This is unedited raw film footage, shot by Academy Award winning US Marine cinematographer Norman T. Hatch for a US newsreel that was never completed, provisionally titled 'Meet New Zealand'. Around 21,000 Marines were stationed in camps around the Wellington region from June 1942 until November 1943. Most of their time was spent training hard preparing for the war in the Southwest Pacific against the Japanese.
[Scene 76C] Christchurch in Wintertime, many people can be seen cycling alongside the Avon River down Cambridge Terrace and then across the Bridge of Remembrance and through the Triumphal Arch.
[Scene 66A] Guide Rangitīaria Dennan leads four Marines up to a billowing steam vent.
[Scene 182] ‘Hasty Tasty’ American coffee bar attracts groups of US soldiers walking along the street.
First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in the Government House gardens talking to a journalist. A brief moment at the microphone for the press conference before this scene cuts to a candid moment just prior to a group portrait with the Governor-General, Sir Cyril Newall and distinguished guests; (see NTSV F318877).
[Scene 63A] Guide Rangitīaria Dennan leads four US marines through the entrance gate of Whakarewarewa Pā, Roturua. Guide Rangi is talking to the group and pointing to the geyser. Boiling mud pools are seen up close. [Scene 65C] Wahine and tamariki bathing in a hot spring. Marines toss coins in for the children.
[Scene 203] The mooring ropes are pulled in and the war ship sails out of the Wellington harbour.
[Scene 183] “WHILE-YOU-WAIT” PRESSING SERVICE!
The window sign draws in marines walking along Lambton Quay. Nearby a milk bar advertising milk shakes and ‘malted milk’ panders to the American servicemen missing the tastes of home.
[Scene 184] A Marine Air Division fighter plane flies over head.
Five Marines on foot with a New Zealand hunter on a horse with a dog, head along a gravel road. The men are all armed with rifles and soon are following the hunter, now also on foot, through scrub on exposed coastal ranges (possibly the Tararua's?). They find cover, sitting down in tall scrub, finally all shooting at some target(s) (wild game?).