item details
Overview
This bookmark promoting the Royal New Zealand Plunket Society encourages donations and subscription to the society as a volunteer. The top of the bookmark has the Plunket Society's circular logo and motto, which features a mother holding a baby and text 'To Help the Mothers and Save the Babies'. The logo is coloured pale blue and is the version used from the 1950s to the late 1980s. The bookmark describes Plunket as 'A vital service for all New Zealand Families!'
The Royal New Zealand Plunket Society
Sir Frederick Truby King founded the Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and Children in 1907 in an effort to improve childcare standards, and it is still active today. It is, however, more commonly known as Plunket, after Lady Victoria Plunket, wife of the Governor of New Zealand at the time of the Society's establishment and a great supporter of King's work. In 1980, the Society officially changed its name to the Royal New Zealand Plunket Society.
Fund-raising
At the time that this bookmark was created, Plunket nurses received some funding from the government, but Plunket needed other sources of income to support itself and its activities. Bookmarks such as this one were given to those who paid an annual subscription of $1 to join the Plunket volunteers - just one of many fund-raising methods that Plunket employed.
Fund-raising is still vital to Plunket. In 2006, its successful '5s for Under Fives' appeal urged the public to donate their5 cent coins to the Society before the coins went out of circulation.
Acquisition
In the late 1980s, Te Papa received a collection of objects and ephemera from the Plunket Society, including promotional leaflets, a 'Well Child' baby book, and a set of scales for weighing infants. These items date from different periods in the history of Plunket, from its inception in 1907 to the time of this acquisition.