100 years on and Families Unite as Rugby Remembers

100 years on and Families Unite as Rugby Remembers

Balls, Bullets and Boots – from rugby field to battlefield and back. The title of this interactive exhibition opening on 22nd of August at the NZ Rugby Museum, Te Manawa Compex says it all.

The exhibition is an engaging, interactive multimedia experience that looks at the legacy of the First World War, as viewed through the eyes of XV New Zealand rugby players and one woman coach – those from every background, those who served and those who stayed behind, those who came back and those who did not return.

50 All Blacks went away to the war, 13 died.  No fewer than 728 provincial representatives served, 163 died and by late 1915 (before conscription) it was estimated that 10,000 active club players from throughout New Zealand had volunteered for service.

Descendants of those players, who include Dave Gallaher, Beet Algar, Harry Jacob Maurice Brownlie and Tom French will come together for the first time at the launch of the exhibition to commemorate their family members. The exhibition helps keep their stories (some previously untold) alive which is an important part of New Zealanders’ collective inheritance.

The Director of the New Zealand Rugby Museum, Stephen Berg says, “These guys are inspiring, both the ones who died for their country and those who returned with a mission to start life afresh. Having close to a hundred descendants of these players together at the launch of the exhibition is a privilege.”

The exhibition explores the impact the hostilities had on New Zealand’s signature sport and its sportspeople. Rugby players during the Great War were often held up by recruiters as heroes, athletes turned soldiers, making noble sacrifices for their country as they traded the cheers of spectators for the roar of artillery fire.

Ex-All Black captain, Anton Oliver features as the exhibition’s ‘digital guide’. Oliver is passionate about the need to confront the realities that New Zealand men and women went through during wartime. “I’m interested in this project because it attempts to strip away all of the political, nationalistic rhetoric and describe what really happened to people in the war by telling peoples’ stories.”

This interactive exhibition takes you through a rugby changing room, down into the trenches and more, while viewing a selection of historic objects, memorabilia, multimedia dramatisations and interactive exhibits. Visitors engage with the players’ personal stories against a backdrop of the social context of a nation at war. There is something for everyone at this exhibition from age 10 upwards.

The exhibition, based on research undertaken by Clive Akers for an e-book of the same name will be launched alongside the exhibition and will expand on the themes and stories of the players.

The exhibition will be free to view and is hosted by New Zealand’s Rugby Museum in the Te Manawa Complex, Palmerston North from the 22nd August to 11th November 2015 and thereafter touring nationally.  For more information, search “Balls, Bullets and Boots Exhibition” on Facebook, or, visit http://www.ww1rugby.nz/about

ends.

Ends

© Scoop Media