Lily May Atkinson

Lily May Atkinson (née Kirk, 29 March 1866 – 19 July 1921) was a New Zealand temperance campaigner, suffragist and feminist. She served in several leadership roles at the local and national levels including Vice President of the New Zealand Alliance for Suppression and Abolition of the Liquor Traffic (1898–1921); president of Women's Christian Temperance Union New Zealand (1901–1905); and, Vice President of the National Council of Women of New Zealand (1901–1903). Early life Lily May Kirk was born in Auckland, New Zealand, on 29 March 1866. She was the daughter of Sarah Jane Mattocks and Thomas Kirk, a surveyor who went on to be an early professor at Victoria University College and the first Chief Conservator of State Forests in New Zealand. She received her education at Greenwood sisters' Terrace School, and in turn taught English to Chinese immigrants, and taught factory workers how to read. Despite never travelling overseas, she was fluent in German and French. She was an avid reader. Political work and family Lily, along with her sisters Amy Kirk, Cybele Kirk and her mother Sarah Jane Kirk, was an early member of the Wellington branch of the Women's Christian Temperance Union of New Zealand (WCTU NZ) organised by Anne Ward on 3 September 1885. She served as the Auditor for the Wellington District Union then became the recording secretary for the National Union in 1887 and continued in this work for more than ten years. She openly supported the work of Ellen Hewett (aka Mrs. Duff Hewitt) who, as WCTU NZ superintendent of Work Among Maoris, held a meeting 30 July 1894 in Wellington together with the Taupo chief Te Heu Heu and Hone Heke Ngapua M.H.R. At the meeting, Lily Kirk together with temperance activist Arthur Atkinson spoke in support of the WCTU NZ work in getting literature and pledge cards to people living in rural areas as well as a letter specifically directed to Maori women "at all the stopping places up the Whanganui River."