The Eastern Shore

I enjoyed writing the history of Glenorchy, because the history of a place covers everything: houses, churches, schools, hospitals, sport, recreation, administration, industries, agriculture, big events, anything I could think of. So I was pleased to be asked to write the history of Clarence. It had so many different aspects: city and country, agriculture and industry, wonderful early history, all sorts of modern activity … I enjoyed working with the Clarence City Council and, again, interviewed fabulous people.  The various historical societies were a great help, and I enjoyed working with them and meeting the enthusiastic people who ran them.

As tends to happen when I write histories of areas, I only realised at the last minute that somewhere was part of the place. In this book was it was Otago Bay.  I had to do some quick research right at the end, to make sure it was included.