Minnie Dean - in Popular Culture

In Popular Culture

In 1985, Dean's trial was the subject of In Defence of Minnie Dean, the first episode of the Emmy-nominated Hanlon New Zealand television drama series about the career of Dean's lawyer. The episode won the Best Director, Best Drama Programme, Drama Script, and Performance, Female, in a Dramatic Role categories at the 1986 Listener Television Awards (also called the GOFTA Awards), and "contributed to a re-evaluation of Dean's conviction".

Minnie Dean is referenced in Dudley Benson's 2006 song "It's Akaroa's Fault" ("I don't want to meet Minnie Dean at the end of my life/If I were to meet her I'd keep her hatbox in sight"). Authors Lynley Hood and John Rawle wrote posthumous accounts and reconstructions of the case as the centenary of her apprehension and execution occurred, in 1995.

On Friday 30 January 2009 the Otago Daily Times reported that a headstone had appeared mysteriously on Dean's grave. The headstone reads "Minnie Dean is part of Winton's history Where she now lies is now no mystery". It is unknown who placed the headstone there. Her family had been considering it but claim that this was not their doing.

The Southland Times reported on 23 February 2009 that the family laid a headstone to honour Dean and her husband's grave.

At the 2012 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, a play titled "A Cry Too Far From Heaven" was performed by a Southland (NZ) theatre company and featured Minnie Dean as one of the title characters on her last night before execution.