Rutherford Waddell

Rutherford Waddell (1850–1932) was a notable New Zealand Presbyterian minister, social reformer and writer. He was born in Ireland; in Ballyroney, County Down, Ireland in about 1850;[1][2] or in Glenarm, County Antrim in 1852 according to the Presbyterian Archives.[3]

He married Kathleen Newman on 22 January 1877 in Dublin and a few weeks later Waddell and his wife migrated to New Zealand.,[4] settling in Dunedin where he led St. Andrew's Church for forty years from 1879 to 1919. An active believer in the value of the ministry to promote social justice, he was a founder in 1888 of the Dunedin and Suburban Reserves Conservation Society, and aided the setting up a mission hall, savings bank, free library and free kindergarten within his parish, as well as promoting the founding of a variety of cultural and sporting groups.[5]

Waddell's most notable accomplishment in nineteenth-century New Zealand, however, was his crusade against sweat shops. In October 1888, his sermon "On the sin of cheapness", stirred many of the local community into action, and the cause was taken up by Sir George Fenwick, editor of the Otago Daily Times, and the paper's chief reporter Silas Spragg. In 1890 a royal commission on sweating was established, and formed the basis of many of the country's social reforms of the following decade. Waddell was a believer in the value of trade unions, and became the first president of the Tailoresses' Union of New Zealand in July 1889.

Kathleen Waddell died in 1920 and Rutherford Waddell married Christabel Duncan in 1923.

He died in Dunedin on 16 April 1932.[6]

References
  1. Breward, Ian. "Rutherford Waddell". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
  2. "Rev Rutherford Waddell in the Cyclopedia of New Zealand". NZETC.
  3. "Ministers Register". Presbyterian Church of New Zealand.
  4. Dougherty, Ian. Pulpit radical : the story of New Zealand social campaigner Rutherford , Saddle Hill Press, 2018.
  5. "Rutherford Waddell" at Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Retrieved 22 October 2015.
  6. Thomson, Jane (editor) (1998). Southern People: a dictionary of Otago Southland biography. Dunedin: Longacre Press. pp. 529–530. ISBN 1-877135-11-9.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link)


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