A Limited Express or Stopping All Stations? Railways and Nineteenth-Century New Zealand

Abstract

Railways have been a significant part of New Zealand life, yet their treatment in historiography often does not reflect this. I argue for a greater appreciation of railways, focusing upon their role in shaping the developing colony in the nineteenth-century. I introduce the existing literature to indicate contributions with which greater engagement is required and to identify directions requiring further research. The provincial ‘prehistory’ of railways preceding the Vogel boom of the 1870s requires particular emphasis; railways figured prominently in the settler imagination even though physical construction was minimal. I then show that the forces unleashed by Vogel were more than economic and offer tentative conclusions regarding the railway’s role within a range of fields. The railway was a site for contesting morality, it deepened the colonial project and identity, and it defined the contours of daily life.