Te Manawa Museum Society extends and supports the history, heritage and mātauranga Māori strands of Te Manawa Museum – Palmerston North’s regional museum, art gallery and science centre – through its voluntary contributions to advocacy, events and research.

It continues the foundational work of the Manawatu Museum Society (established in 1967) for the benefit of present and future generations by exploring the region’s history in and through objects.

Enhancing collection knowledge

Te Manawa has more than 55,000 historical objects. Research is a necessary underpinning to excellent exhibitions and programmes. Collection managers and curators need research assistance due to the scale of the collection. To explore Te Manawa’s collection please visit:

https://collection.temanawa.co.nz/explore

Support from museum staff

Members of Te Manawa Museum Society are supported in carrying out voluntary research tasks to enhance understanding of the collection and improve public access to historical knowledge.

Print and digital publications

We produce print and digital publications. Te Hao Nui – The Great Catch: Object Stories from Te Manawa was published by Godwit in 2011 and remains a valuable resource.

Object photography

We raise funding to commission publication-quality photographs of selected objects in Te Manawa’s collection.

Members work with expert object photographers from the Lower North Island. Their work is made available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 licence.

Writing for this blog

Blog posts are primarily focused on objects related to histories of children and childhood. They may also address other local history themes.

We welcome new writers.

For further information please email: temanawamuseumsociety@gmail.com