A talk by Sean Brosnahan, presented by the Nelson Institute. A Journey to New Edinburgh is a documentary series about the establishment of the Otago settlement as a Scottish and Presbyterian colony between 1848 and 1861. It is the work of a small team from Toitū Otago Settlers Museum who travelled to Scotland in 2022 to uncover the story of the Otago scheme from its first conception in 1843 through to its ultimate success on the ground in New Zealand. At the same time, the team also traced the origins of 100 individual Otago pioneers across Scotland, England and Ireland to make the stories of migration and settlement personal and compelling. This formed a complementary series Pioneers of southern New Zealand, both programmes being available on Toitū’s Youtube channel. Seán researched, wrote and presented both documentaries and will talk about the background to the project and some of the challenges involved.

For preview see: PREVIEW: JOURNEY TO NEW EDINBURGH (2023)

Seán Brosnahan has worked as a curator at Toitū Otago Settlers Museum in Dunedin for 36 years. He has also taught migration history at the University of Otago and written and published a number of books and articles on Irish and Scottish migration and settlement.