The Hocken Library is now housed in a former cheese factory.

The Hocken Library (also known by its Southern Māori name of Te Uare Taoka o Hākena) is a research library and historical archive based in the New Zealand city of Dunedin. New Zealand is an Island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses (the North Island and the South Island Dunedin (dəˈneɪdɪn) Ōtepoti in Maori is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, and the principal city of the region of It is a national library administered by the University of Otago. The University of Otago ( Te Whare Wānanga o Otāgo) in Dunedin is New Zealand 's oldest university with over 20000 students enrolled during

The library's specialist areas include items relating to the history of New Zealand and the Pacific, with specific emphasis on the Otago and Southland Regions. History See also History of Otago The Otago Settlement sponsored by the Free Church of Scotland, materialised in March 1848 with the arrival of the first Southland (Murihiku is the name of New Zealand 's southernmost region and is also the name of a district within that region Open to the general public, the library is one of the country's most important historical research facilities.

The library is the result of the philanthropy of avid collector Dr. Thomas Hocken, who donated his private collection to the university in trust for the New Zealand public. Thomas Morland Hocken ( January 14 1836 - May 17 1910) was a prominent New Zealand collector bibliographer and researcher A private library is a Library under the care of private ownership as compared to that of a public institution and is usually only established for the use of a small number Hocken had offered his collection to public use in 1897, but it was not until 1910 that it became generally accessible in a wing of the Otago Museum. The Otago Museum is situated in Dunedin, New Zealand It is Otago's largest cultural and heritage institution with a collection of over two million artefacts and specimens Sadly, Hocken was too ill to attend the official opening on 23 March 1910 (the 62nd anniversary of the founding of Dunedin), and died just two months later. Events 1174 - Jocelin, Abbot of Melrose, is elected Bishop of Glasgow. Year 1910 ( MCMX) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link will display calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year starting

Until 1965 the library was entirely housed in the Otago Museum. The Otago Museum is situated in Dunedin, New Zealand It is Otago's largest cultural and heritage institution with a collection of over two million artefacts and specimens From that time its pictures collection and increasingly more of its other holdings were housed on other sites around the University of Otago's campus, the pictures being at the Central Library. In 1980 the collections were again brought together under one roof in the new Hocken Building (now renamed the Richardson Building), designed by E. J. McCoy. It soon outgrew that site and additional accommodation was secured at another site in Leith Street. It was reconsolidated on yet another site in the 1990s in a former cheese factory on Anzac Avenue, east of the main campus. In 2005 its name was changed to the 'Hocken Collections'.

External links

• Hocken Collections website

Coordinates: 45°52′11″S 170°31′04″E / -45.86976, 170.517715