University of Otago historian Dorothy Page joined NCW in the 1980s, and has served the organisation at both a local and national level.
"I am enormously honoured and somewhat surprised - I don't really think of myself as patronly," Dr Page said.
"But I am highly delighted to be honoured in this way."
The first incarnation of the NCW, with suffrage campaigner Kate Sheppard as its president, was formed in 1896 but went in to abeyance soon after the turn of the century.
The vast amount of community work - often led by women - carried out during World War 1 resulted in calls for the council to be revived, and in April 1918 the first conference of the newly reconstituted NCW was held.
"It was suggested with the development of urban centres they set local branches up rather than have one big get-together annually, which was limiting for a number of people for distance and financial reasons," Dr Page, the author of the NCW's history, said.
"It was a new organisation, a little less effervescent than the earlier one perhaps ... but people with plenty of energy and commitment were willing to take part."
Dunedin was one of the first branches to be resurrected, and it has sent delegates to all national conferences since.
Then, as now, welfare work was one of its priorities.
Care of intellectually handicapped children and visiting patients at Seacliff and Orokonui hospitals was a staple of the Dunedin branch's early days.
Today the branch raises funds for Women's Refuge and the Salvation Army and runs educational campaigns for young women.
The Dunedin branch marks its centenary tomorrow with a dinner at the Otago University Staff Club.
The guest speaker will be former governor-general Dame Silvia Cartwright.
