Did you know?
Image courtesy of Chris Anderson.
One of these facts isn’t fair dinkum.*
2. It’s believed that because of its early and widespread international use, Kiwi polish was instrumental in making the Kiwi both the national symbol of New Zealand and the most commonly used name for the islands’ residents.
3. N ew Zealand band, Crowded House, released a limited edition vinyl copy of their album, Temple of Low Men with a cover which pastiched the Kiwi shoe polish logo.
4. K iwi shoe polish contains 3’,6’-Bis-(Diethylamino) -Fluoran, the same dye that used to be used in heat-sensitive carbonless paper for fax machines.
5. The same substance which gives supermarket apples their sheen is also used in Kiwi shoe polish. It’s called Carnauba wax and can also be found in chewing gum and dental floss.
6. In Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, exMarine Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro) is seen setting his Kiwi shoe polish alight to soften it prior to buffing his boots. This is possible, although not necessarily recommended, because the polish contains the highly flammable heavy naphtha.
*Calm down Record Collector readers! The vinyl alluded to in number three doesn’t actually exist.
1. Kiwi used to carry a shade of polish called ‘Nigger Brown’. It became associated with the (white) Australian rugby league centre, Edwin Brown, who was said to use the polish. In 1960, he had a stand named after him at his home club of Toowoomba in Queensland. Despite the unceasing efforts of anti-racism activist, Stephen Hagan, the E S ‘Nigger Brown’ stand remained in existence until the ground was modernised in 2008.
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