Te Puke

Te Puke is a town 28 kilometers southeast of the Tauranga District Western Bay of Plenty .  It is especially known for the cultivation of kiwifruit. The city in 2006 had 7,080 permanent residents, this was a continuous increase of 6,492 in 1996 and 6,774 in 2001.  Te Puke is close to the coastal towns of Tauranga, Mount Maunganui, Papamoa and Maketu.

 

The village is located about 60 kilometers from Rotorua and by 75 kilometers away from Whakatane. The smaller towns Te Matai, Manoeka Paengaroa and are nearby. The city’s name means in the language of the Maori “The Mountain”, which reflects the situation reflected on a hill near the Papamoa Hills.

 

The warm, moist climate and fertile soil of the region is conducive to horticulture, particularly kiwifruit, citrus and avocados. The orchards are the most important economic factor in the region. The city is therefore marketed as “kiwifruit capital of the world.” Even livestock, especially dairy farming is operated here. 

History

Colonization

Around the year 1350 the Maori spread along the rivers in the region and built many fortified settlements (PA).  James Cook, in 1769 then still a lieutenant, sailed his first voyage between Motiti Iceland and the coast. Cook named the area “Bay of Plenty”, as he saw that it was apparently well-populated and fertile.

 

In 1830 the Danish sailor Philip Tapsell, (also known as Hans Homman Fella) in Maketu worked as a trader. Missionaries of the Church Missionary Society met briefly and set up mission stations in Te Papa (Tauranga) and Rotorua. After the New Zealand wars of the 1860s subsided in intensity, the European colonization of the Bay of Plenty began, but not in a big way. Maketu was then a thriving village with a school, post office and hotel, and since 1869 it has also had an Anglican church.

 

In 1876 the surveying of the land around the present block began. However, this was not completed until 1879, when the Native Land Court first had to complete its investigations into the ownership rights of Maori.  In 1877 there was established in Tauranga, the Working Men’s Association.  It had 48 members and put forward a request to 4,000 acres (16 hectares) of land from the block of Te Puke, which was to be paid in instalments.

 

At the same time, George Vesey Stewart applied to the Government, for Te Puke settlers to allow settlers from Britain, as he had already done with success in Katikati. The first settlers arrived in 1879, and included Peter Grant and his wife Caroline (nee Moon), William Bird and his wife Sarah (nee Leitch), Joseph Malyon and his wife Sara (nee James). The first settlers of Vesey Stewart met on 2^nd January 1881 on the Lady Jocelyn directly from London to Tauranga.

In July 1880 they began to build a road between Tauranga and Te Puke on the Road to Welcome Bay. It was built by the police and local Maori.  Previously, access was made to Te Puke along an ancient path of Maori on the Papamoa Hills Ngapeke after Manoeka. Peter Grant was withdrawn from the Tauranga County Council in 1879 under contract to extend this path to a mule track. Freight and passengers could reach the city of Tauranga also by boat, but you had to go first to Maketu, then up the Kaituna River to Canaan Landing.

 

From there you could sail with a canoe up the Waiari stream to the place of the current road bridge south of town.  By the end of 1881, Te Puke had 25 wooden buildings, including two hotels, two general stores, a butchers, a post office and a blacksmith. In 1884 there was a butter factory.

 

They began to drain the marshes and found the land suitable for agriculture, especially maize and wheat.  Later it was found that a large part of the country were “bush sick” (a deficiency phenomenon, which is due to a lack of iron, cobalt or zinc. Flax has been cultivated since the 1870s to the early 1940s and became an important industry over the years to the region. Sawmills were set up in 1905 and are still economically significant.  In 1883 the Papamoa Hills were found with gold ore.

 

This was dismantled in the 1920s into a mine at Muir’s farm on the road No. 4.  For the construction of the railway a large quarry was operated in Te Puke, which was a major employer.  Another major undertaking developed in 1968, a cold storage unit Rangiuru HortResearch and 1971, the road No. 1.

On 10^th June 1886 the city was severely hit by the outbreak, located 50km southeast of Mount Tarawera. The residents awakened by the eruption and the associated tremors. Many had a good view of the eruption, and images have been transmitted from this period.  Ash and mud covered fields and pastures, in some places 12 inches high. The sun was not visible until the afternoon.

 

The livestock were threatened by starvation, so that many farmers were forced to release them so that they could fend for themselves. A portion of the cattle was taken away from the affected area, but many animals died. The food and water for the settlers became scarce, so they gratefully accepted the help from Tauranga. Te Puke was once covered by an eruption of Mount Ruapehu in 1995, with ash, but not to the same extent. 

The town of Te Puke began to grow and a combined mission and City Hall building was  built in 1883. This was used for the meetings of the city and as a church for three of the parishes of the town. The first school, Te Puke Primary opened and the first newspaper was printed in 1923, The Te Puke Times.

 

The fire department was created a year later. A Jockey Club was created in 1890, a brass band in 1903, the Rugby Club in 1906, 1908 a Bowling Club and Golf Club in 1912. The trees along the middle of the main road, which today are important for the image of the city, were planted from 1914 to 1918 as a war memorial for the fallen. An infirmary was built in 1918 on Boucher Avenue, though all the more serious cases had to travel by train to Tauranga Hospital.