Elsie Violet Locke (née Farrelly; 17 August 1912 – 8 April 2001) was a New Zealand communist writer, historian, and leading activist in the feminism and peace movements.

[6] Meanwhile, Ellen had been a teenager during the New Zealand women's suffrage movement, and passed on the idea of gender equality to her daughters, as well as teaching them the value of being independent.

[3] As a young girl, she witnessed the injuries of World War I veterans first hand — "...when visiting Warkworth I was taken to see a man whose face had been half shot away and who never went off his farm".

[3] Unusually for a Pākehā of her generation, she developed a close relationship with the local iwi in Waiuku, Ngāti Te Ata, and her later research proved vital to their Treaty of Waitangi claim.

[1][6] She started in 1930, at the beginning of the Depression, and Locke struggled for income – she lived off a mixture of scholarships and part-time jobs, such as working at the Parnell Public Library.

[6] In 1932 during her time at the university, Locke had an experience that would become a major influence on her future political ideology and activism, according to her daughter, Maire Leadbeater.

[2] This "watershed experience" was the sight of 10,000 unemployed men marching down Queen Street, which according to Leadbeater instilled in Locke an ambition "to be one with all who struggled and all who were oppressed".

[2] Locke wrote of her early life and education in her 1981 autobiography, Student at the Gates, which discusses the influences which shaped her socialist philosophies, and some of New Zealand's dominant political and literary personalities of the 1920s and 1930s.

[2][3][6][7] Jack was soon posted in Christchurch by the Communist Party, and in 1944 they moved into 392 Oxford Terrace, a "tiny gingerbread cottage" with an outside toilet, on the banks of the Avon River.

[2] The original purpose of these committees was to publish the early monthly feminist journal, The Working Woman, which Locke began with the support of the Communist Party the same year.

[6] Woman Today was edited by Locke, and ran until October 1939, with contributions from notable writers such as Gloria Rawlinson and Robin Hyde.

[2][6] Locke later wrote that "a 'second wave' of feminism came at that time and was building up when it was cut short by the war, and much of it was expressed in and concentrated around Woman Today.

"[6] In 1936 concern for families unable to support unplanned children led Lock and Lois Suckling to convene the first meeting of the Sex, Hygiene and Birth Regulation Society, of which they were secretary and president respectively.

[11] It dated back to when Leadbeater delivered the People's Voice, a communist newspaper, at 10 years old, and contained detailed information from private meetings held in homes and offices.

[3] Locke focused a lot more of her attention into peace activism after she left the Communist Party in 1956, though she had been involved in anti-war issues her whole life, including the campaign against conscription in the late 1940s.

[6] She was commissioned by the School Publication Branch to write a series of historical booklets from 1962 to 1968, designed to educate children about New Zealand's social history, and later compiled in The Kauri and the Willow: How we Lived and Grew from 1801–1942 (1984).

[3][6] According to The Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature, she expressed the Māori point of view "with sympathy and insight in novels that in this respect were in advance of general perceptions and political correctness".

[1][6] Originally issued with illustrations by Anthony Maitland, and reissued in 1993 with illustrations by Gary Hebley, The Runaway Settlers is a historical fiction novel based on the true story of Mrs Small and her children, who flee from the violent Mr Small in Sydney, assume the family name Phipps, and settle in Governors Bay, south of Christchurch.

[6] The Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature describes The End of the Harbour as "a compassionate exploration of land issues from Maori and Pakeha perspectives".

[1] A Canoe in the Mist, the story of two girls experiences during the 1886 eruption of Mount Tarawera, was released by Jonathan Cape in 1984, with illustrations by John Shelley.

Lillian lives with her widowed mother in the village of Te Wairoa, a popular destination for visitors seeking the famous volcanic sights of Lake Rotomahana.

Lillian befriends Mattie, the daughter of English tourists, and together they see the famous Pink and White Terraces, but ominous signs have been seen – a tidal wave on the usually calm lake, and there are reports of a waka wairua ghostly canoe seen through the mist.

[3] The Elsie Locke Park 43°31′41″S 172°38′28″E / 43.5280°S 172.6412°E / -43.5280; 172.6412 was located on Oxford Terrace in front of the Centennial Pool,[21] but was removed after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake to make way for the Margaret Mahy Playground.