1935, Colin Scrimgeour: Broadcasting genius

The Rev C G Scrimgeour - or Uncle Scrim - was one of the best-known radio voices in Auckland during the Great Depression. (NZ Herald Archive)

Colin Scrimgeour, a radio broadcaster affectionately known as "Uncle Scrim", who is said to have greatly influenced the general election that swept the first Labour Government into power in November is our New Zealander of the Year.

"During the 1930s he won a fame and affection that has probably never been matched in New Zealand," wrote the Herald's Ted Reynolds in 1987 when Uncle Scrim died.

"In America the Christian Science Monitor called him one of the three broadcasters in the world who were possessed of genius."

That genius was too much for some people to bear and just before polling day in 1935 someone - generally thought to be the director-general of Posts and Telegraphs - ordered that his regular "Man in the Street" broadcast on 1ZB be jammed to prevent him urging people to vote Labour.

In later years Scrimgeour - who was also Methodist City Missioner - denied he had been planning to tell people how to vote. But he was beloved by the people for ignoring the blandness expected of broadcasters at the time, wrote Reynolds.

"He could talk about the down-and-outs of Auckland and about his growing belief that charity such as his own mission work merely blunted the effects of social evils but left the evils untouched."

With such frankness, he was the darling of Auckland and whole neighbourhoods used to gather in houses with radios on Sunday nights just to listen to what he had to say.

Further reading:
Biography of Colin Scrimgeour, Te Ara Encyclopedia of New Zealand