Zoologist and museum director Gilbert Edward Archey played a significant role in the development of both the arts and the sciences in New Zealand. Many of his studies remain unsurpassed today.

Born in York, England, on August 4, 1890, Archey’s family emigrated to New Zealand when he was two years old. Early in life, he became engrossed in the study of New Zealand’s vast array of animals, insects, and plants. His pioneering studies began at Canterbury College in Christchurch, New Zealand, where, in 1913, he earned a Master of Zoology with honors and graduated with a DSc. In 1914, he was appointed assistant curator at the Canterbury Museum, where he published in-depth studies of New Zealand centipedes, which remain today the foremost in their field.

In 1912, Lieutenant Archey joined the New Zealand Field Artillery and served during World War I with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force. For his services during the war, he was appointed an Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1919. After World War I, Archey resumed his work at the Canterbury Museum. He undertook field work across New Zealand and its islands, publishing dozens of zoological papers on his findings. His 1922 study of the morphology and life history of the primitive native frog, Leiopelma hochstetteri stemmed from extensive field work. A related species L. Archeyi is named in his honor. Today, the species is commonly referred to as “Archey’s frog.” He will always be remembered for his monumental treatise, The Moa: A Study of the Dinornithiforms, published in 1941.

In 1924, Archey accepted the position of director at the Auckland Institute and Museum (today, the Auckland War Memorial Museum-Tāmaki Paenga Hira). He soon revitalized the museum, moving it into a spacious modern building, managing the furnishing of the galleries, organizing and displaying the collections, and appointing new staff. He also inaugurated a public relations policy and began an educational service to schools, which was later adopted by all metropolitan museums. During his tenure in the 1930s, he studied Maori sculptures and carvings and published some thirty publications. His efforts impressed the Carnegie Corporation of New York who, during a visit to the museum in 1935, provided significant funding to not only the Auckland Institute and Museum but several other New Zealand museums.

During World War II, Archey served in New Zealand as a commanding officer of the 4th Battalion, Auckland Regiment of the National Military Reserve from 1942 to 1943. Around this time, the British Museum had begun supplying lists of monuments and sites in need of protection in the Dutch East Indies to the South East Asia Command (SEAC). At an April 1944 meeting between the SEAC, representatives of the Netherlands government and army, and British Lieutenant Colonel Sir Leonard Woolley, archaeological adviser to the War Office, it was decided to appoint a British Monuments officer to liaise with Dutch art experts in the area. After being selected by Woolley for the position, Lieutenant Colonel Archey was attached to the British Military Administration and served as the Monuments officer assigned to Civil Affairs, SEAC beginning in June 1945. During his time as the only Monuments officer in the area, Archey worked tirelessly to protect churches, temples, monuments, and archives in British Malaya.

Archey’s efforts in the field were invaluable to the preservation of art and culture in southeast Asia. One local art expert wrote a letter to the War Office commending Archey: “I hope that one day it will be realized how much the biological sciences and ethnology in Malaya owe to official forethought and to Colonel Archey’s unselfish energy.”

After returning to New Zealand in 1946, Archey returned to his position as director of the Auckland Institute and Museum and remained committed to the preservation of Eastern art and culture. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1958 and rewarded by the knighthood bestowed on him in 1963. He served on the executive board of the Art Galleries and Museums Association of New Zealand, the New Zealand National Commission for UNESCO, the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council of New Zealand, elected president of the Royal Society of New Zealand, and named director emeritus of the Auckland War Memorial Museum-Tāmaki Paenga Hira. He was the last in a line of museum officials who had been the movers and arbiters of natural science in New Zealand. Archey developed much of the philosophy that came to characterize New Zealand museums.

Sir Gilbert E. Archey died in Auckland, New Zealand, on October 20, 1974.