Our Old Ivied Home

Our old ivied home, South Canterbury, about 1910.

This charming scene is most likely somewhere in the Ashburton area. It’s a nicely set-up quarter plate shot, showing a well established homestead (from around 1870?) and its horse and trap, water tank and dog kennels (with drying skins spread over them). Perhaps that’s the photographer’s sister and niece to the fore – they are only hatless because they’re not in public. An older man in the background watches proceedings, so maybe  it’s a day of rest.

Although this photo is undocumented, circumstantial evidence suggests it is by Harold S. Silcock (1883-1951), who grew up in the Ashburton district and taught at Native schools in the Chathams and at Little River (Canterbury), before relocating to the Nelson region. The image is from a glass plate in my own collection; it appears full-page in my Vintage New Zealand 2019 calendar, soon to be announced.