- This event has passed.
AGM 2025
You are invited to the annual general meeting of the Friends of the Turnbull Library, Wednesday 23 July 2025.
After the meeting, Helen McCracken will discuss how heritage organisations safeguarded their national collections by evacuating cultural treasures during the Second World War.
Safeguarding national collections during WWII
Following the meeting, we heard from heritage advisor and researcher, Helen McCracken.
Aotearoa/New Zealand has been subject to earthquakes, cyclones and, most recently, devastating floods. Helen McCracken’s research into how the nation responded to the threats to national treasure in the Second World War, reminds us that preparedness is key.
“For much in the library, as for other records, to be too late once would be too late for ever.”
— Memorandum from Clyde Romer Hughes Taylor, Chief Librarian of the Alexander Turnbull Library to Joseph Heenan the Undersecretary of Internal Affairs from Librarian, 23 October 1940.
I.A.93/601 Alexander Turnbull Library, Emergency Safeguards, R19168105, Archives New Zealand.
Disaster and Conflict Resilient Heritage was the theme of this year’s International Day of Monuments and Sites on 18 April, led by the International Council on Monuments and Sites.
About the speaker
Helen McCracken has worked in cultural heritage in New Zealand for over 30 years. Since 2010 she has worked at Manatū Taonga Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Helen is also a PhD candidate at the Joint Centre for Disaster Research, Massey University, looking at the existing planning for cultural heritage in relation to emergencies in Aotearoa New Zealand.