KEY POINTS:
A Wellington man with a passion for righting the wrongs of the past has chalked up his 60th successful case.
Map sleuth George Holmes makes submissions to the Geographic Board to correct wrong spellings of place names throughout New Zealand.
The retired public servant's latest meticulously-researched cartographical corrections included Mt Eggeling (previously Mt Eggelling) in South Westland and Mt Norriss (until now, Mt Norris), near the Moteuka River.
Through his work, Le Gos stream near Waitakere would from now on be called Le Gros stream, Lovatt stream near Piha was changed to Lovett stream and Laingholm's William Stream gained an 's' to become Williams Stream.
However, the big one still eludes him -- changing New Zealand to New Zeeland, after the province in the Netherlands.
"It's obviously a very sensitive issue," Mr Holmes told NZPA.
His research shows English explorer James Cook used three different spellings for the country during his South Pacific voyages.
Mr Holmes thinks Captain Cook got the spelling of the land Dutch discover Abel Tasman rechristened Nieuw Zeeland wrong.
The spelling of New Zealand apart, there were still many other places to be investigated, he said.
"I like looking through New Zealand's old historical documents. It's a job made for me," he said.
"It is quite surprising -- previously no one had made the effort to make sure a name was spelled correctly."
Making the names right was about respect for the people they were named after, Mr Holmes said.
"If a letter arrived for you in the mail, and your name was misspelled, you'd take it as a bit of a dig in the ribs that they hadn't taken the time to get it right."
Each submission took, on average, about four weeks to write and was about 20 pages.
With the geographic board convening only once every seven months, he had time to present it with a stack of submissions each meeting.
"Over the years, a good many acres of New Zealand have had their spelling over-hauled," he said.
- NZPA
