{{short description|Cook Islands chief, politician and community worker}} {{Use dmy dates|date=February 2023}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = | image =
| office1 = Member of the Legislative Assembly | term1 = 1961–1965 | predecessor1 = | successor1 = | constituency1 = Rarotonga
| birth_date = 14 February 1919 | birth_place = Maraerenga, Cook Islands | death_date = {{death date and age|1984|9|14|1919|2|14|df=y}} | death_place = Nikao, Cook Islands }}
'''Poko Ingram''' (4 February 1919 – 13 September 1984) was a Cook Islands chief, politician and community worker. She was elected to the Legislative Assembly in 1961, becoming one of the first two women directly elected to the islands' legislature.
==Biography== Ingram was born in Maraerenga, the daughter of Takiora and William Kelly.<ref name=PIM>[https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-339599674/view?partId=nla.obj-339627007#page/n72/mode/1up Poko Ingram] ''Pacific Islands Monthly'', November 1984, p73</ref> She attended Avarua School, and was awarded the Sir Maui Pomare medal for being its outstanding pupil, receiving the prize from New Zealand Prime Minister George Forbes.<ref name=PIM/> The previous year she had toured New Zealand as part of the Cook Islands delegation of arikis for the 100 year celebrations of the Treaty of Waitangi.<ref name=PIM/> A mataiapo,<ref name=DJS>David J. Stone [https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/113873/4/b12930957_Stone_David_Joseph.pdf ''Self rule in the Cook Islands: The government and politics of a new micro-state'']</ref> in 1939 she married Jim Ingram, with whom she started a business, J.P.I. Ltd.<ref name=PIM/> The firm ran a cinema, several shops (including the largest in Rarotonga) and had shares in a clothes factory.<ref name=DJS/> From 1946 to 1949 she lived in Western Samoa, followed by a year in New Zealand, before returning to the Cook Islands in 1951.
In 1961 she contested the Rarotonga seat and was elected to the Legislative Assembly, becoming the first directly elected woman in the Assembly alongside Teupoko'ina Utanga Morgan. During the era of constitutional development, Ingram was in favour of the Cook Islands integrating into New Zealand.<ref name=DJS/> She remained in office until 1965, when she and her husband left for New Zealand.<ref name=DJS/> After returning to the Cook Islands, she joined the Democratic Party, and was a candidate for the party in the 1974 elections.<ref>Thomas R. A. H. Davis, & R. G. Crocombe (1979) ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=wfAGrkbnZjoC&pg=PA148 Cook Islands Politics: The Inside Story]'', p148</ref> Outside politics, Ingram was the secretary of the Rarotonga Child Welfare group, and also founded and was the first president of the Cook Islands Women's Association.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-GriWom1-c1-9.html|title=Cook Islands|website=NZETC|access-date=4 April 2018}}</ref>
She died in Nikao in September 1984.<ref name=PIM/>
==References== {{reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:INGRAM, POKO}} Category:1919 births Category:1984 deaths Category:Cook Island activists Category:20th-century Cook Island businesspeople Category:Cook Island women in politics Category:Members of the Parliament of the Cook Islands Category:People from Rarotonga Category:20th-century New Zealand women politicians Category:20th-century New Zealand politicians