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Graphic: An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand 1966.

Warning

This information was published in 1966 in An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock. It has not been corrected and will not be updated.

Up-to-date information can be found elsewhere in Te Ara.

Contents


REESE, Daniel

(1879–1953).

New Zealand representative cricketer.

A new biography of Reese, Daniel appears in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography on this site.

Daniel Reese was born at Lichfield Street, Christchurch, on 26 January 1879, the son of Daniel Reese, a builder and contractor, and of Cecilia née Wilson, both parents having emigrated from Lanarkshire. He was educated at West Christchurch High School and at Canterbury University School of Engineering, and was apprenticed with Anderson's Ltd., Christchurch, from 1894 to 1900. He worked as a draughtsman with Howard Smith and Co., Melbourne, from 1900 to 1903 and was then ship's engineer until 1906. In the following year he returned to New Zealand where, in partnership with T. W. Reese, he established Reese Brothers, a Christchurch timber, coal, and hardware firm.

While still an apprentice, Reese was playing cricket for the Midland Club, Christchurch, and for Canterbury, first representing New Zealand when he was 16. He played for the Melbourne Cricket Club from 1900 to 1903, for London County, 1903, and for the Tottenham Club (London), and Essex County (W. G. Grace's team), 1906. He represented New Zealand on the Australian tour, 1898–99, 1913–14, and against Melbourne, 1899–1900; M.C.C., 1902–03, 1906–07; Australia, 1909–10, 1913–14. Reese devoted many years to cricket administration. He was a member of Lancaster Park Board of Control, 1907–21; Canterbury Cricket Association, 1907–12 (and president, 1925–53); New Zealand Cricket Council Executive, 1908–29 (and president, 1929–31, 1935–36). Outside cricket he was a member of the Government Railways Board, 1931–34, and a director of the Norwich Union Fire Insurance Co. In 1948 he wrote Was it All Cricket?, an entertaining volume of sporting and business reminiscences. On 2 April 1913, at the Methodist Church, St. Albans, Christchurch, Reese married Esther Nina Blucher, daughter of the Rev. William George Parsonson. He died at 69 Hackthorne Road, Cashmere Hills, Christchurch, on 12 June 1953.

Dan Reese was a left-hand batsman, a slowmedium bowler, and probably the best fieldsman ever seen in New Zealand. Sir P. F. Warner rated him as among the greatest of all time.

by Bernard John Foster, M.A., Research Officer, Department of Internal Affairs, Wellington.

  • New Zealand Cricket, 1914–33, Reese, T. W. (1936)
  • The Cricket Almanac of New Zealand, 1953 (Obit)
  • Press (Christchurch), 13 June 1953 (Obit).

Co-creator

Bernard John Foster, M.A., Research Officer, Department of Internal Affairs, Wellington.