Lambert Gee

Lambert Gee Ouw Low 朱鋈鎏 Zhuhuangtang village 朱黄塘村

5 October 1923 – 16 July 2016

Lambert was born in New Zealand but his parents sent back to China at a young age to learn his Chinese which proved fruitful when he came back to NZ in the 1940’s.

When he settled down in Wellington in 1949 after having lived in Auckland and Raetihi, he became involved in the affairs of the Chinese community and was a delegate at the 9th New Zealand Chinese conference held at the Tung Jung Association premises in Frederick Street. Prior to this, he had been involved in the Ohakune Chinese Association between 1942 to 1944 and the Auckland Chinese Association between 1947 to 1948. He became an executive member of the Tung Jung Association in 1949 and was also involved with the New Zealand Chinese Association at the same time as it was based in Wellington.

In 1950, he was elected president of the Tung Jung Association and though his term of office was for only one year, he served in the committee until 1952 when his family responsibilities took priority. Being on the Tung Jung committee, many of the NZCA conferences were held at the Tung Jung premises in those early years. He was also involved with the erection of the Tung Jung memorial at Karori Cemetery in Wellington, so that members could gather at one central point when observing the traditional Ching Ming and Chung Yeung festivals instead of moving from grave to grave.

He was elected into the New Zealand Chinese Association committee in 1951 and was a delegate at the 16th NZCA conference representing Wellington. He was involved in the sub-committee to revise the constitution of the NZCA in 1963 and remained as an executive officer of the Wellington branch of the NZCA until 1973 and as a national executive of the NZCA until 1983.

One of his biggest achievements when serving on the NZCA committee was in 1971, when he was involved in consultations with the then Australian High Commissioner as to the reason why NZ Chinese had to complete documentation for entry into Australia when others didn’t have to. This procedure was later withdrawn and NZ Chinese then had equal rights to enter Australia.

Lambert also helped to organise the classification of NZCA documents before his retirement which later on facilitated the writing of the NZCA history book “Turning Stone Into Jade”.

He is survived by his daughters Evelyn and Lois and son Martin and their families.^[1]----