Papers Past

Papers Past is an online, searchable database with thousands of stories from historic newspapers across New Zealand.

The earliest paper dates around 1840, and the last 1945, with around 90 titles from across the country.

It includes the Poverty Bay Herald (the forerunner to today’s Gisborne Herald) from 1879-1920.

Although over the years the Pākēhā press has been very consistent in the way it portrays Māori, there are many valuable stories in here for whānau searching their own history and whakapapa.

For example if you search "Tokomaru Bay", you will get over 70,000 hits! And of course you can refine your search…

So you can either go straight to Papers Past or check out their helpful guide.