Norman Blackie's Tauranga in 16mm

In 1983 my family bought a large VCR player. It was a gift from the future, as far as this 13-year-old was concerned. Painfully shy, I relished the thought of watching a movie that didn't require my going out in public. All I needed to do was wait a year and then bring it home to watch on the family 20-inch TV. 

The same year I recall my geography class laughing at the teacher as he struggled with a large reel film projector. On that sunny afternoon, watching an underpowered projector struggle to cast its dreary educational film onto a dirty white sheet stapled to the classroom wall, we pimply few exchanged knowing smiles behind his back. 

"Reel films are a joke", said those smiles.

The future was VHS. 

This learned judgement was despite the jammed tapes, rogue marmite sandwiches, impossible operating instructions and unimpressive picture resolution that accompanied VHS.  Sure, reels only had mono sound, were large and unwieldy and couldn't be paused, but they had primarily lost the format wars based on convenience more than anything. VHS tapes were just smaller and easily mass-produced.

The market had spoken. 

1983 was also the year the light of Tauranga resident, Norman Wakefield Blackie, flickered and failed after 84 years. Norman had been an avid videographer, capturing much of the public life of Tauranga from the 1940s to the late 1970s. 18 of his films had been gifted to Tauranga City Libraries and by 1985, the then archivist Jinty Rorke was making enquires about local "Reel to VHS" services. The reels were to be deposited with the National Film Archive, the predecessor to Ngā Taonga, Sound and Vision, where they sit today. 

Odine and Norman Blackie (via a grand-daughter on Facebook)

Fast forward and these 16 mm reels have had a new lease on life. Tauranga City Libraries recently requested Ngā Taonga undertake to restore and digitise all 18 of Blackie's reels in their care, and the results are incredible.  The digital files they created are truly beautiful. They're sharp, correctly coloured and free from all the limitations of underpowered bulbs, dirty lenses, and those old sheets from the spare bedroom.  What immediately grabbed my eye was the size of the crowds in the background. They line the streets and fill the squares, despite a population just 10% of our current. Yet Norman doesn’t often focus on these crowds, their size is nothing unusual for him. For Norman it is the spectacle itself; the floats, the costumes, the games, the beauty queens and marching girls. It seems when something is happening, half of Tauranga comes out to cheer on the other half participating.

The footage is wonderfully showcased in a beautifully nostalgic and optimistic two-minute tribute by Ngā Taonga here, and below.

Today, you can see the entire footage on Pae Koroki here, and on Ngā Taonga here. 

Sources: 

• Records relating to the history of the New Zealand Room, Tauranga Library; General and research correspondence, 1985 (Ams 289/4/2)
• Norman Blackie Collection, Pae Korokī
• The Past and the Curious, Tauranga in 16 mm, a short introduction
• Ngā Taonga blog: The Blackie Collection: a window into mid-century Tauranga (January 24, 2023)
• Norman Blackie (1899-1983), a biography by Debbie McCauley
• Tauranga Heritage Collection, Item 0007/19 (Norman's camera)
  
  

This archival collection has been digitised and is available to view on Pae Korokī. For more information about this and other items in our collection, visit Pae Korokī or email the Heritage & Research Team: Research@tauranga.govt.nz