Here’s where you can hear or read more about this project. Click on the links below (in chronological order, with most recent material first.)
RNZ interview Anzac Day 2026:
RNZ interview V.J. Day Anniversary 2025:
On the 80th anniversary of V.J Day (Victory over Japan), marking the end of World War II, I spoke to RNZ’s Afternoons programme about the recordings of New Zealanders who served in Japan as part of J Force, between 1946 and 1948.
Anzac Day 2025 – RNZ interview:
Turnbull Library Record article:
The 2024 issue of The Turnbull Library Record (Aotearoa’s longest-running, peer-reviewed humanities journal, published by the Friends of the Alexander Turnbull Library) carries an article I wrote about the library’s wonderful collection of photographs of the New Zealand Broadcasting Unit in action during World War II (many of which can be seen here on World War Voices.) It also touches on my research into the archived correspondence of one of the unit broadcasters, John Proudfoot, which is held at the Turnbull. A PDF of my article can be read here
Australasian Sound Archive Journal article:
The Australiasian Sound Archive (the Journal of the Australasian Sound Recordings Association) has published an article about my research into the well-travelled disc which holds recordings of New Zealand air-crew trainees in Ontario in 1941. This content is not yet available online, but you can read a version of the article aimed at the general-interest-reader, in the blog ‘Her Father’s Voice.’
New Zealand Journal of Public History article:
The December 2023 edition of the New Zealand Journal of Public History carried my article about research into radio listener response to the Mobile Broadcasting Units’ output, heard back home in the programme With the Boys Overseas. Primarily the public responded to the thousands of simple ‘messages home’ the unit recorded throughout the war, and demanded to hear more, which in turn, put pressure on the Broadcasting Unit staff and shaped their work. You can read a PDF of the article here.
International Association of Sound Archives Journal article:
An article was published in the August 2022 edition of the IASA Journal about my work to identify the speakers in the Mobile Broadcasting Unit recordings and make them more discoverable and accessible to researchers. Plus a side-bar by my friend and former colleague, audio conservator Sandy Ditchburn, on the technical challenges faced when preserving and digitising the Mobile Unit discs.
Manatu Taonga Ministry for Culture and Heritage online talk:
In May 2022 I gave an online presentation about the response of NZ radio listeners to the mobile units’ work, as part of the Public History talks series organised by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage and the Alexander Turnbull Library. You can watch the video of my presentation here or listen to it as podcast .
Older media:
A presentation at the National Library, Wellington to mark the 100th anniversary of the first radio broadcast of voice and music in New Zealand, on 17 November 1921. (The second half of my talk is about this project.)
Interview with Justine Murray on RNZ’s Te Ahi Kaa 30 April 2021
Interview with Kim Hill on RNZ’s Saturday Mornings 30 Jan 2021
UNESCO Memory of the World Aotearoa Register entry and nomination submission
Blog about the project to digitise the discs by Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision
Many of the Mobile Unit’s recordings of Māori can be heard on the official 28 (Māori) Battalion website – including transcriptions and translations.
A “Spectrum” radio documentary by RNZ about descendants of a New Zealand sailor lost on HMS Neptune in 1941, hearing his voice for the first time: “Finding Eddie Vazey”
Further recordings can be heard on Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision’s online catalogue. Some highlights of recordings uploaded so far:
Embarkation of the Third Echelon (23 August 1940)
Talks by New Zealand members of the Long Range Desert Group (17 Feb 1941)
Report by Noel Palmer on New Zealanders evacuated from Greece (08 May 1941)
A talk about the New Zealand signallers in Greece (24 May 1941)
Lt Charles Bennett talks about the Māori Battalion’s experiences in Crete (04 Jun 1941)
Māori Battalion open-air concert in the desert (23 Sept 1941)
Decoration of Lieutenant Charles Upham with the Victoria Cross (18 Dec 1941)
A tribute to 2nd Lieutenant Moananui-a-Kiwa Ngarimu, V.C. (06 Jun 1943)