Newspapers
Rotorua papers are kept indefinitely.
The NZ Herald and Dominion Post are kept for 12 months.
New Zealand newspapers from other places are kept for 2-3 weeks. You can view these on the ground floor of the library. Click here to see a list of those titles.
Rotorua newspapers available on the second floor - Hot Lakes Chronicle 15 Feb 1895 – 20 Feb 1897, 4-5 Nov 1905
- Rotorua Chronicle 10 Aug 1931
- Rotorua Morning Post 24 Aug 1931 – May 1948
- Rotorua Post May 1948 – Dec 1960
- Daily Post Jan 1961 –
- Rotorua Review Oct 1984 –
- The Weekender
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The Hot Lakes Chronicle February 29th 1895 |
The sad story of the missing newspapers
Most of the Rotorua newspapers before 24 August 1931 no longer exist. This date coincides with a change of ownership of the newspaper and a possible explanation is that the new owner stored the old papers in a building that later burned down. Don Stafford read through the Bay of Plenty Times for the missing period and included Rotorua news from it in his research files in the Don Stafford Room.
Another place to look is in PapersPast (see Quick Links) which is a collection of digitised historic New Zealand newspapers. Rotorua news can appear in newspapers all round the country so don't limit your search to just the areas around Rotorua.
Indexes to Rotorua Newspapers
The online Rotorua Newspaper Index is available here. It covers local news from the Daily Post and Weekender from 1993 to January 2001 inclusive plus a few older articles.
Many references to newspaper articles on local people and events up to 1986 can be found in the card index to the Don Stafford Files (ask staff at 2nd floor desk) and in the Rotorua Index which can be accessed on the CD-ROM PC in Family History on the 2nd floor.
References for some recent biographical articles about Rotorua people can be found on Index New Zealand.