In these two episodes of the 1950s radio series "Looking Backwards" Dame Elizabeth Gilmer [daughter of Premier Richard Seddon] gives an account of her childhood days and youth in Kumara and Wellington.
She was brought up in Kumara at the height of mining there. She recalls school picnics and lolly scrambles organised by her father. She remembers visiting opera companies such as Pollard's and learning Gilbert and Sullivan operas. There were trips to Christchurch by coach, which took two days with an overnight stop in the Bealey Hotel. they used to have their feet packed into sacks full of straw to keep warm.
She remembers her making first telephone call to her mother from Christchurch. She expresses her homesickness for the West Coast and the smell of the bush.
She remembers the political atmosphere at home, especially at election times. They would catch a horse-drawn tram to Greymouth to go to Wellington by boat. They moved when her father became the Premier. Her mother had to pack up 8 children and move to the residence in Molesworth Street.
Some of the children went to the Terrace School and others to Thorndon School. Visitors from the West Coast and overseas were always coming to stay, and many West Coasters were found work by her father.
She remembers the Missions to Seamen and fund-raising sea shanty concerts on the lawn for them. She recalls various theatres and concerts by visiting artists, including Hugh Ward who fund-raised for the Wellington Children's Hospital. During school holidays the family would tour New Zealand by boat with her father. Another time they toured the 'South Sea islands' and Tonga.
She remembers as a child when women got the vote and looking forward to being 21 so she could vote herself. The first chamois in New Zealand were sent to her father by the Emperor of Austria, and moose which were sent to him from Canada. They looked after them at home in Molesworth Street until they could be liberated at Mount Cook.
In 1897 her parents and older sisters went to England for Queen Victoria's Jubilee and her parents brought her home a bicycle which she used to tour all over Wellington.
In part two she continues by talking about a trip to the 'South Sea islands' including Tonga, with her father. They went to the Cook Islands and while they were their they heard the news that the siege of Mafeking had ended [in the South African War] and there were great celebrations. The Duke and Duchess of York visited New Zealand in 1901 and she remembers the great Maori welcome they were given in Rotorua, and she travelled with them in the Royal Train. She recalls Sir John MacKenzie coming to meet them and being knighted by the Duke in the Royal carriage.
She talks about the Boer [sic. South African] War. She says her father was a great imperialist and helped supply men and horses for the war effort. They were visiting Australia when they heard Queen Victoria had died and they then left with the 9th Contingent for South Africa and England for the Coronation of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra.
She says she and her sister felt their parents were the most handsome couple in Westminster Abbey at the Coronation. Her father went back to visit St Helen's, Lancashire and she was suprised to hear him speaking in the local dialect. She recalls P.M. Seddon's commitment to the Age Old Pension Act", which he deemed his greatest achievement. She recalls the opening of St Helen's [Maternity] Hospitals by her father and the state paying for young women to be trained as nurses.
She says deep sea fishing on Wellington Harbour or in the Sounds was her father's favourite pass-time, along with horse-rising and singing around the piano. She talks about the family's many Māori friends who visited their home. She ends by talking about Justices of the Peace and an anecdote about her father staying at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York.