Garage museum full of surprises

When Joan Rogers said she wanted her lounge back, husband Robbie had no choice but to convert part of the garage into a museum.

Joan shares Robbie’s love of history and collecting interesting objects but she didn’t want to live in a museum.


Robbie Rogers’ museum in his Rotorua garage may be small but it contains an amazing collection of memorabilia and examples of early technology.

A shelf in the museum holds a number of ‘Artillery Splitting Guns’ which were filled with explosives to blast apart timber. The accompanying advertisement for them claims “Every farmer, every post splitter – everyone” – should have one. Somehow using a chainsaw seems a little underwhelming in comparison to blowing up logs.

Robbie delights in teasing visitors about the purpose of some of the more obscure items in his collection.

“Now this,” he says – holding up an over-sized tennis racket shaped object without any strings – “is for hitting those big mosquitos in the South Island.”

Well it’s a good story but in fact the object is for beating the dust out of carpets – thank goodness for vacuum cleaners.

Among the ‘labour saving’ devices on display is a beautifully restored and polished copper washing machine, which still requires a good degree of manual labour to operate the lever on the side to work its mechanism.


This early washing machine in Robbie Rogers’ collection has been beautifully restored.

Joan and Robbie believe it’s important to restore and protect objects from the past because technology is changing so rapidly, their significance will otherwise be forgotten.

Robbie and Joan’s museum is a private one but they are happy to share it with small groups by arrangement. Phone Robbie on 0274 502 723.


Joan Rogers enjoys restoring cane doll’s prams and pushchairs.


Is this an over-sized fly swot? Robbie Rogers claims it’s for hitting South Island mosquitos.


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