Pacific Matildas: Susan Davis breaking ground in 1950s New Zealand

Written by Susanna Davies (aka Susan Davis) and
Dr India Ella Dilkes-Hall, University of Western Australia

Locating women’s roles and contributions within historical archives is complicated, especially when women are not listed as authors and instead identified as ‘wives’, ‘assistants’, and/or ‘indigenous guides’. To date, the Pacific Matildas project has identified 50 Pacific Matildas, their careers spanning three centuries (e.g., Rose de Freycinet c. 1817 and Janet Davison 2019). In contrast, archaeopedia.com lists only nine 'women archaeologists'. Here we shine the spotlight on Susan Davis.

Susanna was born on the 20th of March 1935 to parents Thelma and Sidney Harold Davis of Leatherhead, Surrey, England. The Davis family moved to New Zealand (NZ) in 1949 after Susanna’s parents bought a farm at Waiuku, 40 km south of Auckland.  

​During the post-war expansion of the 1950s, Susanna studied at the University of Auckland (1954–56) where new subjects such as History & Anthropology and Maori Studies were introduced and young academics were widely encouraged to become active researchers. Susanna was mentored by Jack Golson, a renowned Cambridge-trained archaeologist, who arrived as lecturer at the university in 1954 and who convened the meeting which established the NZ Archaeological Association (NZAA) in August of that year (Prickett 2004: 4). As an undergraduate, Susanna gained practical archaeological skills participating in a number of archaeological projects spearheaded by Golson. An active student and eager volunteer, Susanna was closely involved in the establishment of the NZAA and was in attendance at its first conference in Auckland 1956 (Figure 1). At Dunedin (1957), the NZAA was made official with the adoption of a constitution and Susanna was the only female member of the incoming council (Prickett 2004: 9).

Figure 1. Auckland conference group 1956. Photo: Wal Ambrose (modified from Prickett 2004: 8)

Upon completing her studies, Susanna became the first woman to hold a museum position (Assistant Ethnologist) at the Dominion Museum, Wellington (Figure 2) and her appointment led to further involvement in a number of archaeological projects and site surveys across NZ. ​In 1957, Susanna became the first woman (and sole-author) to publish on North Island NZ archaeology, the publication detailing Maori occupation in the Castlepoint area (Davis 1957). The research is thorough and detailed and her archaeological expertise evident in the quality of her illustrations (Figure 3).

Figure 2. The Evening Post, August 8th 1957, newspaper article

Figure 3. Susanna Davis’s illustration showing the location of the Castlepoint area and stratigraphic profiles of archaeological deposits (from Davis 1957: 200)

Susanna’s passion for archaeological fieldwork meant she spent nearly every weekend of 1959 excavating NZ archaeological sites (Davis 1959) and, in June 1959, as part of the Dominion Museum archaeological site exploration party, she travelled to Palliser Bay to conduct excavations. After this initial work in the area, Palliser Bay became a foci of systematic archaeological research, resulting in a three-year archaeological program in the late 60s culminating in the completion of two PhD theses (H.M. Leach 1976; B.F. Leach 1976) and the seminal publication of Prehistoric Man in Palliser Bay (Leach and Leach 1979). Worth noting here is that Helen May Leach is identified as a Pacific Matilda in her own right.

As part of the Wellington Regional Group of the NZAA, Susanna and colleagues began archaeological excavation at the Paremata Barracks in September 1959. A publication produced from this research (Burnett 1963, with a note on excavations by Susan Davis) received a somewhat mixed review by Wards (1963: 82):

 "This Bulletin, unlike others in this series, has been made the vehicle for contentious theory of a kind which belongs to early and eclectic research, not to the historian’s considered verdict."

Wards (1963: 85) goes on to suggest that the only good thing about the publication is in fact Susanna’s contribution to it:

It is interestingly supplemented by the archaeological notes of Susan Davis, notes which contain information about the site both before and after the existence of the barracks. It is a matter for conjecture whether the interests of the Trust would have been better served if Susan Davis's notes, published elsewhere, had formed the basis for this Bulletin rather than the insecure argument of Mr Burnett's 'fustian grenadiers' versus the 'bubble-gum’ of Dr Miller's 'unimaginative British soldier '. We might then have known more about the defended site of the whaling days, and of the shearing shed of a later era, without being involved in hypotheses of doubtful relevance.

Figure 4. Original photograph scanned from Susanna Davis’s private collection.

​​From 1956 to 1960, Susanna appears in several newspaper articles for The Evening Post. One such article contains a striking image of herself and the secretary of the Historic Places Trust, Mr John Pascoe, at the aforementioned Paremata Barracks (Figure 4). One can just make out the trowel in Susanna’s hand by her side. There is something to be said here about archaeology in reality vs imagined archaeology and its presentation to the general public. This particular scene was constructed for photographic purposes and Susanna played a crucial role, at a critical time period, in normalising the place of women in the field and subverting public perceptions. 

Figure 5. The Evening Post article, 29th April 1960, p. 18

​In 1960, Susanna returned to the UK (Duff 1960), her departure from NZ announced in The Evening Post (Figure 5). Upon her return, Susanna worked on the excavation of the celebrated deserted medieval village at Wharram Percy, Yorkshire under the directorship of John Hurst and catalogued New Zealand artefacts at the British Museum before taking up a curatorial appointment at the Saffron Walden Museum (SWM), Essex. During her appointment at the SWM, Susanna curated the excellent multi-disciplinary collections of archaeology, natural history, and ethnography held by the museum and continued to write up various aspects of her NZ archaeological research (e.g., Davis 1962, 1963) while keeping a hand in Pacific ethnographic collections (Cranstone 1963: 48). 

​In mid-1963, Susanna left the SWM to take a curatorial position at Guildhall Museum. She then moved to London Museum where she curated exhibitions drawing on the museum’s collections of historic jigsaws and the suffragist movement. During this time, she joined the Suffragettes Fellowship, lending her voice to advocate for women’s rights (Figure 6).
​
Leaving the London Museum in 1968, Susanna travelled to the USA to work on Plimoth Plantation, Massachusetts, where she took part in the famous re-creation of the 17th century settlement founded by the Pilgrim Fathers. Her work involved researching and commissioning accurate copies of appropriate period furniture and soft furnishings, as well as correct costume for the living history interpreters in the houses.

After her second return to the UK, Susanna held curatorial positions at a number of well-known museums, Bewdley Museum in Worcestershire (1974 to 1982), Cider Museum in Heresford (1982 to 1985), and Ayscoughfee Hall at Spalding, Lincolnshire (1985 to 1995), before retiring in 1995 to Wales where she resides today.

Our research shows that after moving back to the UK from NZ, Susanna’s publication output decreases, which is reflective of her shift in focus from archaeological sciences and research to an alternative career pathway focussing in museums. While Susanna’s time as a professional archaeologist in NZ might be considered brief, there is no doubt of the lasting impact her research has had in the development of the archaeological discipline in the Pacific region.

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In the early and transformative years of the development of archaeology as a professional field of work, Susanna was at the forefront as one of the first women breaking into previously male-dominated academic circles and institutions, and this project proudly identifies her as a Pacific Matilda. Furthermore, Susanna’s ability to engage with the media brought archaeology to the public and into the home, highlighting to other young women (future Pacific Matildas!) that a career in archaeology was no longer just for men. 

Figure 6. Daily Mirror, 7th February 1968, p. 3

Acknowledgements

​I am greatly indebted to Susanna Davies who has generously shared her life story with me as part of this research. I also thank Stephen Price who has been a wonderful liaison between Susanna and myself and incredibly patient with our correspondence. This research is funded by an Australian Research Council DECRA Grant (DE200100597) and ethics approval has been granted by the Human Ethics Office at the University of Western Australia (2020/ET000338).

References

• Anon. 1957 500-year-old greenstone adze. Museum studies rare moa hunter artifact. The Evening Post, 8th August 1957, p. 12.
• Anon. 1960 Archaeologist to further studies overseas. The Evening Post, 29th April 1960, p. 18.
• Anon. 1968 The veteran campaigner and the girl who will be battling on. Daily Mirror, 7th February 1968, p. 3.
• Burnett, R.I.M. 1963 The Paremata Barracks. Wellington: Govt. Print. in conjunction with the National Historic Places Trust.
• Cranstone, B.A.L. 1963 A unique Tahitian figure. The British Museum Quarterly 27(1/2): 45–48. (https://www.jstor.org/stable/4422812)
• Davidson, J.M. 2019 The Cook Voyages Encounters: The Cook Voyages Collections of Te Papa. Wellington: Te Papa Press.
• Davis, S. 1957 Evidence of Maori occupation in the Castlepoint area. The Journal of the Polynesian Society 66(2): 199–203. (http://www.jstor.org/stable/20703605)
• Davis, S. 1959 A summary of field archaeology from the Dominion Museum Group. New Zealand Archaeological Association Newsletter 2: 15–19. (https://nzarchaeology.org/download/a-summary-of-field-archaeology-from-the-dominion-museum-group)
• Davis, S. 1962 Interim report: Makara Beach (Wellington) excavation. New Zealand Archaeological Association Newsletter 5: 145–150. (https://nzarchaeology.org/download/interim-report-makara-beach-welington-excavation)
• Davis, S. 1963 A note on the excavations of the barracks at Paremata. In R.I.M. Burnett (ed.), The Paremata Barracks, pp. 25–29. Wellington: Govt. Print. in conjunction with the National Historic Places Trust.
• Dreaver, A. 1997 An Eye for Country: The Life and Work of Leslie Adkin. Wellington: Victoria University Press.
• Duff, R. 1960 New Zealand. Asian Perspectives 4(1/2): 111–117. (http://www.jstor.org/stable/42927491)
• Leach, H.M. 1976 Horticulture in prehistoric New Zealand: an investigation of the function of the stone walls of Palliser Bay. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Otago, Dunedin.
• Leach, B.F. 1976 Prehistoric communities in Palliser Bay, New Zealand. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Otago, Dunedin.
• Leach, B.F. and H.M. Leach (eds) 1979 Prehistoric Man in Palliser Bay. Wellington: National Museum of New Zealand.
• Prickett, N. 2004 The NZAA—A short history. Archaeology in New Zealand 47(4): 4–26. (https://nzarchaeology.org/download/the-nzaa-a-short-history )
• Wards, I.M. 1963 The Paremata Barracks by R.I.M. Burnett. Political Science 15(2): 82–85. (https://doi.org/10.1177/003231876301500222)