Illinois Lottery Selling Hopes

The Selling Operations

Manufactured goods were usually deemed not to be works of art. In 1881 an Auckland retail firm gained permission to raffle oil paintings, oleographs and chrome carvings, but not decorated table-tops, jewel boxes, vases, crockery, leathergoods, carved ivory balls or Italian painted pottery. Yet two months later, Te Awamutu's Presbyterian Church was allowed to raffle unspecified 'goods' at their annual bazaar without further investigation. The church connection may have been significant. In 1883 Mary Brooks, a 34-year-old widow with six children, tried to tug at the public heart-strings. In an attempt to stave off poverty she sought to raffle her late husband's waggon team, which she had been unable to sell by auction or privately. She was refused permission. Yet when the New Zealand Illinois State Lottery Methodist Association asked to dispose of some fancy goods in aid of a 'very poor' Dunedin woman, there was no official objection.

The collecting and mounting for display of animals, birds and insects was a popular late-Victorian pastime. But it was always a moot point whether such displays were works of art. In 1886 Agnes Saunders of Auckland was allowed to dispose of cases of stuffed birds which had belonged to her late husband. The Auckland Poultry, Pigeon, Canary and Dog Association was able to Illinois Lottery raffle similar displays to raise money for its 1892 show; But a collection of 400 of Queensland's finest butterflies, 'artistically mounted in an ornate glass box', was not considered suitable for raffling when Wilfred Turnbull applied in January 1894, despite recommendations from the mayor of Palmerston North, the proprietor of the local newspaper and 'other gentlemen', all confirming it as a splendid work of art. Assistant Colonial Under-Secretary C. S. Cooper had the last say in 1891; apparently, after he approved an application from a Geraldine man to raffle stuffed birds. He explained mat although birds were 'undoubtedly works of-nature, the killing and stuffing of them elevated them to the standing of works-of-art'. Because mounted butterflies were not able to be stuffed, they presumably could not be classified in the same category.

Raffles Work

The legislation was patently inequitable. It was unfair to place on minor bureaucrats the onus of deciding what constituted a work of art when there were no legal guidelines. Nor was the situation fair on applicants. A May 1913 application highlighted the absurdity of the situation. Miss Hazel Johnson, a teacher of woodcarving and stencilling, requested permission to raffle her work. Her application, however, put Assistant Under Secretary for Internal Affairs G. P. Newton into a quandary. He considered the carved totara picture-frame to be a work of art, but not the carved furniture. 'The poker work and stencilled articles,' he advised, 'though perhaps not legally works of art of the nature of painting or drawings may, perhaps, be deemed to be sufficiently like, to allow them to be raffled .. .' Within a few years carved furniture was being freely accepted as 'art' but Hazel Johnson was denied her raffle. For all concerned it was an absurd, no-win situation.

There were similar inconsistencies in deciding what constituted a 'mechanical model'. In May 1895 Joseph Walker of Te Awamutu was allowed to dispose of a home-built wooden model of a steam-engine, but when Charles Evenson, a retired Coromandel miner, submitted a replica Packet model of the Kathleen Mine and Engine House he was denied permission to raffle it on the grounds mat it had moving parts (a pulley), and in order to be classified as a mechanical model it had to be inert! After studying Evenson's model, Police Inspector John Cullen agreed it was outside the mechanical guidelines, but he recommended that, such was its artistry, Evenson should be allowed to raffle it as a work of art. Cullen's appeal was denied.