New Zealand

The Columbia Broadcasting System presents Norman Corwin's One World Flight, linked to an authentic Maori chant sung by a chorus of Maori school girls in the town hall of Auckland, New Zealand. This is one of many sounds and voices recorded inside New Zealand.

Be heard tonight on this 12th of a series of 13 broadcasts, based upon Norman Corwin's recent global tour as first winner of the One World Flight Award, established in memory of Wendell Wilkie. This is Norman Cohen.

The Dominion of New Zealand was the last country visited in the course of the One World Flight, and in many ways it was the most remarkable. Just how remarkable and in what ways you may judge for yourself.

As for me, I must confess that when I boarded a flying boat in Sydney, bound for New Zealand, I knew only that I shared the average Americans lack of information about that country. I had always thought Australia and New Zealand were close together, but they're actually as far apart as Providence, Rhode Island and Havana, Cuba.

And the distance on this particular day was filled with clouds that obscured the face of the sea. An overcast makes monotonous scenery in any part of the world, so I thought to improve the hours by whittling away at my ignorance on the subject of our next stop.

I looked at a map and realized New Zealand was no mere spec out in the Pacific, but a crescent of two islands whose length, north to south, is equal to the distance between Seattle and Los Angeles.

Also, I'd had an idea that New Zealand was at least as old a country as we, but a fellow passenger set me right. The United States was already fighting a territorial war against Mexico before the first white settlers really took hold of New Zealand.