24/04/2026
A BEAUTIFUL REMINDER ABOUT THE POPPIES ENDURING POWER: "Tomorrow, as New Zealanders gather at dawn services from Bluff to Kaitāia, many will pin a small red poppy to their chest. It's a simple gesture - but one carrying more than a century of meaning.
A Flower From the Waikato to the Western Front
In 1916, Auckland soldier Len Shaw knelt in his trench on the Western Front and carefully picked a Flanders poppy, pressing it flat and posting it home to his niece Jessie in the Waikato. "I thought you might like some little thing," he wrote. "Pieces of shells are too big to send, and I think flowers much nicer."
That poppy eventually found its way to the Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira, where it rests today - a fragile but extraordinary link between one Kiwi family and the war that changed the world.
How the Poppy Became Ours
After 1918, poppies spread across the allied nations, mass-produced to raise funds for widows and orphans — many made by disabled veterans rebuilding their lives through the very symbol of their sacrifice. In Britain, the poppy was tied to Armistice Day on November 11, but New Zealand gave it a new home. Because poppies had to be shipped from Europe, our RSA simply repurposed them for April 25. Poppy Day has run every year since 1922, and that practical Kiwi decision gave us something precious: the Flanders poppy became forever linked with Gallipoli and the ANZAC spirit.
A Symbol That Belongs to Everyone
The poppy has always united communities, not just soldiers. In the early years, women's groups led Poppy Day, pinning flowers to veterans' chests across the country. By the end of the Second World War, one in every two New Zealanders was wearing one. Today the Auckland War Memorial Museum offers a Rainbow-friendly poppy alongside the traditional red, and this year the RSA returns to a biodegradable paper version - a nod to both Kiwi values and those earliest handmade flowers. You can even leave a virtual poppy at the museum's online cenotaph, where Len Shaw's name is recorded among thousands of New Zealanders who served.
Shaw was killed just a month after sending that poppy home. The flower he picked for his niece became the last living thing a grieving Auckland family knew he had touched.
When you pin yours on tomorrow morning, you're part of a chain of remembrance stretching from the fields of Flanders to the streets of your own town. That little red flower holds more than a century of love, loss, and the enduring Kiwi spirit.
Lest we forget".
(My shortened version) By Rowan Light, Lecturer in History, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau - April 23, 2026
https://www.mindfood.com/article/1020293/
