Donovan’s World

I wrote and illustrated Country Churches of New Zealand. It was published in 2002 by New Holland, Publishers and is still on sale in bookshops. The publishers have kindly agreed to me re-publishing some of the book’s images and descriptions in this blog.

By the time I reached St Francis’s church the early autumn rain had crossed the Rimutaka ranges and had reached Kahutara, just south of Featherston.

I was pleased enough to shelter briefly in the unusually square nave whose wooden walls exuded the musky smell of linseed oil.

Built in 1882 at Morrison’s Bush, the church was moved to its present site - donated by John Bidwill - in 1961 and dedicated for the joint use of Anglicans, Methodists and Presbyterians. At £400 the move cost twice as much as the original building - there’s inflation.

© DON DONOVAN
 
donovan@ihug.co.nz

COBBLESTONES MUSEUM COLONIAL COTTAGE, GREYTOWN

One thing’s certain: NZ Historic Places Trust’s Registered Building No. 4001 is a pretty piece of symmetry. Another certainty is that it was built by a Mr. Towsey and stood near the Anglican Church before it was removed in 1972 to its present site. Beyond that all facts are in dispute, little is known, and there’s much speculation. A notice beside the front door reads:

which might mean that Mr Towsey erected more than one cottage in 1862, not that it was one of Greytown’s first dwellings: which it certainly wasn’t.

Greytown had been set up as a ‘designer’ town six years earlier, in 1854, by the Small Farm Association whose objective was to help working class early settlers to gain proprietary access to land. Named after Governor Sir George Grey it was an important town (and might have remained so had the railway line laid in 1878 from Wellington not by-passed it). It started with 110, one acre sections and it’s obvious that even if only a few had had cottages built on them Mr Towsey’s wouldn’t have been among them.

In one of the back rooms of the cottage I found an old poster. I’m pleased somebody saved it. From it I deduce that they didn’t name the orchestra because they hadn’t yet hired one; that the difference between two shillings and half-a-crown was a sixpenny supper; that the ‘trophys’ (they couldn’t spell even then) were for the highest number of bulls scored with .22 rifles on a 25-yard range; and that ‘old time’ meant the polka and old fashioned waltz not those ghastly new-fangled things like the fox-trot and quickstep! Ah, happy days in Greytown.

Upon entering Featherston after negotiating the numbing loops of the Rimutaka Highway one of the first things you notice is the Royal Tavern squatting solid and grey like a land-based battleship on the southern side of Revans Street. Impressive and reassuring, it seems to exemplify the essence of the town.

The first pub burned down and was replaced by the present building in 1893. A photograph in the ‘New Zealand Cyclopaedia’ of 1906 proves that it has hardly altered in nearly a century. It was then described as having thirty-five well furnished rooms, the best liquors and accommodation, a good table, being lighted by ‘a private installation of acetylene gas’ and having ‘up-to-date fire escape appliances.’ In an age of motels it’s now a tavern and most of the upstairs rooms are empty.

My first experience of Tauherenikau was on a hot summer’s day at the nearby racecourse where a friend’s horse won its race. Later, under shady trees in the gardens, we celebrated with a champagne picnic out of the boot of his cream Chevrolet Impala and felt ourselves to be quite special. Heady days!

Many years later, while cruising down State Highway 2, two things about the Tauherenikau Hotel stopped me in my tracks. One was the bold brilliance of the lettering ‘THE TIN HUT’ on the roof, which screams itself halfway up the Wairarapa; the other was that fascinating door to nowhere with its Parisian canopy. It used to lead to a first floor balcony that became unsafe: now (it still opens) it’ll lead to a broken ankle if anybody’s daft enough to walk though it.

The first licencee, in 1857, was Thomas Hales, who also ran the ferry across the Tauherenikau River. It was quite a large establishment, having eighteen rooms. From around 1865 the hotel became inextricably entwined with horse racing. At that time the Ferry Reserve, which eventually became the site of the race course, was covered with scrub and holes made by the 1855 earthquake, and was considered ‘a dangerous piece of land to ride over’, but Robert Rowe, lessee of both the hotel and the reserve, reckoned that if it could be made safe for racing both the district, and the hotel, would benefit. Trustees were appointed but nothing much happened until a new owner of the hotel, C. Potts, offered to form and fence the course for them in return for a lease of the ground for 21 years at a small rental. His offer was accepted, the course was finished and the Wairarapa Racing Club had their first meeting at Tauherenikau in 1874.