Alfred Hamish Reed

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Alfred Hamish Reed, MBE (1875-1975) was a New Zealand publisher, author and entrepreneur.

A. H. Reed, who was born at Hayes, Middlesex, England, on 30 December 1875, the son of James William Reed and Elizabeth Reed, came to New Zealand with his parents in 1887. After some experience in Northland as a kauri gum digger, he moved to Dunedin where, in 1897, he became manager of the Typewriter Co. An early childhood leg problem, denied him access to active duty during world war one, he was retained at an army base, as a clerk, for his shorthand skills. He entered the bookselling trade, when he founded the firm of A. H. and A. W. Reed, a leading publisher of New Zealand-related nonfiction and reference works, in association with his nephew Alexander Wyclif Reed. In 1932 he branched out as a publisher and, in 1935, as an author.

He is also renowned for undertaking some remarkable walking and mountain-climbing expeditions. He climbed Mount Egmont (aged 80), Mount Ruapehu (aged 83), Ngauruhoe (aged 85), walked from North Cape to Bluff (aged 85) and from East Cape to Cape Egmont (aged 86), and walked through Marlborough (aged 87). Reed was created M.B.E. in 1948.

In 1938 A. H. Reed and his wife established the Alfred and Isabel and Marian Reed Trust for the promotion of the Christian religion, of education, of literature, and for philanthropic and other benefits for the people of New Zealand. Among other activities the trust has built up a collection of rare books and manuscripts for the Dunedin Public Library, including one of the most comprehensive collections of manuscripts and early printed Bibles in the Southern Hemisphere.

The A. H. Reed Memorial Kauri Park Scenic Reserve, near Whangarei, commemorates the associations of the Reed family with the district.

[edit] Books published

The Wreck of the Osprey (1937)
Two Maoriland Adventurers: Marsden and Selwyn (1939)
The Isabel Reed Bible Story Book (1944)
The Story of New Zealand (1945, seventh edition 1957)
Great Barrier: Isle of Enchantment (1946)
Farthest East. Afoot in Maoriland byways. (1946)
Farthest North. Afoot in Maoriland Byways. (1946)
The Story of Otago; Age of Adventure (1947)
Samuel Marsden- Greatheart of Maoriland. (1947)
Stepping Stones to the Solomons - The Unofficial History of the 29th Battalion with the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force in the Pacific (2 NZEF IP) (1947)
The Gumdigger (1948)
The Story of Canterbury - Last Wakefield Settlement.(1949)
John Jones of Otago : Whaler, Coloniser, Shipowner, Merchant. (1949) with Alfred Eccles
Captain Cook in New Zealand - Extracts from the Journals of Captain James Cook giving a full account in his own words of his adventures and discoveries in New Zealand (1951)
The Story of the Kauri (1953)
The Four Corners of New Zealand (1954)
First New Zealand Christmases (1955)
The Story of Northland (1956)
The Story of Early Dunedin (1956)
The House of Reed. Fifty Years of New Zealand Publishing 1907-1957. (1957)
Walks in Maoriland Byways (1958)
The Story of Hawke's Bay (1958)
Everybody's Story of New Zealand. (1958)
Heroes of Peace and War in Early New Zealand (1959)
The Story of Kauri Park (1959)
Historic Bay of Islands (1960)
From North Cape to Bluff (1961)
From East Cape to Cape Egmont On Foot at Eighty-six. 1st Edition 1962.
Marlborough Journey (1963)
The New Story of The Kauri (1964)
Nelson Pilgrimage (1965)
The Milford Track (1965)
Footslogger - Sydney-Melbourne in his 90th Year (1966)
A.H.Reed. An Autobiography (1967)
The Gumdiggers : The Story of Kauri Gum (1972)
Ben and Eleanor Ben Farjeon and Dunedin (1973)
The Happy Wanderer. A Kiwi on Foot 1915-1961. (1974)