Photo Recall: Let's see those socks

Senior Constable David Powell shows Charlotte Wilkinson his red socks. Photo / Clint Marston. Photo Researcher / Emma Walter

Much like the black and silver flags flown during the Rugby World Cup, lucky red socks were the symbol of Kiwi support during the 2000 America's Cup campaign.

Two months ago, former police officer David Powell was sorting through belongings after a fire at his Epsom home when he came across a front page clipping from the New Zealand Herald, dated February 2000.

In the photo, Powell is gleefully raising his police regulation trouser leg to show off his non-regulation lucky red socks; the same type worn by 5-year-old Remuera schoolgirl Charlotte Wilkinson and her Corran School class.

Powell had often wondered what became of the sweet little girl he compared socks with that day.

The Herald on Sunday tracked Charlotte Wilkinson down to find her studying hard for her Cambridge exams - the last one's on Wednesday - with plans to go to university and get into law school. She's become a talented sports woman, representing New Zealand in under-17s water polo in Brisbane earlier this year.

Charlotte, now 17, remembers the day she was photographed with Senior Constable Powell 11 years ago.

"We were on our way back from chapel," she says.

These days, Powell works for Auckland Transport, running the cycle safety programme in West Auckland.

Always interested in road safety, he started with the Ministry of Transport in 1977 as a road traffic instructor, stayed in the job when the MOT amalgamated with the police in 1992, and retired from the force in 2005.

In 2000, Powell was working with schools teaching children road safety in the Stepping Out programme.

That year, New Zealand was gripped by America's Cup fever as Sir Peter Blake and Team New Zealand defended the Cup on home waters.

Red socks became inextricably linked with the America's Cup campaign after Sir Peter's wife, Pippa, gave him a pair of lucky red socks during the 1995 Cup battle in San Diego.

The Black Magic team came home victorious and, in 2000, Kiwis once again donned red socks in their thousands in support of the America's Cup campaign.

Powell's sergeant gave him a pair of the socks and he recalls "a bit of a hoo hah" in police ranks when the photo was published showing him wearing non-regulation attire.

"But as my sergeant had arranged for the photo to be taken, I thought I might as well wear them. I've still got those red socks."

A year later, the red socks came out again, this time as 30,000 mourners gathered in the Auckland Domain to farewell Sir Peter at a memorial service after his murder.

Armed pirates, known as "water rats", had boarded his environmental research boat Seamaster, anchored in the Brazilian Amazon, and when one threatened a crew member, Blake, 53, reached for his gun and was shot and killed by one of the pirates.