Joseph Hodgens (1886–1955) was a New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 politician of the Labour Party

New Zealand Labour Party

The New Zealand Labour Party is a New Zealand political party. It describes itself as centre-left and socially progressive and has been one of the two primary parties of New Zealand politics since 1935....

.

He represented the Manawatu electorate of Palmerston from 1935

New Zealand general election, 1935

The 1935 New Zealand general election was a nationwide vote to determine the shape of the New Zealand Parliament's 25th term. It resulted in the Labour Party's first electoral victory, with Michael Joseph Savage becoming the first Labour Prime Minister...

, and from 1938

New Zealand general election, 1938

The 1938 New Zealand general election was a nationwide vote to determine the shape of the New Zealand Parliament's 26th term. It resulted in the governing Labour Party being re-elected, although the newly-founded National Party gained a certain amount of ground.-Background:The Labour Party had won...

 when it was renamed Palmerston North

Palmerston North (New Zealand electorate)

Palmerston North is a New Zealand Parliamentary electorate, returning one Member of Parliament to the New Zealand House of Representatives. The current MP for Palmerston North is Iain Lees-Galloway of the Labour Party...

, to 1946 when he retired.

Born in Nelson

Nelson, New Zealand

Nelson is a city on the eastern shores of Tasman Bay, and is the economic and cultural centre of the Nelson-Tasman region. Established in 1841, it is the second oldest settled city in New Zealand and the oldest in the South Island....

, Hodgens was a builder, Secretary of the Carpenters Union, and served on the Palmerston North Borough Council (1919–21; 1923–38) He was a relative of Pat Hickey

Pat Hickey (New Zealand)

-Blackball 1908:Born at Waimea South, near Nelson in 1882, Pat Hickey rose to prominence as Secretary of the New Zealand Federation of Miners and a leader in the Blackball Miners' Union in 1908...

(Savage, p. 283).