rudolf Steiner Centre, 401 Whitehead Road, Hastings
unless stated otherwise.

  • Thursday 30 January 5:30pm.  HBB Committee Meeting.
  • Friday 31 January 7pm.  Reading: Second Study (continued). Hindrances and Helps to the Michael Forces in the Dawn of the Age of the Spiritual Soul. (p118) + Leading Thoughts 131 to 133
  • Saturday 1 February 9:30 to 12 noon. School of Spiritual Science.  Recapitulation lesson 3
  • Sunday 30 March 2025. 100th anniversary of Rudolf Steiner's death.
  • Kolisko Conference "Great Expectations" in Taikura School 11-14 April 2025. 
    Taikura was founded as a Rudolf Steiner School 75 years ago in 1950.

    The Committee ask that visitors to events in the Centre pay a contribution into the Koha box in the Foyer, as we we have regular bills for electric power, city rates, insurance, and maintenance for an aging building.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  

ANNIVERSARY YEAR

This year is Taikura Rudolf Steiner School’ 75th birthday (being founded in 1950 through the purchase of Queenswood) and the 100th anniversary of Rudolf Steiner’s death on 30 March 1925.

The Branch Committee meets this week.  We would love to know what members and readers would like to happen to honour these anniversaries.  Who can help or make suggestions or lead or support activities and events?  Please let us know.  Write/email to info@anthrohb.nz
or phone
Robyn Hewetson  021 2178688
Robin Bacchus  022 3982805
John Jackson  022 1228002
Angela Hair  027 4436737
Michael Caris  021 1538720

********

Over the next weeks I will share some notes about the early years of Anthroposophy in New Zealand.  Over the years several histories have been written.

 In 2013 Garth John Turbott presented his thesis "Anthroposophy in the Antipodes - A Lived Spirituality in New Zealand 1902-1960s" to Massey University for his MA.   [Massey Research Online: www.mro.massey.ac.nz/handle/10179/296 ]
Many Massey theses are now available online.   The following notes are derived from Garth Turbott’s thesis.

...............

“Anthroposophy first came to New Zealand in the early twentieth century, within a few years of Steiner starting his lecture cycles. Initially it was studied and discussed in small groups in Christchurch, Wellington and Havelock North. A national organization, the Anthroposophical Society in New Zealand, incorporating the various existing groups around the country and officially sanctioned by Dornach, was established in Havelock North in 1933. It has grown since to its present size of around 550 active members with branches and groups throughout New Zealand.” P2

“The first appearance of Anthroposophy in New Zealand is … through the lives and work of two early pioneer women, Ada Wells (1863-1933) and Emma Richmond (1845-1921).”  P7

“… the initial leadership in New Zealand Anthroposophy as it emerged in the early twentieth century came from women, both Emma Richmond and Ada Wells demonstrated social activism and leadership well before becoming Anthroposophists.” P8.  Ada was a suffragette with Kate Sheppard in Christchurch.

“Certainly, the Hawke’s Bay area around Havelock North was home to a succession of vigorous spiritual movements in the early twentieth century, around the time that Emma Richmond arrived there with the anthroposophical impulse in 1912.  ...  The growth of Anthroposophy in Havelock North was centred about Emma Richmond, her daughter Rachel Crompton Smith (1876-1967), son-in-law Bernard Crompton-Smith (1874-1958), and two redoubtable women who were to provide leadership for the Anthroposophical Society in New Zealand for over 40 years, Ruth Nelson (1894-1977) and Edwina (Edna) Burbury (1890-1978).  The work of these Anthroposophists contributed to the formal establishment of the Anthroposophical Society in New Zealand in 1933, and to the emergence of Steiner Education in New Zealand at Queenswood School in Hastings in 1950.  While early Anthroposophy was centred on Havelock North, … vigorous development in Wellington, where a group at York Bay led by Hal Atkinson (1895-1975) was closely involved with a variety of artistic and creative activities.”  p8-9.

“,,, the contribution of two German scholars and Anthroposophists.  Alfred Meebold (1863-1952) was a botanist and a wandering seeker after spiritual truth who visited New Zealand several times in the 1920s and 30s.  He then settled in Havelock North after World War II, making a major impact on the intellectual content and philosophical underpinnings of New Zealand Anthroposophy.
 Ernst Reizenstein (1902-1970), a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, came to Auckland in 1939. He contributed not only to the development of Anthroposophy there, but also to the artistic and cultural life of the city, and to its eating habits as the founder, with his wife Elisabeth, of New Zealand’s first commercial whole grain bakery.” 
P9.  This led to the modern Vogels bread.

It seems that Ada Wells had contact with a Theosophical group in Christchurch before travelling. 
“Ada Wells’ two older daughters were both gifted musicians.  Ada was determined that they should have the best education and opportunity to develop their talents, and took the oldest daughter Chris to Germany in 1902, to enroll in violin studies at the Leipzig School of Music. It was on this trip that she attended lectures by Rudolf Steiner, who had recently been appointed the General Secretary of the German section of the Theosophical Society.” P21
Rudolf Steiner lectured in nearby Berlin (a couple hours by train).  On her return to Merivale, Christchurch, she formed an Anthroposophical study group.

More next week.  RB

Posted: Sun 26 Jan 2025

Back