Jessie Mackay

Who was Jessie Mackay?

Jessie Mackay was a New Zealand poet.

Her Scottish parents were the shepherd Robert Mackay and his wife, Elizabeth Mackay. She went to Christchurch to train as a teacher, and taught at small rural schools until 1898. She moved to Dunedin, and worked as a journalist for the Otago Witness.

In 1902, she moved to Christchurch where she lived with her sister Georgina. In 1906, she was lady editor of the Canterbury Times.

Her papers are held by the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Wellington, New Zealand. The Jessie Mackay Memorial Award for Verse is given by the PEN New Zealand.