Important Library

Of Fiji Books Opened In Suva

Lady Barker, widow of Sir Alport Barker, made a special trip from New Zealand in May to formally open the Sir Alport Barker Memorial Library in Suva on May 23. The library houses Sir Alport’s collection of books, papers and journals deal

ing mainly with Fiji’s history and

that of its Pacific neighbours.

FIJI’S Governor, Sir Derek Jakeway, said at the opening ceremony that Sir Alport Barker, former Mayor of Suva and proprietor of The Fiji Times, had offered to bequeath his collection to the Colony and people of Fiji two years before his death in 1956 if it could be used as a nucleus of a national reference library of material dealing with Fiji and the Pacific generally.

This offer was accepted. Later, in 1963, the Colonial Sugar Refining Company offered to contribute £2,000 towards the cost of a building to house the collection if the Govern ment provided the balance.

This offer was also accepted, and the library building was now com pleted.

Sir Derek Jakeway added: “It is appropriate that the Sir Alport Barker Library should be placed close to the Central Archives of Fiji which . . . holds official records, not only of Fiji, but also of all the other territories for which the British Government is responsible in the Pacific.

History Documented

“There are now about 11,000 ft of shelving and the records document much of the history of British ex pansion and administration in the Pacific over about the last 80 years.

“The Sir Alport Barker Library, together with that of the late Mr.

Harold Gatty, which has recently been acquired, will provide a valuable supplement to the Central Archives; while near at hand is another im portant and developing centre of research—the Fiji Museum.

“Much progress has therefore been made towards the realisation of Sir Alport Barker’s wish that a national reference library of Fiji should be established.

“It would, however, be wrong to

pretend that, at this stage, the Central Archives and its associated libraries represented a full and complete re ference library based on standards elsewhere, “An important step forward has, nonetheless, been made with the construction of the Sir Alport Barker Library, and there is every reason to hope that it will expand steadily in consonance with the Colony’s needs.”

Enlarging on Sir Derek Jakeway’s remarks, Fiji’s Archivist, Mr, A. I.

Diamond, said in a letter to PIM that the Sir Alport Barker Library was being administered as a unit of the Central Archives, and that its acquisition meant that the Archives had one of the world’s best collections of Fiji newspapers in English and the vernacular.

Newspapers

Mr. Diamond went on: “The Barker Library, when transferred to us, contained a valuable collection of Fiji English language newspapers, including a complete file of The Fiji Times, from its establishment in 1869 to 1918.

“We have since received on loan from the Times office a continuation of the Barker Library Times file from 1919 to 1939.

“The collection was also greatly enlarged by the transfer to us in 1960 of the entire collection of Fiji newspapers accumulated by the Registrar-General’s Department in virtue of the Newspaper Registration Ordinance of 1895.

“The Central Archives now acts as the office of deposit for all news papers currently published in Fiji.

We are thus equipped to keep our collection comprehensive and up-to date.

“The library also contains an ex cellent coverage of the official pub lications of the Government of Fiji and of other British territories and dependencies in the Pacific. By arrangement with the various admini strations the library receives copies of all publications currently issued by them.”

More Samoan Readers According to a columnist in Samoana recently, membership of the Nelson Memorial Public Library in Apia has increased in the past 15 months from 800 to 4,000 juniors and from 400 to 1,100 adults.

The columnist added: “It would be hard to find a better selection of up-to-date reading in a library of similar size anywhere, and extra activities such as the current art exhibition by Miss Jean McGreal [a graduate of Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland and a lay art teacher in Catholic schools in Samoa] all create interest and help to bring in new readers.”

However, according to library assistant Miss Usuga Mo’ilo, the Apia library has too many books for its shelves.

Miss Mo’ilo, who is in New Zealand on a six-month in-service training course at the expense of the New Zealand Government, told the Dunedin Evening Star in May, that the Apia library was getting so many books from the Canadians and Americans that “we are forced, through lack of shelves, to pack them away in boxes.”

Lady Jakeway, wife of Fiji's Governor, Sir Derek Jakeway, shares a joke with Lady Barker at the opening of the Sir Alport Barker Memorial Library in Suva on May 23. — Photo: Stan Whippy.

The ministerial form of gov ament, which is expected to

ow out of Fiji’s newly-estab

hed “membership” system,

ly sound like something brand w in Fiji. But the truth is that ji had ministerial government >re than 90 years ago.

HE first Ministers in a truly national government were those jointed to the Cakobau Govern nt at its launching on June 5, Ministers had served both Ratu kobau and other chiefs previously, these had been regional rather n national governments, fhe Cakobau Government was des ;d to last, though with constant nges in the ranks of the Minis until March 20, 1874. From n on, an interim government ran country until Cession to Great tain in October of the same year, lince then Fiji has been a Crown ony, ruled by a Governor through egislative Council.

Vhen the Cakobau Government 1 formed, the two regional govern its that had preceded it had been a constant struggle for power. >ne, for the Kingdom of Bau, er Ratu Cakobau had been in :e since 1867. t was supported and recognised most of the better class of settlers, r European residents of Levuka,