(John Ballance is visible above in the photograph on display at Ballance House)
In 1866, John, and his wife of three years, Fanny, who was in ill-health, decided to emigrate to New Zealand, a step that was to change John's life dramatically. They travelled on a long sea journey which eventually took them to the small town of Wanganui, North Island, New Zealand. John soon got a job as a reporter. The newspaper that he began was called the Evening Herald, later called the Wanganui Herald. Tragedy struck in 1868 when Fanny Taylor died.
A few years later, however, John re-married to a young girl called Ellen Anderson, who had been born and brought up in County Down.