Margaret McPherson

Margaret Louisa Kendall (1895 – 1974) was born in Leeds, England. After completing her schooling at a Quaker school she went on to study at the University of St Andrew's in Edinburgh. At the start of WWI she met and married Alfred Sinclair Macpherson and shortly after the couple emigrated to New Zealand. She began writing for the women's column, Wahine, in the Maoriland Worker, the weekly paper of the labour movement. After the column was discontinued, Macpherson moved to Kaitaia to become editor of a progressive weekly newspaper called The Northlander and then wrote for the Kaitaia Guardian. During this period her marriage failed and she subsequently left New Zealand to work as a journalist in Australia, the United States, Britain and Malta. One visit back to New Zealand strongly influenced her subsequent career. When George Bernard Shaw visited the country in 1934, Macpherson was granted an interview. She later wrote that Shaw had rebuked her for complaining there was no art, drama, music or culture in New Zealand. He suggested she undertake a New Zealand journey of discovery - and that she should write about it. Her resulting book was titled Antipodean Journey (1937). Later works included New Zealand Beckons and I heard the ANZACS singing written while she was living in New York during WWII. She returned to New Zealand during the 1960s and died in Kaitaia in 1974.