Maker: Bridget Fraser

Panel number: 371

Petition sheet number: 443

Person honouring: Mrs Bridget Tyne

Relationship to maker: Great-great-grandmother.

Bridget was born in Poverty Bay in 1853 to Susan and William McMahon.

In 1877 she married William Tyne; they had four sons (Edmund, Patrick William, Thomas, Francis Leo) before husband William died in 1884. She was in Napier when she signed the petition, and by 1896 she was registered to vote. 

We don’t know much more about Bridget except she apparently had amazing blue eyes, and spent most of the rest of her life in the Hawke’s Bay region – until she died in 1924. 

As a descendant of Bridget Tyne, my panel has a simplified family tree that shows Bridget with her sons, represented by four small lines. Then Thomas (my great-grandfather) with three small lines to represent his children, including my grandmother Joy, then my mother Helen, myself, and my daughter Emma.

The tree is placed on a map of the East Cape and Hawke’s Bay because Bridget spent most of her life there. 

The other signatories on sheet 443 were living in a similar area in Napier – with commonly occurring road names including White, Black, and Beach roads. I placed most of the Xs (to represent other signatories on the petition sheet) near the area they signed in.

Panel materials: Used offcuts from Vinnies Re-Sew, material leftover from other projects, and garden twine.