Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New Zealand/West Coast task force/History

William Shaw

I was working my way through the 1866 election results for Canterbury constituencies when I came across William Shaw (Q104415950), who lost Westland against William Sefton Moorhouse. A year later, Shaw was mayor of Hokitika. He was a newspaper proprietor who seems to have got around quite a bit. While in Hokitika, he set up the West Coast Times. Was it him who had previously worked at the Melbourne Age? It seems his tour through the country took him from Invercargill (where he was part proprietor of the Southland News) to Hokitika, Picton and then Thames. He then tried his luck in Philadelphia, where he died in 1878. None of the usual biographical dictionaries have him, and unfortunately, The Cyclopedia of New Zealand (Nelson, Marlborough & Westland Provincial Districts' edition) lists Evan Prosser as the second mayor of Hokitika, when in fact he was the third. Now I'm curious!

Mike, could you dig through your library at some point and see whether there's anything useful about Shaw? No urgency. Schwede66 18:45, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

I'll see what I can find; I can also ask the Hokitika Museum people for help. —Giantflightlessbirds (talk) 03:49, 23 December 2020 (UTC)