Ancestry Inquiry
Introduction.
In this inquiry, I am going to be trying to figure out why my ancestor moved from where he lived to New Zealand [NZ]. The ancestor I'll be doing this inquiry on is William Edgar Jagger, he was born in 1907. In 1924 my great-great-grandfather emigrated from England to New Zealand. He was part of a huge wave of people moving from England at that time. He left England because being the second boy in a family of four boys there was no place for him in the family business.
Biography of my ancestor.
My great-great-grandfather grew up in West Yorkshire playing rugby and helping out at the family wool business in his early teens. He was educated at Bradford Grammar School, Being born on 29th March, made him one of the youngest in his year at school. An interesting fact about him was that he hated his name William so everybody just called him by his middle name which was Edgar. New Zealand was not the first country he went to, he first went to Canada than Australia before he came to New Zealand. I'll be explaining these reasons later on in this report.
Push factor one
My great-great-grandfather moved from England at a very young age of just 17. He left England to find a place in the world because he had no place in the family wool business because he was the second son out of four. I would assume the reason he went to two countries to find a way to live was that he came from quite a wealthy family, and he would not have had to pay the full price. The boat he went on to get to Canada was unknown by everybody including him. In the 1920s in Canada, there were really good imports and exports, and trade balances. As hydroelectric power was replacing coal, Canada's output of hydroelectricity became the second largest in the world. Hydroelectric power was a good and bad thing at that time. The good thing about it is that it can generate electricity without making greenhouse gasses which are bad for the environment. However, it can also cause environmental threats such as damaged wildlife habitat and harmed water quality. He wanted to escape England and find a good and better place elsewhere but in many ways, Canada was similar to England then. With bad weather, almost all the time, bad pay and Canada is part of the British common weather so there's not much difference.
Push factor two.
The reason he went to Australia was that that's where all the Canadians at that time were moving for a better life to get away from the bad pay, bad economy and bad weather. The boat that he took to Australia didn't have a name, but we do know how long the boat ride was; it took exactly four months. During the 1920s heaps and heaps of people moved to Australia, so it was getting harder and harder to get a job, it was still easier to get a job in Australia than it was to get one in England and Canada. It gets way too hot in the summertime in Australia and there are lots of crops and animals that find it hard to survive in that sort of heat. My great grandad always knew he wanted to be involved in agriculture but did not quite know what he wanted to do, but he did know he did not want to farm cactus or wheat, canola, oats, pulses, sorghum and a barley farmer. So he did some research and found NZ just across the ditch from Australia. As Well as all the problems I just talked about, farmers have to be very cautious because of all the snakes and spiders and all the other dangerous things you'll come across on an Australian farm. There are always lots of farmers dying from work-related things and animals in Australia. Framers also have the highest suicide rate out of all the other civilians in Australia.
Discussion of push factors.
I agree with my ancestors' choice to emigrate to New Zealand. It was extremely hard to find jobs and if he did find one it was hard to keep the job you had. Bad weather was another huge impact on why he left. It was hard to get the soil ready because of how bad the weather was all the time. There were just so many things wrong with England at that time for him. If he had made a different choice and stayed in England he could have ended homeless, a criminal or even dead. I am quite lucky that My great grandad chose NZ to live out of all the other countries there would have been quite a few choices for him to choose. But he did the research and tested out a few other countries before he came to NZ and at that time he completely made the right choice.
Pull factor one.
There are so many reasons why my great-great grandad moved from England to New Zealand, but I do not have 10 hours to tell you, so I will try to only talk about a few of those reasons in this paragraph about why he chose NZ. The economy was good throughout the 1920s, although it was fluctuating lots it never got really bad. Farm production was better than ever thanks to new technology such as electrified milking sheds and tractors, the application of artificial fertiliser superphosphate and improvements to pasture and stock. The Department of Scientific and Industrial Research established in 1926 played a leading role in agricultural research. Unlike most countries in the 1920s, New Zealand had lots of farmland and even better it didn't cost millions to buy. Being only 17 at the time, my great-great-grandfather would have loved fun and adventures. New Zealand has all of that to offer from great beaches and great weather to beautiful mountain tops covered with snow.
Pull factor two.
In the notes, my granny gave me about my great-great-grandfather she talks about how he went back to England at the age of twenty-one because his family sent for him. But shortly after he arrived in England he moved back to NZ because he did not approve of the class system that England and his family had. His family were probably referred to as upper class while they treated him like the working class because he was not in the family business and didn't have much money. He got treated differently from his family because of the choices he chose to go travelling and find a place in the world for that exact reason. But in New Zealand, there is only one aspect of the class system which was separated by Pakeha and Maori.
Discussion of pull factors.
All of the reasons why My ancestor chose NZ to come to are all very valid and good reasons. If he had stayed in England he would have been treated like a working-class citizen, which is the lowest you can go without becoming very, very poor. If he had stayed in England he would not have been able to become a farmer because of much of the land costs over there.
Conclusion.
My ancestor Willaim Edgar Jagger left England in 1924 to find a better future and a good job. He left England at the young age of 17 because he wanted to find a place in the world. Being the second boy out of four meant he didn't get a place in the family wool business, so he left to find a job and a place in the world and last but not least a good future. When Edgar immigrated to NZ he believed he would get a job, get a family and find a place in the world. He found all of those things in NZ, so in conclusion, the decision to immigrate to NZ could've possibly been the best choice he had ever made, if he hadn't chosen an image I would probably be living in England right now which I would hate.
Bibliography.
The first way I got my information was from Dad because he was the closest to me. He sent me an email with information about him. After that, I used the websites to find more helpful information. I've put down the websites that helped me below. After that, I called my granny to get more information on him and that was the best information I'd been given so far.
These websites below helped me find critical information about my ancestor and where he came from.
Paperspast.natlib.govt.nz, paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers.
“The 1920s, the Roaring Twenties, in Britain.” The historic UK, www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/The-1920s-in-Britain/.
Family Echo - Free Online Family Tree Maker, www.familyecho.com/.
“Family History.” National Library of New Zealand Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa,
natlib.govt.NZ/researchers/guides/family-history.
https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/The-1920s-in-Britain
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers
https://natlib.govt.nz/researchers/guides/family-history