U.S. 2nd Marine Division march through the streets of Wellington, New Zealand, June 1942

This day, eighty years ago, September 2, 1945, is my first memory as a child of four years old. It was V-J Day, when the representatives of the Empire of Japan signed a surrender document on the battleship USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay. While Victory over Japan Day was announced on August 15, 1945 in New Zealand, a Victory Parade was not held until it was official. I remember it because my mother gave me the dinner gong that was used to summon guests to dinner and told me to go out on the street and ring it. My sister and I were to get dressed up (she was to be Britannia with a helmet holding a trident and shield) and walk in the parade but I chickened out fearing the bagpipe band!

We were very much aware of the possibility of a Japanese invasion in New Zealand. They had bombed Darwin in Australia and threatened the South Pacific area. Our troops were in North Africa, Italy, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa leaving us vulnerable. Plans were made to bring them home until Franklin Roosevelt ordered U.S. Army, Navy and Marines redirected to New Zealand. In June 1942 they arrived in Auckland and Wellington to train for landing on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. With the absence of New Zealand men and the arrival of young Americans romance blossomed. Fourteen hundred war brides resulted. Nearly 100,000 Americans came to New Zealand during the war. Many stayed or returned to repay the hospitality they enjoyed from families.

My birth in June, 1941 was responsible for my father being exempted from overseas deployment since fathers with two or more children were to stay behind. But we made plans to escape to the bush country in the mountains to hide if the Japanese invaded. After the war we learned of the atrocities inflicted on our servicemen and women in the POW camps and the horrors of the building of the Burmese railway. My mother would never buy anything made in Japan. Eighty years later we look upon Japan differently. Now Communist China is the focus of fear and Japan is an ally. Many Asian children go to New Zealand to school and Chinese and Japanese companies invest in New Zealand companies. The local dairy cooperative factory in my home town, Hokitika, was purchased by the Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group in 2019 and invested NZ$40 million to double butter production and distribute dairy products to over 40 countries. It is now part of a worldwide industry – a far cry from my cousin’s dairy farm I visited as a child.

As I look back the world has changed dramatically. It is hard to believe what has happened. Yet nothing stays the same. We must adapt or perish. But I will never forget how much we owed to those US troops in 1942. They saved us. No wonder I banged that gong in the street.