New Zealand Local Weather Forum
Weather Discussion => Historical => Topic started by: JennyLeez on February 29, 2012, 12:35:38 PM
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An interesting piece of history as only noted every 4 years due to the opening being on Leap Day.
(http://panui.tangatawhenua.com/rangikainga/images/3/maungapohatu.jpg)
A milling road built by the Bayten Timber Company provided the first vehicle access to the remote Urewera settlement of Maungapōhatu – famous as the former home of the prophet Rua Kēnana. The road was opened by Sir Eruera Tirikātene, who, as Minister of Forests (1957–60), had pushed for its construction despite the opposition of his department. Undeterred by torrential rain, more than 1500 people attended the opening celebrations, travelling over the steep, winding road in 12 buses and 200 cars and trucks.
For a few years the milling operation brought modest prosperity to this isolated and impoverished area, which had never recovered from the exodus of most of its inhabitants. According to Rotorua’s Daily Post, Maungapōhatu’s permanent population in 1964 was just 15.
For a time in the 1920s it had seemed possible that Maungapōhatu might become economically viable. At Rua’s urging, Ngāi Tūhoe had donated 16,000 ha of land to the government in 1922 so that arterial roads could be built to connect the settlement with eastern Bay of Plenty and Ruatāhuna. Construction was expected to start in 1927, but the roads were never built. By the early 1930s most of the local people had left to seek food and employment elsewhere (Tūhoe finally received some monetary compensation for their gift in 1958). Rua Kēnana died at Matahi, a community he had founded on the Waimana River, in 1937. His hopes that Tūhoe could live fruitfully on their own lands and take control of their own lives remain largely unfulfilled.
New Zealand History online
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Thanks for that Jenny - just love history.