This article argues that William Pember Reeves's history of New Zealand, The Long White Cloud: Ao Tea Roa, published in 1898, played a pivotal role in establishing and promulgating the national ideology proclaiming New Zealand to be a model of social equality, by failing to mention how the resources of the nation were transferred from its indigenous population into colonist control. This ideology denied knowledge of the racist policies of successive New Zealand governments which deprived Māori of their lands and resources and sponsored inequality, primarily through legislation implemented by the Native Land Court