Mona Tracy

{{short description|NZ children's writer, journalist and community worker}}

{{Infobox writer | name = Mona Tracy | image = Mona Innis Tracy, circa 1923.jpg | caption = Tracy, {{circa|1923}} | pseudonym = | birth_name = Mona Innis Mackay | birth_date = {{Birth date|1892|01|24 |df=y}} | birth_place = Adelaide, South Australia | death_date = {{Death date and age|1959|02|22|1892|01|24|df=y}} | death_place = Christchurch, New Zealand | resting_place = Ruru Lawn Cemetery, Bromley, New Zealand | occupation = {{Cslist |Novelist |journalist |poet |short-story writer |community worker}} | period = 1925–1930 | genre = Children's adventure stories | spouse = {{Marriage|William Francis Tracy|1921}} | children = 2 | relatives = Katrine Mackay (mother) }}

'''Mona Innis Tracy''' ({{nee|'''Mackay'''}}; 24 January 1892 – 22 February 1959) was a New Zealand children's novelist, journalist, poet, short-story writer, and community worker. She was best-known for her three children's novels, published between 1927 and 1930, which were adventures set in historical New Zealand.<ref name="DNZB">{{DNZB|title=Tracy, Mona Innis|first= Betty|last= Gilderdale|id=4t24|accessdate=26 December 2020}}</ref>

==Early life== Tracy was born in Kensington, Adelaide in 1892, to Catherine Julia Bilston, an Australian-born writer and journalist (later known by her penname Katrine), and her husband John Williams Mackay, a New Zealand farmer and auctioneer.<ref name="DNZB mother">{{DNZB|title=Mackay, Catherine Julia|first=Janet|last=McCallum|id=4m16|accessdate=31 December 2020}}</ref> Shortly after Tracy's birth the family moved to Whangārei, New Zealand, where her younger brother Cyril (known as Ian) was born, and from there to Auckland and later Paeroa where she attended Paeroa School.<ref name="DNZB" /><ref name="DNZB mother" />

Tracy and her brother learned to speak Māori fluently during childhood. She also excelled at the piano and as a teenager was offered a contract by J. C. Williamson's to tour theatres in Australia and New Zealand, but declined the offer. After her father deserted the family around 1902, her mother supported the family by working as a journalist for the ''Auckland Weekly News''.<ref name="DNZB" /><ref name="DNZB mother" />

==Career== [[File:Rifle and Tomahawk book cover 1927.jpg|thumb|upright=0.7|left|The first edition of ''Rifle and Tomahawk'' (1927), illustrated by G. H. Evison]] Tracy left school at the age of 14 and began working as a sub-editor for the ''Auckland Weekly News''. In 1912, she and a cousin lived in Sydney for a year, where she worked as a reporter at a local paper. After her return to New Zealand, in 1917, she began working as a general reporter for ''The Press'' in Christchurch, as one of the first female general reporters in the country,<ref>{{cite web |title=The Press: Background |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/press |website=Papers Past |publisher=National Library of New Zealand |access-date=1 January 2021}}</ref> and was one of the first female journalists to sit in the press gallery at criminal trials. On 29 March 1921 she married a young barrister, William Tracy, at St Mary's Church, and they had two children.<ref name="DNZB" /><ref name="OCNZL">{{cite encyclopedia |last=McCallum |first=Janet |editor1-last=Robinson |editor1-first=Roger |editor2-last=Wattie |editor2-first=Nelson |encyclopedia=The Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature |title=Tracy, Mona |url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780195583489.001.0001/acref-9780195583489-e-1252 |access-date=31 December 2020 |date=2006 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-1917-3519-6 |oclc=865265749 |doi=10.1093/acref/9780195583489.001.0001|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Over the next ten years, Tracy raised her children and wrote poetry, short stories and three bestselling children's novels (all published by Whitcombe & Tombs). ''Piriki's Princess'' (1925), a collection of stories that had been published in ''The Sun'',<ref name="OCNZL" /> was praised by ''The Evening Post'' as having a "truly New Zealand background and atmosphere", and for including stories dealing with Māori legend and viewpoints.<ref>{{cite news |title=New Zealand Stories |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/EP19250829.2.152.3 |access-date=31 December 2020 |work=The Evening Post |date=29 August 1925 |page=17}}</ref> Her first children's novel, ''Rifle and Tomahawk'' (1927), was set at the time of Te Kooti's War, and featured both Pākehā and Māori teenage protagonists.<ref>{{cite web |title=2019 Publishers Picks |url=https://publishers.org.nz/2019-publishers-picks/ |website=Publishers Association of New Zealand |access-date=31 December 2020 |date=10 December 2019}}</ref> The ''Auckland Star'' praised the novel "not only for its merits, but for its connection with the story of our own country", noting that it represented one of the first stories of adventure for young readers set in New Zealand; "young readers will discover thrilling episodes and incentive to heroism and much entertainment".<ref>{{cite news |title=A Story of New Zealand Adventure |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS19271112.2.181 |access-date=31 December 2020 |work=Auckland Star |page=24 |date=12 November 1927}}</ref> Her subsequent novels ''Lawless Days'' (1928) and ''Martin Thorn: Adventurer'' (1930) were similarly praised for their adventurous nature and appeal to young readers.<ref>{{cite news |title=Adventure: Mona Tracy's Latest |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS19301220.2.169.33.2 |access-date=31 December 2020 |work=Auckland Star |date=20 December 1930 |page=16}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Lawless Days: Story of Adventure |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZH19281124.2.176.38.6 |access-date=31 December 2020 |work=New Zealand Herald |date=24 November 1928 |page=7}}</ref>

She continued to write articles for various publications including the ''Auckland Sun'' and the Australian magazine ''Aussie'', in which she contributed to a column called "The Voice of the Enzed Woman" and discussed women's political issues. She also wrote for the ''Whitcombe's Story Books'' series and wrote several school history textbooks.<ref name="DNZB" /><ref>{{cite web |title=Whitcombe's Story Books |url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/C457770 |website=AustLit |publisher=The University of Queensland |access-date=31 December 2020 |date=12 December 2007}}</ref> Two of her poems were published in the anthology ''Kowhai Gold'' in 1930.<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Pope |editor1-first=Quentin |title=Kowhai Gold |date=1930 |publisher=E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc |location=London |page=64 |url=http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-PopKowh-t1-body-d9.html |access-date=31 December 2020}}</ref> In the 1930s she presented a series of radio broadcasts about life on the West Coast of New Zealand; these were later collected in the book ''West Coast Yesterdays'', published by A. H. and A. W. Reed in 1960 shortly after her death.<ref name="DNZB" /><ref>{{cite web |title=West Coast yesterdays |url=https://collection.nelsonmuseum.co.nz/objects/B2317/west-coast-yesterdays |website=Nelson Provincial Museum |access-date=31 December 2020}}</ref>

In 1937, Tracy earned the King George VI Coronation Medal for her services to the community. She had served as secretary of a Christchurch refugee committee in the 1930s, and established a soup kitchen near her home in New Brighton for those affected by the Great Depression.<ref name="DNZB" /> In 1942, having given her age as seven years younger than she actually was, she enlisted in the New Zealand Women's Auxiliary Air Force, and attained the rank of corporal. Her husband worked as an officer for the Home Guard at Lyttelton Harbour.<ref name="DNZB" />

After the war, Tracy and her family moved to the small town of Governors Bay, where she served as the president of the local branch of the Women's Division of the Federated Farmers of New Zealand in 1949–50. She died in Christchurch in February 1959, and her brother gave a Māori oration over her grave.<ref name="DNZB" />

==Selected works== ===Short-stories=== * ''Piriki's Princess'' (1925)

===Novels=== *''Rifle and Tomahawk'' (1927) *''Lawless Days'' (1928) *''Martin Thorn: Adventurer'' (1930)

===Non-fiction=== *''The Story of the Pacific'' (1925) *''Historic Kawau'' (1927) *''West Coast Yesterdays'' (1960)

==References== {{Reflist}}

==External links== * [http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-TraRifl-t1-front-d7.html Digitised edition of ''Rifle and Tomahawk'' (1927)], available on the New Zealand Electronic Text Collection website * {{AustLit}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tracy, Mona}} Category:1892 births Category:1959 deaths Category:New Zealand women writers Category:Australian emigrants to New Zealand Category:20th-century New Zealand journalists Category:20th-century New Zealand women journalists