(DRAMATIC BEAT) Mark Twain ` one of the most famous writers who's ever lived. Even if you've never read his books, I bet you've heard of him. In 1895, he was broke and was forced to do a worldwide lecture tour. He came here. What did he think of us? What did we think of him? And what else was happening in New Zealand at that time? (SLOW COUNTRY MUSIC) Captions by Kristin Williams. Edited by Antony Vlug. Captions were made with the support of NZ On Air. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2019 Palmerston North ` the name means harsh reviews. Just jokes. John Cleese's nasty words from 2005 have faded, and Lonely Planet describes Palmy as open-minded with a rurally bookish vibe. That's much kinder than what Twain twitted in 1895. It's a bank now, but the Club Hotel is where Twain stayed while he was in Palmerston North. And he didn't really like it. He complained about the manager, who kept his hat on while talking to a lady, the 'Queen of Sheba' barmaid who wouldn't do what he asked, and the walls that were so thin he could hear, quote, 'the drunken loafers downstairs', which makes him the first in a distinguished list of overseas celebrities to have dissed Palmerston North. What a sad guy. It's probably just as well that Trip Adviser reviews weren't around back then because Twain wouldn't have given the Club Hotel a very good write-up. This is what he wrote. 'Early in the morning, baby began, then the piano. 'Straight average of three right notes to four wrong ones. Considering it was the cat ` 'for it must have been the cat ` it was really a marvellous performance. 'It convinces me that a cat is more intelligent than people believe and can be taught any crime.' There's one person who can prove Twain's ranting to be fact or fiction ` animal trainer Caroline Girdlestone. She's trained the great animal actors of the silver screen ` Sheep on Babe, a wolf for Thor. And now, the pinnacle ` the piano playing puss in Following Twain. Are there any animals that are harder than others to train? What do you really struggle with? Um, cats would have to be the hardest. Yeah? Cos they just have a mind of their own and... Yeah. Cats are so stubbornly individual like that. Yeah. Well, they're just aloof. Yeah. Milky. Milk, Milk. Puddy, Puddy, Puddy. Here he comes. Milky. Come on. Come, Milky, here. Look. 'The first time that he actually made a sound, I stopped and I put the lid down, and I said, 'No, no. Come on,' and he was going, 'Oh, please. Oh, please.' And so, he'd sleep up there, and he'd wait till I came again. Then you'd put it up, and he'd go, '(GASPS) OK, can I do it now? Can I do it now?' Come on, up. Oh. Good boy. (PIANO CHIMES) Good. Good. Good boy. And can you sit and do it? Good. And play. Good. Play. Good. And play. Good boy. Come. It's quite a plaintive, melancholy kind of tune, isn't it? (PIANO CHIMES SLOWLY) Quite filmic. He's kind of purring contentedly. (PIANO THUNDERS) I know. He's purring the whole time. (CHUCKLES) Oh, you're a good boy. (MEOWS) Yes, you are. You're a good boy. Wow. Thank you, Milky. You're very talented. You play better piano than me. That isn't hard, but still ` skills. (EASY-GOING COUNTRY MUSIC) What has he starred in? He was a kitten in Ghost in the Shell. He was in` No. He did a film with Scarlett Johansson? Yeah, he did. He was in her bedroom, what's more. Check you out. Wow. You're a kitten star. What was it like working with her? (MEOWS) Oh. He's like, 'Meh.' Meh. Scarlett, Schmarlett. (CHUCKLES) (CHUCKLES) Speaking of cool cats, King Dick was... well, the king. This lion was named after New Zealand's longest-serving prime minister, Richard Seddon. During his term, New Zealand refused to become Australia's seventh state. 'On ya, Richard. Seddon gave us the old-age pension and annexed the Cook Islands in 1901. He died in office in 1906, but his nickname lived on thanks to Wellington Zoo's first feline. Karen Fifield is in charge of the four-legged King Dick's old digs. What on earth was a lion doing in New Zealand in 1906? He was here with a travelling circus from the UK. And he was not very old. He was only, like, a year old or something like that. And they decided that they would gift him to the city to start the Zoological Society in Wellington. Wow. So King Dick kicked it all off. He did. It all started with King Dick, so he's quite special. And he obviously has a very important part and place in the history of Wellington Zoo. What were zoos like in the early part of the 20th century? Zoos back then were very much about curiosities. It was about animals that people didn't get to see very much. Would he have been the first lion in New Zealand? Well, he would've been, in a zoo situation, because we were the first zoo. So he would've been the very first one. Wow. So people would've come from all over the country, maybe. Oh, yeah, probably. And he was quite a spectacular lion. Do you think early Wellingtonians at that time would've taken immense pride ` pride, get it? (LAUGHS) Do you think they would've taken a great deal of pride in the fact that they had the lion... Yep. Yeah. ...and that it was a Wellingtonian. Exactly. And that's probably why Wellingtonians have such a thing with lions, eh, because their rugby team is called the Wellington Lions. And they're all right too (!) I say that through gritted teeth. Oh. (CHUCKLES) Quite a good team for second division. Now, come on. Well, they're all right. They're all right. They made the final this year. There's lions just over there. (LAUGHS) They might have something to say to you about that. (LAUGHS) Wellington seems to have a thing with cats. Eh, Gareth? In 1879, these rugger boys formed one of our first provincial teams, the Lions. In 1895, the Bush, Canterbury, Horowhenua, Otago, Poverty Bay, Southland and West Coast Unions signed up, and New Zealand Rugby was born. When King Dick died, they stuffed him. (YELLS) Jesus. They botched the job, so thank goodness he's now hidden away in Te Papa so he can't scare small children. When I was little, I used to be scared of this stuff. It used to freak me out. But it's interesting seeing it from a perspective of this is what the entertainment was in the late 19th century, when Mark Twain visited. Instead of collecting Pokemon Go, they used to collect specimens, and a lot of them ended up in museum collections, and they're kind of like a very sacred hall of skins, really. So it's not spooky at all. Glad I got over that, otherwise I'd be really freaking out. I guess they've been dead for ages. (CHUCKLES) I hope. Old school collector and taxidermist John Ward has his very own zoo of dead delights. The fascination with taxidermy in the Victorian times was these people that arrived in these different countries and experienced, 'Wow. Look at this. Look at the beauty of these animals.' It was a in thing way back then, in a big stately home, to have a collection of taxidermy and put it on show. These are leopard skin here, you see. Wow. This thing here is a very, very old Victorian type skin. Now, this one here` Can I touch it? Um, yeah, OK. You can touch this one. Just gently. Just gently, yeah. Wow. It's a beautiful skin. It's still got a lot of lush in the fur and that on it. Just like the tiger skin. The tiger skin is well over 100 years old. So a lot of the stuff here ` very historical. I don't want you to think it's just a museum where we chop heads off and put them on the wall. This is from the past for the present. In a weird way, you're kind of bringing the past to life a little bit, aren't you? Yeah. Yeah. I see myself as on a bit of a crusade. I could talk all day and tell you about everything. I've got so much information locked in my head. I sense that. Yeah. Every time I see a programme on England and antiques and that, I'm always looking ` when they're walking through those big stately homes,... Yeah. ...and I'm thinking, 'Take the camera back. What's that up on the wall? (CHUCKLES) What's that in the case over there?' and stuff like that. Now, tell me where that two-headed lamb came from. That come from Stratford. Stratford. (LAUGHS) Stratford. Yes. Stratford. Over here, you can see. Oh, now this is upset` Wow. The chickens. See, I love roosters. All of the chickens. Yes. See the chickens. I really love roosters. I have a lot of chickens, eh? Because the chickens, to me, are as pretty as the pheasants, and they're so diverse in colour. I think they're more pretty than pheasants. They` They are. There's just such a range of them, you know. So I've got 112 chickens mounted in this collection. I've probably got the biggest chicken collection in New Zealand. Any space at all, Oscar, that you think that I can put anything else, you be sure and let me know, OK? (CHUCKLES) I will. I will. Good on you, mate. Collectors, eh? A breed unto themselves. When it comes to celebrities, people can go a bit mad with things that they've touched. Scarlett Johansson's snot in a bit of a tissue sold for $5300. We tend to think that level of obsession and fandom is a modern thing, but in 1895, when Twain was in Napier, he had a haircut, and the barber sold off bits of his hair. I thought we were classier back then, but apparently not. Mind you, he was one of the most famous men of his day. Be worth quite a bit of money now. MAN: Good to see you, mate. Oh, thanks, brother. Cheers. Coming up ` the woman who dared to fly a hot-air balloon over windy old Palmy. She definitely had a lot of guts. And the writing's on the wall ` Twain was here. New Clinically Proven Lash Serum from L'Oreal Paris, proven to repair and strengthen lashes in 30 days. New: And for intense volume, finish your look with Paradise - our number one mascara. From: VOICEOVER: Hey, Auckland, which of the Youi 40 ways to save would work best for where you live? Grey Lynn, close to the city, is where Ava lives, so number 1 of 40 - "Don't drive to work" - could be best for her. Titirangi, where most people have off-street parking, is Rick's suburb, so number 24 - "Park securely at night" - could be best for him. Why not see which of the 40 ways apply to you? You could save lots. Get a quote online at youi.co.nz and save 15%. * When Twain bowled through Palmerston North, locals had already been wowed by a bold American. In 1894, a woman called Leila Adair sailed into town with her hot-air balloon act. Fangirl Katherine Erebus reckons Leila's story is truly illuminating. What sort of woman was Flying Leila? Well, she definitely had to be someone who had a lot of guts. She used to string a trapeze underneath a gigantic hot-air balloon. So she would do a trapeze act from the hot-air balloon? She swung low across the crowd. Can you imagine them all holding on to their hats and scattering like chooks as they're trying to get out of the way of this balloon? And that's risky, man. Yeah. Um, all Twain had to do was stand on a stage and, kind of, be a bit of a raconteur and tell dry, witty stories. But this woman, how high up do you think her hot-air balloon went? Over 900 metres... 950 metres. She was a tiny pinprick in the sky. Nearly a kilometre. What would you even see from the ground? Not very much, but she ended out all the way out in Kairanga. Where's that? Well, it's... Just out of town. (BOTH LAUGH) In Auckland, she launched her balloon, and she headed off towards Rangitoto. The wind caught her the wrong way, and she ended up ditching in the sea. She sounds amazing. Cos you imagine that time, and you kind of imagine a fairly, kind of, boring traditional time, but actually it was quite a buzzy old time, wasn't it? I think that any time... Any time, you've always got those people who are pushing the boundaries. Yeah. And she really was. This was before balloons were a big thing. This was before Pearse or the Wright Brothers had done their stuff. That was a decade before they had even gotten people's minds spinning about those men and their flying machines, you know. This woman was something completely else. They would've never seen anything like her. Do you think people would've considered her a freak? Quite possibly. A lot of the circus arts, you know, you have these people doing these amazing things, these bizarre things. They're all 'strange' and 'weird' and 'not really like us'. Is she an inspiration to you? Oh, definitely. This is this amazing human being who decided that it was well worth her time to journey half a planet away to go and-and-and... Do her act? Yeah. Yeah. I think that she reinforces a lot of the values that I have. This is someone who is dauntless. Leila wasn't the only American daredevil to blow up big. In 1889, Professor Thomas Baldwin was the first man to fly in New Zealand skies. He got bored with his hot-air balloon and invented the modern parachute so that he could jump from it. It was clearly an inspiring act. A few days later, a local boy jumped off the roof of his house clutching an umbrella, which sadly had inferior aerodynamic properties. He broke his arm. Since I'm reliving 1895 entertainment options, a brew seems in order. Craft brewer Murray Cleghorn has seen old school become new again. Oh, that's good. (CHUCKLES) In terms of the way you brew beer here, how much has that changed from the way it was done in 1895. You know, back in the day ` and certainly when Mark Twain was in Palmerston North ` the beer he would've drinking would've been made locally. There was certainly very little imported beer. Very little beer was moved around. It wasn't stable. It didn't last well, so people would typically just drink whatever was made in their local town. So when you have a beer that's produced like that, it's almost like connecting you with history. That's a good excuse to go to the pub. It's not that you wanna get wasted. - (BOTH LAUGH) - It's that you wanna connect with history. Palmy knows its beersies. The famous Joseph Coutts set up a brewery here, but it was his son Mortie who was the beer baron. Morton developed a technique called continuous fermentation. And what did that allow them to do? Make a lot of beer very quickly. (CHUCKLES) Wow. So it was a really efficient way of making beer. So the process that led to, I guess, what could be called factory beer... Mm. The kind of beer that's widely consumed around the world, began here in Palmerston North. Yeah. Or with a Palmerstonian, for sure. As a brewer, does that make you proud? Uh, no. No, but, uh, I think it's an amazing achievement. He founded breweries all over New Zealand, this guy. And I think the most famous was Waitemata in Auckland. And that, of course, progressed on to become Dominion Breweries and away they went. I hope the people of Palmerston North own that part of their history proudly. Even though everyone's into craft beer now. But, you know... (CHUCKLES) The fact is that the process invented here by the Coutts family... Mm. ...was eventually used to produce beer around the world. Yeah. Yeah. Right, back to it. Palmy loves its modern street art, and that's getting a history lesson too. Mike Marsh is handy with a brush and can and happy to do his bit to honour Twain's tour. So what are you doing exactly, bro? Uh, I'm just making a bit of a mural today, bit of a portrait. I can already see Mark Twain, just from the scraggly hair. Yeah. Yeah. I've got sort of, uh, an idea of where I'm going with it. Just mainly I just want to try and make him not look like, um, Colonel Sanders. (CHUCKLES) (LAUGHS) Yeah. He looks like if Colonel Sanders and Albert Einstein had a child. Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm gonna aim for some sort of middle ground between those two. I think a lot of it's in the eyes, you know. So if you get the eyes right... (CHUCKLES) it kind of helps. (RELAXED MUSIC) I remember reading a whole bunch of Reader's Digest magazines when I was a kid ` Mum and Dad used to get subscriptions to them ` and just about every second thing used to have Mark Twain written at the bottom. And I thought, 'Who is this Mark Twain guy? 'He seems to be everywhere.' Yeah. He looks like a thinking man, you know. Like, he's definitely got ideas. Well, Mark Twain's not gonna see this but, I mean, hopefully he'd think it was cool. Shot, Mike. Up next ` blowing the whistle on the Palmerstonian who gave us rugby. We should get our $2 note back and then put this face on it. 'And the song that saved the Un-score-ables.' BOTH: # On the ball. On the ball. On the ball. # * (LAID-BACK MUSIC) Welcome to the Palmerston North Train Station, circa 1895. You kind of have to use your imagination. 'In 1871, 25 people lived in Palmy, and four years later, the main trunk line moved in too.' Some locals get angry when you say this town has a patchy history, but it's true. In 1885, the town hall was ravaged by fire, destroying all the public records. In New Zealand, we're not that good at teaching our own history. I've always loved the subject. It was my best School C result. I got 83 ` my only A. What I loved is that the more you learn about the people in the past, the more you learn about today. And here in Palmerston North, there's some really interesting history to be learned. 'There is one type of history that we don't sidestep ` yep, rugby.' It's Kightley for the line! Kightley! Oh. Oh. Kightley! Oh, that's a bit weird. New Zealand's love affair with the game kicked off in Nelson, but it has Palmy to thank for it. In the 1870s, New Zealand schoolboy Charles Munro went to England to study, and while there he learned the rules of rugby. He returned and taught his schoolmates, and Munro called Palmerston North home for most of his life. Stephen Berg from the New Zealand Rugby Museum is proud of the town's roll in the game. So, Charles Munro was living here at the time when Twain visited. I wonder whether, being such a distinguished gentleman, do you think he might've been in the audience when Twain performed? I think it would be almost certain that Charles Munro would've been here, yeah. I feel like we should get our $2 banknote back and then put his face on it. That's something very special there, isn't it? Yeah. This is kind of a cool item that has got a bit of a special story to it. Now, the very first New Zealand team was actually 1884. So they would wear a blue jersey with this gold fern on it, and when we were doing our research, we realised that it was actually cut out of an original 1884 team jersey. That fern there? Yeah. And not only that, the guy whose jersey it was, Harry Roberts, he scored the very first try for New Zealand. Are you serious? Yeah. Wow. There is a Maori proverb and that is that when one frond breaks off, another one will grow to take it's place ` you know, as they grow from the top ` and when one warrior is killed in battle, another one will rise to take his place. And I always like to think that in rugby, the silver fern is a symbol that when one guy's tackled, there's always someone on his shoulder to take his place. Catch the ball or clean out at a ruck. To carry it on. To carry it on. And it's a really great symbol for rugby. Wow. And that's our national symbol today. I really love that. I'm not sure how many people know that story about the Silver Fern and why that's our national symbol. Well, billions now, Oscar. (CHUCKLES) Back in the late 1800s barette was a graceful French form of football. Oh la la. In Europe it was a popular women's sport, but we played real rugby. In 1891, a female Auckland rugby team tried to tour the country. Newspapers of the day called it a 'foolish enterprise' and recommended that the women stick to their knitting, but they kept pushing all the same. The tour did get called off, but there is a men's team I've heard of that could've used some of their grit. Seven years before Mark Twain arrived in Palmerston North, the Manawatu rugby team were pretty stink. So stink, in fact, that their nickname was the Un-score-ables. They went a whole six games one season without scoring a single point. And then one day, on the way to a rep game in Whanganui, the team captain, a guy called Edward Secker, decided to compose a song to boost team morale, and it goes a little something like this. (SLOW PIANO MELODY PLAYS) 'And coincidentally, it was composed on the exact same piano 'Twain was complaining about at the Club Hotel.' # Some talk of cricket and some of lacrosse. # Some long for the huntsman's loud call. # But where can be heard a more musical sound than the old rugby cry 'On The Ball'? BOTH: # On the ball. On the ball. On the ball. BOTH: # Through scrummage and three-quarters and all. BOTH: # By sticking together, we keep on the leather BOTH: # And shout as we go, 'On the ball!' # It's actually quite a neat song. It's, like, five beautiful verses, and it goes on to compare rugby to life. I'll just read the last two. 'This life's but a scrummage we cannot get through, But with many a kick and a blow, 'And then in the end, though we dodge and we fend, 'still that sure collar Death takes us low.' Oh. 'Remember, then, boys, as we journey through life, there's a goal to be reached bye-and-bye. 'And he who runs true, why he's bound to get through 'and perhaps kick a goal from his try.' Quite epic, really. That was the Manawatu team's song over 100 years ago. And maybe the new team, the Manawatu Turbos, could maybe pick it up again.