1974: Join Together

January 24, 2020

By AHNZ

Today in history, 24 January, 1974, Christchurch hosted the10th British Commonwealth Games. There was sports, there was tourism, there was construction, there was politics. Above all, it was a time for various public and private organisations to join together on  a short-lived gravy train in the expectation of making some big money. Even the museum!

Having lost out to Scotland in the bid for the 9th Games, ‘Christchurch’ had the logistical and financial ability to be allowed to run this giant hotdog franchise for 10 days or so. Thousands of firms and individuals wanted in on it and they wanted their cut; Could ‘Christchurch’ hold all that together?

It was a huge bureaucratic undertaking to include so many different little sects and rivals and to exclude others without risking any kind of sabotage. A few of the firms to buy in…

$10-20,000 buy-ins
Wattie Industries Ltd (probably get a deal to to make their buy-in fee back in catering contracts)
NZ Breweries Let. (same)

$5-10,000 buy-ins
Auckland City Council
Wellington City Corporation (what’s in it for them?)

$2-5,000 buy-ins
Auckland Rugby League Inc. (huh?)
Cashmere High School (probably got a new building out of it?)
Marlborough Harbour Board (Really? Did they get preferential shipping over Lyttleton who refused to play ball?)
Northland Harbour Board (Least the southern ports hold you to ransom??)
Napier Harbour Board (Ain’t no warfies holding this games hostage)
Woolworths NZ Ltd. (Probably got rights to promote supermarket food using Games branding)

$1-2,000 buy-ins
Aerial Sowing Ltd. (An exclusive deal to take aerial photos?)
K.F.C NZ Ltd. (Branding rights and on-site sales, I suppose)

$500-1000 buy-ins
Bay of Plenty Harbour Board (backup option)
A. R Guthrey Esq.
A. R. Guthrey Travel and Shipping Ltd.
Guthreys Freightways Ltd. (Previous mayor, Ron Guthrey, is having his seat at the table. Three!)
Invercargill Licencing Trust (it’s not a real meet unless the Southland Alcohol Mafia attend)
Ref. p416, Official History of the Xth British Commonwealth Games, A.R.Cant (1974)

Of course those with the most to gain were represented by someone on the Organising Committee of which there were 40. The major upset to the team came when Ron Guthrey lost the 1971 re-election to the Christchurch Mayoralty. The new guy was willing to play ball, of course, but his hefty fee was the creation a mega-expensive swimming and athletic centre built from scratch: Queen Elizabeth II Park (QEII Park.) Like so many other stadiums built for a one-off, it was always expensive and beyond local requirements. QEII came down in the 2011 earthquake and has since been demolished.

Join Together

What this mighty occasion also needed was some musical cover. Some feel-good pop song to highlight the unity of races and creeds through sport. Laughter, peace, love, and all that I Care hippy crap the kids seemed to be into in 1974. Ideally, one that could spell out for the kids the concept of the Games so they’d get in on it.

“Once in every four years, the commonwealth becomes a unit to which everyone, from everywhere belongs. They gather in a place that’s named. This time it’s in Christchurch. And getting it on together…play sport with a feeling that should surround the earth.”- Actual song lyrics from Join Together (1973)

Even the publicity song was a publicity exercise. State Television (NZBC) ran a competition on their prime time show called Studio One for the song of the Games over the course of 6 weeks. Some 100,000 votes were cast and Steven Allen’s tune easily won.

“…the song itself reached a sector of the community, the teen-agers, who had been relatively untouched by Games activities. The song went to No. 2 on the New Zealand hit parade and was given extensive overseas airing.”- A.R.Cant (1974)

Of course it got extensive overseas airing…the promo guys paid for that air time!

I’m not saying it’s a bad tune or anything, and it’s intertwined with positive nostalgia for Kiwis. However, Allen certainly did engineer a song to please his marker. The lyrics are crammed with boiler plate information such as the above. He even threw in a line about God into the chorus which goes to show how Christchurch, New Zealand, and the Commonwealth rolled in 1974. According to Wikipedia, “the song was banned in South Africa because the words freedom, race, peace, black and white were deemed unsuitable.” The 1970s sure are a bit like the 2010s where similar things are triggering and offensive.

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Image ref. QEII Park; Windward Apartments; Facebook

Image ref. Christchurch Press (21/1/1974); Colorised by AHNZ

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