We have a clever display in the Whangārei Museum at Kiwi North called Deconstructed Fairytale. It combines a variety of locally sourced antique objects and gives visitors the opportunity to decipher the fairytale.

Included in this display is a selection of bowls with spoons, a chair, a porridge recipe and a bear. It is, of course, depicting the classic fairytale Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

I thought I knew the story of Goldilocks. A cute girl with curly golden hair, a family of bears, but I’ve learned this week that I only knew the modern version. The original was a whole lot darker.

First written by Eleanor Mure in 1831, her tale was called The Story of the Three Bears. Mure had created a hand-made book as a gift for her nephew, which was circulated within their family. It was written in verse and included watercolour illustrations. From the very first sentence, it was clear that this story would be different to the one I knew.

“Many ages ago, it was common, I find,

For dumb creatures to talk just as well as mankind”.

It goes on to talk of a world where animals, no longer happy with their station, talked to the king about living as equals with people. The three bears were not a family as we have come to know them, but three bachelors that moved into a house “among the dwellings of men”.

These three bears never met Goldilocks, however, as in the original story, the antagonist was an old woman who was eager to make their acquaintance. The bears weren’t so keen and refused to invite her in, so she waited for them to leave their home and proceeded to explore their house alone.

Things are a little more familiar at this point. First, she tries the bear’s milk, preferring the third bowl. Next, she sits in their chairs, once again preferring the third one until the bottom falls out of it, and finally, she tries their beds, but the comfiest of these also breaks.

This is where the story takes a shocking turn. The old lady sees the bears returning home and hides fearfully in the closet. The bears eventually find her and, referring to her as a delinquent and an old enemy, they drag her out of the closet to decide on her punishment.

First, they throw her on a fire but she doesn’t burn. Next, they try to drown her but she doesn’t drown. Finally, they decide to “chuck her aloft on St Paul’s churchyard steeple”.

The first printed version was published six years after the original in 1837 by English writer and poet Robert Southey. The old woman remained in the story, portrayed as extremely rude and having been sent away by her family for being a disgrace.

This contrasted with the three bears, which were described as good-natured, trusting, harmless, tidy and hospitable. It is in this version that the woman is found sleeping in Wee Bear’s bed and chased away, never to be seen again.

It wasn’t until Joseph Cundall released his version 12 years later that the old woman was replaced by a young girl. He made this decision because he believed there were too many stories about villainous old women and he wanted the character to be sweeter and more naive. He called her Silver-Hair.

The name Goldilocks was used for the first time in 1904.

The artifacts which make up our Deconstructed Fairytale display include a teddy bear that once belonged to Neville Clarke, who grew up in the Clarke Homestead.

There is a soup bowl made by Grimwade Bros, accompanied by a spoon that belonged to Sgt. E. J. Drake, who fought in World War II. He returned to Whangārei from the war but was down a pinky finger. What looks like a pillow is a nightdress case, and the cookbook with the porridge recipe is from the early 1900s.

Even as a child, I was a little confused about how people could find a story of what equates to a home invasion appropriate, but having now read the original version, I am grateful to have grown up knowing of the curly-haired girl and the family of bears. The story of a cantankerous old lady who meets an appalling demise is not one I’ll be telling my own kids any time soon.