Biographical information provided by Helen Smith for the He Tohu exhibition:
Judith Ann Hare was born in 1862 in Lurgan, Ireland, to Joseph and Maggie Hare (nee Metcalf). The Hare family came to New Zealand in 1865 on the Lancashire Witch. The following year Maggie died in childbirth and Joseph married a widow, Hannah Skinner, who also had a large family. The family converted to 7th Day Adventism in 1885. Judith married William Shannon Taylor, a sewing machine salesman, in 1895 and they settled in Whangarei. They had Thomas William (1898-1962), Helena Martha (1900-1995), Robert Eugene (1904-1984), Margaret Annie (1906-1991). Widowed in 1926, Judith died in 1957 in Whangarei.
She is probably related to Hannah, Maud and Elizabeth Hare who all signed Sheet 375 at Kaeo. Her sisters Margaret Lane, Martha Lawrence and sister-in-law, Maria Hare, also signed.