FENWICK, SIR GEORGE (1847-1929) was born at Sunderland, England, and came to Melbourne with his father, Robert Fenwick, in 1853. After a year or two on the diggings and in Melbourne, Fenwick was persuaded by W. H. Reynolds to come to Otago, and the family crossed in the schooner Challenger in 1856. George went to a school in lower High Street and also to the Dunedin Academy, which had been opened by J. G. S. Grant at the end of 1855.

At the age of 12 he entered on his apprenticeship at the Otago Witness office (where he was engaged for five years, 1859-64). He went over to the Otago Daily Times under Vogel. In 1866 he returned to Australia and saw a good deal of his uncle, Captain George Turnbull Brown, master of the East Indiaman Cornwallis. He took a post on the Cleveland Bay Express (at Townsville) but disliked the climate and, on the death of his mother, came back to Otago in the schooner Susannah Booth. James Matthew offered him a partnership in the Tuapeka Press at Lawrence, but after 18 months they found the opposition of the Tuapeka Times too strong and they sold out. The last issue of the Press was reprinted with a new heading, Cromwell Argus, and Fenwick started off at once on horseback for Cromwell, which he had already visited and prospected, so that the Argus was first published on the day he reached there (Sep 1869).

Not satisfied with his prospect Fenwick handed over his share to his brother William and returned to Dunedin, where he joined John Mackay (q.v.) in a general printing business. The property of the Otago Guardian and its weekly the Southern Mercury being put up to auction, G. M. Reed and Fenwick acquired it and determined to make it pay, but finding again that the existence of opposition newspapers in the same town was uneconomic, they made up their mind to acquire the Otago Daily Times and Witness. This they achieved through the mediation of Reynolds. On the papers being amalgamated some of the old staff started a paper of their own, the Morning Herald (May 1877) which they issued at a penny. This complication and the failure of the City of Glasgow bank, with its repercussions in Otago, compelled Fenwick and his partner to look to their laurels. They floated a limited company to take over their papers, Reed being editor and Fenwick managing director, and after 18 months' strong competition the directors at length agreed to Fenwick's suggestion and reduced the price of the paper to a penny. From that time its success was assured. The Herald became an evening paper in 1884 and ceased in 1890, being absorbed in The Globe. From 1883-90 R. E. N. Twopeny (q.v.) was editor and Fenwick managing director, but after 1890 Fenwick held the joint post continuously till 1909, when the editorship was entrusted to James Hutchison (now Sir James).

The depression of 1886 necessitated cuts in salaries throughout the staff and led to a strike by the Otago typographical association, which started a morning paper, the Daily News (only to live for two months). In the eighties Fenwick took a strong stand in the paper against industrial abuses in Dunedin. In 1888 he published a sermon by Dr Rutherford Waddell (q.v.), which was followed by a series of articles in 1889 disclosing the existence of sweating in Dunedin factories and home workshops. The Otago Daily Times took the lead in exposing these abuses and assisted in the formation of the tailoresses union. Fenwick was personally thanked by the labour organisations for his services. He afterwards mediated in a wages dispute between the tailoresses and their employers. The papers were now thoroughly established. The Times had a colonial reputation and the Witness was not only a good farmers' weekly, but also a nursery of New Zealand literature.

Fenwick continued as managing director till his death but he was assisted from 1919 by W. Easton as manager. The paper gave its powerful assistance to cultural movements in Dunedin, notably in raising £10,000 for the endowment of Otago University; in raising money for a new wing to the museum to house the collection presented by Fenwick's friend Dr T. M. Hocken, and other public objects. Fenwick was a founder in Dunedin in 1885 of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, of which he was president for many years. He was a vice-president of the Patients and Prisoners Aid Society and when the prisons board was formed he was appointed a Government member and continued to act till 1927. He was on the committee of the Hocken library and the Art Gallery (of which he was a life member) and was a trustee of the Young Men's Christian Association. On principle he abstained from taking much part in public life, but he accepted nomination for the licensing committee on one occasion and was elected at the head of the poll. He was the first president of the Rotary Club in Dunedin.

Fenwick helped to organise the first press association in Dunedin and was in later years for a long period a director and sometime president of the United Press Association. He was a director also of the Newspaper Proprietors Association, the New Zealand Master Printers' Association, the Dunedin Tramways Co. and the Perpetual Trustees, Estate and Agency Co. In 1909 he attended the Empire press conference in London and was chairman of the New Zealand delegation. He took the keenest interest in gardening and trees, was an ardent walker and wrote several noteworthy pamphlets on the beauties of western Otago.

Fenwick married (1874) Jane, daughter of David Proudfoot. He was knighted in 1919 and died on 23 Sep 1929.

Who's Who N.Z., 1908, 1924; Paul; Otago Daily Times, 24 Sep 1929 (P).

Reference: Volume 1, page 140

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