Gordon, Thomas Lindsay (Lindsay) Interview

[Interview recorded in 1992]

My name is Dorothy Skinner, and today I’m talking with Mr Lindsay Gordon at his home in Clive, in Farndon House where this interview is being recorded. Perhaps we could start with your family background; where and when were you born?

I was born in [on] July 31st 1894. The bearing of this child is very interesting, of that history at the time, because when I was born the only doctor was in Napier, and we had to get the man that looked after all the horses in those days – my father got him to ride from Clifton Station to Napier to bring Doctor W Moore out to Clifton homestead to bring this into the world. And that was a brother of the old original J N Anderson that [who] had the nursery garden away up on the hill, not far from the public hospital. That’s the first thing; well that was the man that [who] rode the horse – that’s the connection there. Later on – years later on – here, I happened to meet that same man, and I was thrilled to the core having met him; I thought he was dead years ago. And I said, “Was it worthwhile your riding all the way to Napier on horseback to bring the doctor back?” “Well”, he said, “ha” … just laughed.

And where was your mother born?

Mother was born at ‘Riverslea’. It’s a great big house halfway between here and Havelock North, on the right hand side going to Havelock.

Can you remember the date when she was born?

No, I’ve forgotten that; she was the fourth one. No I can’t … no, I can’t. It’d tell you all of that in the cemetery; see, all that’s written down in the cemetery.

And where was your father born?

My father … I’m sure looking back, was born in India, I think. ‘Cause that’s again a sidetrack, a very interesting sidetrack. We’re going back into history.

Where were they married? Were they married in India?

No, no, no, no, married out here. In those days my grandfather Tanner didn’t want his daughters to marry at all. And the Ngaruroro [River] used to be between him and civilisation, really, [chuckle] and I don’t know how they ever got courting. Still don’t know.

What religion were your parents?

My grandfather Gordon was Church of England, all very low church in those days because he was Scottish; he was a proper Scot.

Who were your godparents?

Ah … her father, and …

Miss Tanner?

Miss Tanner’s father.

Second speaker: My father was born in 1870; was your mother older than ..?

Lindsay: Oh yeah. Yes.

Second speaker: So she was born somewhere in the sixties?

Lindsay: Your father’s towards the last [?]. It was a very big family at that time.

Do you know anything about your grandparents … where they were born?

Oh, well which grandparents do you want, male or female?

Well, your mother …

My mother’s were born out here at the Riverslea house where the bulk of the children were born.

And what was your father’s occupation before he was married?

Farmer.

Second speaker: Grandfather Tanner?

Yes.

Lindsay: Now which do you mean? What did you say? What was that?

Well, your father’s occupation?

Yes, farmer.

And when did he buy his farm, and where was it?

He didn’t buy it, he inherited it from my grandfather, because originally Clifton Station was thirteen thousand acres. Well it’s all a very big subject you’re asking [about].

‘Tis; we’ll just move on to that a little later. How many brothers and sisters did you have?

One sister, Eileen.

And also born at …

Yes, at Clifton.

And tell me a little bit about your life as a child … you grew up in Clifton?

Partly; at three years old we went with our Nurse … Father and Mother and Nurse and my sister and myself, to England. We stayed with my grandfather in his lovely Georgian house in Devonshire … Northam; we stayed there for two years. We had a photograph with a donkey cart – I remember all that very well, ‘cause we stayed two years in England.

Can you tell me a little about your home here at Clifton?

When we were coming [chuckle] … then I’ve got to deviate that you ask me a question like that – it’s a very long subject. I don’t actually remember the original house of Clifton. I have got a photograph – I’ll show you all the photographs on the walls. The original house, I don’t remember that because when we came back from England when I was five … I remember all that, but the house had burnt down. By the time we arrived in New Zealand – it took many weeks to come out here, I can assure you; and by the time we arrived out here the original Clifton, which was a lovely old place – I’ll show you a photograph – that had burnt down.

And my Tanner grandparents … lovely, great big house [Riverslea] … that had been burnt down too; all about the same period. And we had nowhere to go at all. This is when I was five years old.

‘Bout the turn of the century?

Yeah, just about the turn … just at the time of the turn of the century, I suppose.

So the house was rebuilt?

So the house was rebuilt, I think the present one, 1902. I remember all the incidents, too, the whole lot; very nasty incidents, too. No, I’ve got a very good memory. I can tell you where the hidden cash is, too.

Is the house still standing?

Oh yes.

And do you remember who designed it?

I can’t remember who designed it, but Bull Brothers built it. It was their first big house to build. And I can remember – and I can tell you awful stories – remember the people that carted; I can remember everything about that. I remember seeing all the wood stacked like that for a year, and they wouldn’t build it in those days until it’d been all seasoned. It was all heart timber.

Who lived in the house apart from you and the family? Was it just the family?

Oh, Lord yes. It still is there, the house. It’s there now.

Is it still occupied by members of the family?

Oh, it’s occupied by my great or great-great nephew, one of my half-brother’s sons, living in it. It’s an awful history I’ve got.

What was your family life like?

Oh, God – you’re going back in the good old days. At twenty-seven years old I remember having to raise my cap in Herschell Street … twenty-seven years old in those days. So men of my father’s age – called them ‘Sir’.

Who made the decisions in your family?

Both. Both my … I had a wonderful mother … really wonderful mother. *She was killed in the first [?earthquake?] car crash – her father was very badly injured – at Helensville. One train a day, and it passed through the middle of Helensville.

And as a child, what were your leisure activities?

Oh, vast; because in those days there were no shops and no means of getting there. And if we were given a toy – that’s why I look after everything that I’ve got – ‘cause I was trained, used to look after anything that was given to us ‘cause gifts like that were very rare. But we had animals, you see.

Did you ride a lot?

Yes, from childhood.

My mother imported one of her nieces, Mrs [?Heggs?], and her sister – this chap who came here – her mother, Mrs McIntyre. She was brought up as a sister of ours ‘cause my mother couldn’t have any more, and she’s like a Māori, she borrowed one from my aunt. Brought up with us entirely.

Can you remember any stories that you were told as a child?

Oh … no, because those’d go in one ear and out of the other. All that I learned from my parents … ‘Do unto others as you’d be done by’.

And my sister and I, and my wife, we all lived here, you see, in the end. We were brought up very strictly indeed.

Are there any events in your childhood which stuck in your mind?

So many. I’ll tell you one thing – it came out in [on] the wireless the other day in an interview I think, or something of that sort – and why not, ‘cause there were no doctors or anything of that sort available if anything happened when we were children. And we were always cutting ourselves and doing that sort of thing; and if we’d had a cut we had no sticking plasters and things like we’ve got today. We’d go into the old stables where [there were a] tremendous number of draught horses etcetera, and go and get a decent cobweb and wrap that round the wound – straight off hanging there. And we never got any diseases from it; stopped the flow of blood.

So they were a natural antiseptic?

Mmm. I saw that the other day, rather interesting, in the paper that someone had done that. Oh, [???] in those days. We were isolated, you see, it’s a long way.

What did you do about your school?

Oh, we had governesses. We had governesses until I went to old Heretaunga when I was about nine, I think it was … nine or ten, ‘cause I left there when I was twelve to go home to England.

Can you remember what you studied at school …

No.

… when you went to Heretaunga?

I’ve got no brains. I have got no academic brains at all.

You went back to England for how long?

Well I went to school in England, ‘cause my parents – they both had [an] English education; both sides of my family, all of them, had English educations, and they were determined that my sister and I would have an English education; particularly me, because being born a colonial they thought I’d be much more useful to society if I had an English education as well – be able to look at things from both sides, ‘cause they’d had that. And my father thought that I’d be much more useful if I could look at things from a different point of view to the colonial one. You’ll notice I still call England ‘home’, and you know, always do note it as home. Spent four years there.

Before we move on to your work life, you are a Gordon …

I am a Gordon.

So your family background …

Yes?

… you were Scots?

Scots.

The Highlanders?

Gordon Highlanders. Got our own tartan. I gave the last of my tartan to my great nephew, who’s now head of the … whatever it is … Scottish things round here. I gave it only two days ago; that’s the last. This belonged to my sister; we bought that in Scotland in [the] early fifties.

Very attractive …

I gave him my one. This is the dress tartan, not the ordinary tartan.

When you came back from England, you started your life on the farm, did you?

Now wait a moment …

After your schooling in England …

I came back; I went as a … what d’you call them when you go on someone else’s farm?

A cadet.

Cadet – I went [as a] cadet to Spring Hill – Williamses, up there at Atua; he was a son of J N Williams. And I went there because my father said – the station then was, when we came back, seven thousand acres; it’s a very long story. And he quite rightly said that he wasn’t going to train me there, so they took me as a cadet with the Wilders of Spring Hill, which is part of Atua … down there at Atua.

And it was from there in 1913 that Mother was killed. And then with all the kerfuffle that went on there, it left my father with just my sister and two Chinese servants, the cook and the housemaid; men, which was an interesting thing. All that was brought up in Parliament – whether we should be allowed to keep them on – Chinese as servants. But anyway, we had to get rid of them ‘cause it’d mean that my sister was there all alone all day with two men, Chinese servants; so we had to get rid of them. I can ramble on for years.

What about the First World War?

First World War? That’s a very long story again. Forgotten when we went home. My sister … in the meantime, see, my sister married [a] second cousin of ours, a wonderful man, a St Hill; and that left just my father and myself. I’m talking about at the beginning of the First World War, and no one knew anything about that type of war at the time, and in the end my father and I said, “Well, we’ll go home to England and see what we can do.”

Well, we were staying in London at the time, and there was a [an] urgency when the Germans got within twenty miles … or twenty kilometres, call it what you like … of Paris. And they [the French] had no equipment at all in any way to start a war, or to continue a war. Well, anyway, they sent out an urgent message to England – could they supply free ambulances? The people that got them had to buy their car, turn it into … in those days, it was a long time ago … we bought a Delaunay Belleville; my father said, “This is something – perhaps all that I can do – with an awful lot of money I can supply them with an ambulance and a driver.” So that’s how it all started, and it’s a long story.

I went out there, and I – you had to join the French Army; didn’t see any English, didn’t talk to any English – and you were paid a sou a day. [About ten cents today] But we were given the honorary rank of a Lieutenant; that was here; it was a red cross on the thing, and we were under Army law; and it’s a very long story. And that was the ‘mad English’ as they were always known in the old days; and still it’s the ‘mad English’ as far as I know.

Then the war went on, and I was in the Battle of Verdun … don’t know if you’ve ever heard of Verdun? Where the Germans very nearly took it. And I’ve got relics here that I can show you that I put under my war coat and brought home. There’s a beautifully … lovely brass and things, that sort of thing … just shattered to blazes; just lying about everywhere. And I picked up one or two of the things. These days you couldn’t do it, but in those days, it was. And I’ve got a piece of a shell, too, that dropped outside our Section which … I think twenty ambulances in that. And we each had a Frenchman with us, so that if anything went wrong we had a Frenchman that could speak as well, you see, on board; and we never went to the Front without a Frenchman. Oh, it’s a very long story.

I was there until – the war went dribbling on. Verdun is a fortified town you know; it’s a basin, with an entrance to the basin. The whole way round it’s excavated. We all got told that everything’s underground in this huge fortress; and acres and acres and acres and acres; and this huge building that housed all of our working ambulances which were on duty, which would be about ten in those days, under these seats where the Army drilled in bad weather. Huge buildings. Well a shell dropped one evening at the entrance to this building; it was a hole about as big as this room. They used to drag the horses to them, put them in the holes and cover them up; save digging a hole. I’ve got a photograph of that – I’ll find it in a moment.

So at what stage did you return to New Zealand?

Ohh … well after the war, because I went to Italy and I ended the war in Trieste. And my half-brother – he was in the English Army, the Second World War – my half-brother ended the war also in Trieste. Extraordinary …

And how long were you in Italy?

About a year. Hated it!

What did you hate?

Well, we didn’t have any frontline work; there was [were] no risks of any sort. It was a very dangerous job, ours, you know.

What regiment were you with?

No regiment. We were with … all that I know is we were in the Second Army, and I’ve got a photograph; I’ve got the Croix de Guerre, [War Cross] and our Section had the biggest honour that any Army can ever give anyone – they invested the whole of our Number 10 Unit with the Croix de Guerre, which meant that we had to have it painted on our ambulances to show what [a] distinctive Section it was.

[Break in recording; restarts on a different subject]

When were you married?

February 2nd 1922.

And your wife, what was her name?

[Evelyn] Allan.

And where did your wife live?

Right in the backblocks near Cape Runaway, and I couldn’t get to her. I took Carl Tanner … I was hunting – I was twenty-seven then; time I got married. I took Carl Tanner up there ‘cause I had seen a woman that struck me [as] a lively … just what I wanted, that sort of thing; beautiful to look at, and lively and that sort of thing. And she lived away in the wop-wops in those days, and the awful Depression was on. Everyone had lost all their money and everything of that sort. And I took him up the coast; I was living at Clifton – I was running Clifton for my father then – and I told my father I was going up the coast to look at some heifers. “Oh”, he said, “I’m coming too.” See our faces drop – so I said to Carl, “Oh lord! How’re we going to shake the old man off?” Knowing the old man well. So we stayed in Gisborne until the old man said, “When’re you going up further to see the heifers?” “Oh, there’s no hurry.” This went on; every morning he said, “When’re you off?” “Oh, no hurry – we’re going to have a look round Gisborne.” “Oohhh”, the old man said, “I can’t stand this knocking about here – I’m going home by Aard car. [AARD Motor Services Association of New Zealand] Exactly what we wanted; four days of the old man in the hotel – well, we got rid of him.

Then we got in the car and went up the coast. And we got near Cape Runaway, and we couldn’t get up to my wife, ‘cause the only means of getting up in those days was up this big river, and you had to cross it the whole time. And the only way they came down was the bullock dray. So we tried every means we … we just couldn’t get up, so we gave it up and came down.

And then I met her again at Te Aute. She’s got no Williams blood in her, but she’s a cousin of the Williamses up there, Samuel Williams, you see. They’re cousins through the female side.

And so where were you married?

Married? Oh, where were we … oh yes; We were married in Havelock [North] … yes, we married in Havelock, that’s right. And my father-in-law [was] manager of a huge company in the Falkland Islands; I’m talking Seddon’s day.

But anyway, we were married in Havelock; very small wedding. My father-in-law couldn’t afford to give us a wedding ‘cause he had no money, so I said to him – he’s a very fine man; by jove, he calls a spade a spade, too. We got on very well.

And what date was this?

Oh, 2nd February 1922. I arranged all the wedding and that sort of thing, did it as far as it wouldn’t embarrass him. But in those days you had to ask your father-in-law if you could have his daughter. My sister and I [were] living at Clifton when we were home then, you see, and my father was in England at the time. We’d sent him away to get rid of him; we had to. But then, you see, we got the father-in-law who didn’t know us to come and stay the night. You did those sorts of things in those days. And my sister discreetly left the morning room and went to bed, you see. Then I was left with this long-talking father-in-law-to-be, and I had to make all the conversation; rather shaky. And then he wouldn’t say anything; he wouldn’t ask me any questions at all, so in the end I wanted to go to bed, so I said to him, “Look, I suppose, sir, you know I can support a wife?” “Wish to God I could say the same!” I said, “Well …” Now, we always had whisky; we always did in those days. I said, “Would you like a drink from the ..?” “Don’t touch the stuff!” So, all around [??] not said. In the end I went into my sister and told her all about it. [??] “You’ve got a toughie as a father-in-law.”

Well anyway, we were married, and we lived there. We had to get rid of my father, [chuckle] ‘cause he would interfere with the way that I managed Clifton, you see. Although I managed it, he would interfere with everything. I could tell you all the stories, but … too long. My sister and I said, “Well look, we can’t go on like this. We’ll send the old man home in the hope that he’ll marry this very nice woman that we left behind when we came out after the war.” We picked a very nice woman indeed, and we thought she’d be suitable someday for him; and when we couldn’t bear the old man any more we packed him off to England on £200 a year. That’s all – Clifton Station, seven thousand acres – that’s all we could afford to pay the owner. I didn’t get any; I had my own income and my own farm and all that sort of thing. I was just managing Clifton; the only thing I got out of it was my keep – nothing else at all.

Well anyway Nancy’s got exactly the same history. We sent my father home on board this boat, and he got caught leaning over the railing on a lovely moonlight night with the moon and a woman leaning on the railing with him. He got caught with my mother-in-law – Nancy’s father got caught – he went home; he got caught, exactly like my father did, you see.

Well anyway, out of that, which was very good indeed, I had no family. My sister lost her first husband in the war; she slipped a baby five months in … she married him more like in the end of … she had no family. My wife, soon after we married, she had an operation which you wouldn’t have today, and she couldn’t have a family. So neither of us have had a family.

So my father wrote out and said, “I’m terribly sorry but I cannot support” … she’s a very well off woman he married … “I cannot support a wife on £200 a year.” So I wrote back, “Terribly sorry, Dad, you’ll have to bring her out here.” So in the end, as was decided, he brought her out here, and to cut a long story short, we all lived together for a certain time, and then we couldn’t bear it any longer; two lots of family, different generations.

And I happened to be walking … we had all this big farm across the river here, and I happened to be walking across here; I saw this extraordinary old dilapidated house across the river, and I said to myself, “Ooh, that’s lovely! I wonder if I’d be able to buy it.” So I rang up an agent and said, “There’s a house which rather attracts me. It seems to be isolated from other houses; seems to be land with it, and I’ll be able to go across by boat to the farm.” And I rang up the man and sent him down; I said, “And walk on, say who it’s for ‘cause they’ll bump up the thing ‘cause we’re supposed to be very wealthy.” So he said, “Yes, it’s for sale; it’s been on the market for some time, and the price is £2,000.” So I said, “Oh, that’s a gift from heaven.”

So we got my wife, and we came over and saw it; and a frightful, dilapidated place you’ve ever seen. It was a [an] old-fashioned poultry farm. All the poultry was there, and the yards were there and it was all dug up. There was no entrance; the carriage marks … you know how the carriage marks with the horse and … down the middle? And anyway, we bought it, and we moved in here sometime in 1922.

Who did you buy it from?

Oh, the original owner was Gerald Lascelles, a relation of the Lascelles that married into the Lowe family, d’you remember? It was the brother that went to [?] and he built that enormous house. It was an enormous house, twelve bedrooms. I’ve got a photograph of the house, it was [a] huge house. Why he chose Clive in those days, ‘cause Clive was always under water … this was always under water too, on occasion. But anyway, what did you ask me?

I was going to ask you about Clive in those days?

I’m waiting to get … I hope he doesn’t die before I get it … some very good photographs of Clive under water. I’ve seen them, but years ago.

Were there many houses here then?

No. There were cottages; d’you mean just in this spot, or in Clive?

In Clive.

You’ll see what I mean … you know the new Rest Home here … d’you know it?

No.

Well – are you Hastings or Napier? You’re Napier. Yes, well when you go out of here, you know the road that leads to Haumoana? Well, just go past there; on the right hand side there’s a big Rest Home that’s been built there. Well you have a look on the right hand side – there’s still some little cottages; rare New Zealand little cottages.

Was there any industry in the region?

No. There was a big blacksmith’s shop, and [?Lawn’s?] Hotel. I can show you a photograph of the hotel that was at Farndon; I can show you what the horses were like in those days … little horses; and I can show you that hotel that was brought across the river and dumped in its present site, way up here; and a huge hotel further down the estuary, and now there’s no hotel there at all; there’s a small hotel across the road. I’ve got all that history and photographs and everything.

So the earliest forms of land transport were horse and cart?

Oh, lord yes. Well, ‘cause when we came here in 1922 as I told you, there was the middle track where the horse used to go, and where the wheels used to go.

The local features that made transport difficult, I suppose, were our rivers?

Our rivers – oh, very much so. Our uncle was drowned when he looked after the big Grange property [Clive Grange] for Murray Roberts.

Where was that?

See, there’s three stations built the Black Bridge; you wouldn’t remember the Black Bridge pulled down – where the present bridge is going to Haumoana; there used to be a big black bridge there. Well that was pulled down; way up in the air because of the floods. If you went to Haumoana it was a great big double storey house practically on the banks of the then Tukituki River. And that was managed by an uncle of mine that [who] married a Tanner, and he was drowned during the flood – ‘cause there was no bridge – swimming his horse across the Tukituki. Ooohhh …

Do you remember much of the coastal shipping?

No. The coastal shipping I learned from Mr Duncan when I bought a piece of land next door to them in Napier, and I had a commercial flower garden there and combined with this when we went in for commercial flower growing instead of farming, when I sold out of all my land. Used to own a big dairy farm, Pakowhai, you see. It was a six hundred acre …

The Farndon block?

Mmm.

Six hundred acres?

Mmm.

Can you tell us a bit about the farming life?

Well … yes it’s a vast subject. See, Farndon was one of the most difficult … there were no banks on rivers. And I went in for fattening bullocks, and went in for sheep … breeding sheep and that sort of thing. And we used to [?] what I could; tame sheep, paint the gates and the things white because we’d have to very often – we’d hear it here. We’d be asleep, not in this, it wasn’t here; in the old house – in the middle of the night in heavy rain we’d hear crashing and banging of water going through all the trees way across the river. The wife and I’d have to get up, and we’d know that the water was flowing across the farm so we’d have to get up and try and swim our sheep to safety; all that sort of thing. Awful! And we’d lose all of our barley; we used to grow a lot of barley, stack it – I had a first class man doing all that, and we’d put them where you’d think they were absolutely safe, but you’d get a freak flood and spoil the whole lot.

Were these floods an annual occurrence?

Oh, practically. It was all through the season. You could have a summer flood.

How many people were living in the area?

Well it was a working class area only except for the Lascelles, who weren’t there in my time.

And what about the Māori houses on the farm, particularly Te Awanga?

Oh, no; you’re thinking of … whatsaname? The pā that was always there this side of the Black Bridge … I can’t remember. There was a pā there; a very bad pā indeed; all the occupants of it were not good Māori at all. They’d interbreed with the Chinese that [who] had a lot of leased land. Thank heaven they’ve altered the pā entirely and they’ve rebuilt the whole thing, and it’s quite a nice pā now. But in all my young days it was a hell of a pā.

There were excavations done a few years ago.

Were there? It’s such a big subject …

It is. Did you have itinerant workers in to help you?

Only during harvest. During harvest, and we had a lot of women. We’d employ anyone, but we’d prefer people if they knew a little bit.

You will’ve noticed the farming methods have changed?

Oh! Thank heavens I don’t farm today, because there’s so many diseases and so many things. I wouldn’t own the sheep that my great-nephew’s got on the property to [??]. He’s just got grazers to keep all the land. See, we’ve got fifteen acres here … that’s going into another story.

So you sold some of the Farndon land?

Oh, we sold all of the Farndon land. This was originally seven acres, you see; a long narrow section that came up there, and the boundary was there. This is all Sir George Whitmore’s land, all of this originally, and he had a great big house here. And unfortunately the great big house was burnt down; Sir George[‘s son died]. He owned all the land here and across the road there.

On this site?

No. Just here where the White’s have got the house now; just through the other side of these trees, but it’s not the same house.

Just moving back to transport – can you remember your first car?

Yes, remember the first car, yes. Certainly; it was bought from the Chambers, and I drove my … my father was an awful driver; never, ever, any good. Very good with horses; no damn good with a car. He learnt to drive on the tennis court at Clifton … on the tennis court at Clifton … and he couldn’t even control the car, and he dug up all the edges under the – oh, you’ve got no idea! Well he drove a chain drive car – drove it up to the thing – and it had bucket seats at the back. We children would get in at the back and sit in this hollow there, and Mum and Dad were in the front there, you see. Had no hood or anything of that sort. And I’ve got pictures of going in that to [a] Christmas party in [at] my grandfather’s in Napier. And my mother was great for visiting people, and she went down the side road there, and my father drove her down there; and he was driving back – which he couldn’t drive – and when he came to the road that was the [?] he got tangled up in my mother’s rug, and went on backing. And he backed into this ditch of water with my sister and I … we were here, and there was the ditch … backed us into the ditch.

What make of car was it?

Wolseley.

How were your letters delivered in the early days, when you were at Clifton?

Oh, I don’t know. Because often we used to get our stores [at] one time, and we had a big storeroom up at the house built specially. And the cook’d have to come up and get the stores from our storeroom; quite a long walk up for the cook, too, from the cookhouse to the house. No, we used to get the stores from the store down here, and once a month they used to come by dray, you see.

Where was the store located?

Where the stores are now, in that line. They were real old stores; they used to stock everything. Almost black inside, long narrow, high up from the ground because of thing. [Floods] And the old storekeeper used to live at the back.

Can you remember the sort of things you ..?

Oh lord yes! Oh, heavens yes. And then they built this present house here many years after he retired and sold the store. Ooohhh, yes, yes. We used to have to go in there as children, into [the] store. If we ever came to town we’d leave the trap and horse at Farndon Railway Station and take the train into Napier.

The first newspaper in Hawke’s Bay was [it] the Herald Tribune?

No, we never took the Herald Tribune. [Speaking together] We were entirely Napier people; we didn’t have much to do with Hastings at all. I still am a Napier person, although I don’t often go there now, ‘cause …

Why was that?

Oh, because you see my grandfather and grandmother lived at Balquhidder …

What was their name?

Well, Tanner. Thomas Tanner. He’s the one I’ve got all the history … he was one of the ‘Twelve Apostles’, and so was my other grandfather. Now my grandfather Tanner sold a big block of Fernhill which used to belong to my grandfather Gordon. Oh lord, I’ve got all that history with all the …

Can you tell us a little more about the land at Fernhill?

No, it’s all too big. It’s all a [??]. I’ve got a … came upon it the other day; I’ve forgotten what I’ve done with it. This’ll interest you; this tells you in writing what I’ve been telling you. I‘ve got a very good memory. The trouble is, you see, I’m a relation of the original settlers. So Thomas Tanner was the original settler, before we married, and went home to England to find a wife. Lived in a raupo thing.

[Break; recommences on a different subject]

[As] a weekend boarder, my mother used to come in a horse and gig. In those days there was no bridge across here at all; we had to go across the ford which was way above the bridge, up to our axles in water; we’d see the goldfish swimming by. We used to have to go across the ford there to go to school. And this’ll bring you up to what happened this morning – back into history. She used to drop me at the Old Heretaunga School which is a big playing field now; you know where …

Where was the Heretaunga School?

D’you know Mitre 10 store on the left as you go into … there’s a big playing field as you get near Hastings? Well it was in there, and the … not Iona, the other girls’ school …

Woodford.

Woodford [Queenswood] was quite close, just across. It’s only been moved a few years in my mind. Well Heretaunga was just across in that big playing area there, the school. Well my mother’d drop me at the gates there, and I’d run into the big building. And in those days you weren’t allowed to kiss your mother goodbye, so you had to do it before the boys’d see you. Rupert Carlyon from Gwavas … I’m talking Gwavas big station; he was a little bit older than me … he was caught. They had one of the first Rolls Royces; smelling of money in those days. They used to erupt out of this antiquated old Rolls Royce, and he was heard by one of the boys, or some of the boys, “Kiss me quick, Mum!” I’ve never forgotten; and he was always known as ‘Kissmequick’. “Hey, Kissmequick” – that sort of thing.

Well now, that goes back to what happened today. I’ve got this great-nephew; this is the family, the Allans, that are inheriting this place; we’ve got no children. This chap’s father and mother and sister were all killed in the Erebus crash out of this house, you see; we lost them all in the crash. Well that is David’s father, sister and mother. And we’ve got the memorial there just across from the gate here. We’ve got a mulberry tree and the names; it’s all done and it’s there forever. We’ve had the service and blessed them all …

Well, this Thomas is at King’s College, and he’s come down for the break. He’s fifteen, and I’ve been always very fond of him; I’ve hugged him and kissed him, given him $10 every time for school, treated him as a grandson, which he is.

You see, his father and his brother were the two Allans that we brought up as my wife’s and my unofficially adopted children. We asked my – I’m deviating again – when we found we couldn’t have any children … we love children and we planned for ten. We had the table made for ten – lovely table; huge table. Anyway, we didn’t get any, and we said to my brother-in-law and sister-in-law – she was at school with the wife, you see, she’s English – and we four were great friends indeed, until he was killed flying in the war, you see, and there was just her. Well anyway, we said to them, “We’ll give you $1,000 to [?raise?] us a child.” “No trouble”, says my brother-in-law, “no trouble at all.” Well when it came to Mother; Mother said, “Yes, that’s all right, but I know very well that I could never part with it.” So we said, “All right. Will you allow us to unofficially adopt your two children and treat them as ours?” “Yes, certainly – we’ll share them with you.” So since they’ve been little children we’ve all shared them, and we’ve treated them as our own children. And yes, they are our unofficial adopted children; but people don’t understand what we mean ‘cause they don’t understand. And they inherit; not any Gordons at all, poor things, they’ve got plenty of money in that side. And these people have come here, and they are going to carry on. They’ve got three children, a boy and two girls, and they’re carrying on like my wife and I did; exactly the same thing, opening this for good work – this house. I can’t go on. But going back to this place, when I die it’s going to be carried on in the same strict way it [??]. Marvellous.

Well anyway, this morning he came – this boy’s fifteen. I’ve always hugged him goodbye, and all that sort of thing … my arms round him and kissed him, that sort of thing. Well now he’s come to this age, we worried whether he’ll be upset if I still put my arms round him and squeeze him and say. So I talked it over with Nancy you see; and rather an awkward question as the boy’s passing through a stage, you see. And I haven’t been brought up in this other way. So I asked their mother on the telephone about my problem. I said, “Do you think he’ll be embarrassed this time if I welcome him and throw my arms around him and kiss him like I always have? Embrace him?” And she didn’t know, you see. So the mother told you … she rang up …

Second speaker: No. I saw Thomas.

Lindsay: Oh! You go on with the story there, ‘cause it’s very interesting.

Second speaker: All right – I didn’t know that he had been talking to Sarah, Thomas’ mother …

Lindsay: No, Sarah told him about it.

Second speaker: Yeah, and I said to him, oh, that Uncle was a bit worried about this business wondering whether he, Thomas, would be embarrassed, you know … his great-uncle kissing him. And he said, “Oh!” He just laughed; he said, “Oh no, not at all.” He said, “Mum, Gordon told me about it”, and he said, “Oh, no”, he said, [chuckle] “no, I like it”, you know. [Chuckle] So, all’s well.

Lindsay: It’s rather interesting, you see, ‘cause I was petrified, having had this earlier thing. Things have changed though, you see. I’m a great-great … very big difference in ages you see. And it must’ve prodded the mother, ‘cause the mother must’ve talked to Thomas, which is so lovely. I talked it over with Nancy, you see. It’s a very ticklish subject with young people.

It can be.

Second speaker: I don’t think today the same [?].

Lindsay: Well I’m going to throw my arms round him …

Second speaker: With all the gay people and everything else, well …

Lindsay: Yes, see all the gay people, they all talk about all this. You talk about things that you never talked about.

So your home now, which is large, was once quite small?

Yes. If you’d like to have a look at it – it’s very interesting to see what it is … no, I can only show you; I can show you the inside. It’s all … you can see by the ceilings …

When was it built?

Oh yes, 1881. I’m having that printed above the front door.

Did you live then in the small house for a while?

No, we lived in a partly small house … partly. You see, I bought the first original Bishop’s Court in Napier, way up on the hill. Huge house – turned it into five flats.

Was this before you bought Farndon?

Oh no – afterwards, in Napier.

Was it called Farndon when you bought it?

It was … all the area there was Farndon.

D’you know why it was called Farndon?

Yes. It was originally built – all that land there was evidently owned by an earl or a lord or something of that sort, who sent out money from England to invest in land. He never came out; never saw it, but he sent money out to invest in land and he bought a very big area there without having seen it. He must’ve lost heavily on it anyway. But there was one period where there was a very big – one of the biggest – milking sheds in New Zealand, I suppose. Because the present milking shed is fairly big they used to milk by hand, tremendous number of cows at a time. Used to be a double storey shed – a huge place. That had burnt down, and then they built another, and it was a very big shed when I bought it, but we never milked cows there. Got it’s own very big well … three-inch well that was in the … but you couldn’t drink the water; smelt of sulphur and that sort of thing.

I was going to ask what the water supply was like in the early days …

Oh, marvellous. We’ve got ten power [horsepower] pressure here you know. It goes up into Nancy’s room up there, and it’s only … our old well’s out here, our original well.

Do you remember some of the names of the local families in the twenties?

Yes, but I’d have to – get one the other day because I couldn’t remember – but I’d have to write them down, and think of it. Oh yes – we were at that the other day ‘cause old man Glazebrook … you’ve heard the Glazebrook name?

Yes.

Well old man Glazebrook lived here, and it was old man Glazebrook … when he lived down there just before he married he lived down there in Clive … and he had a carting business. It was he that carted all the timber for the present big Clifton house for Bull Brothers.

So Bull Brothers were builders?

Builders.

They seem to’ve been an early Napier family.

Yes. There were … I think there was three brothers.

What memories have you of early Napier, and going in along the Marine Parade?

Oh, quite a lot when the stables were there. You see the big stables were in what is Hastings Street now … great big stables; same as Hastings had one. But Napier had a very big stables ‘cause all the coaches and things that went into the back country, and the Taupō coach you see, they were all there.

Can you recall travelling to Taupō?

Oh yes, oh yes.

Where did you stop overnight?

We used to ride from Clifton. What’s the name of the first … where Mrs Donnelly … what’s the name of the ..? Where the spring is?

On the road to Taupo?

Yes.

Tarawera.

Tarawera. Tarawera was a great big hotel. We used to stay there. We did ride from Clifton there; but I can’t remember and I can’t get any mobile thing to find out where we spent the night between Napier and Tarawera. I can remember going down the hill, missing the road – there’s no longer a road there, it’s too steep. I remember going down … still remember that, cutting off a vast amount of the road and going straight down the hill with the horses.

Where would you be travelling to?

Oh just to Tarawera.

To Tarawera?

Mmm.

What was at Tarawera?

The great big hotel.

Oh, the hotel.

The halfway house; the coaches used to stay there, and my mother said, “It’s time we went into the back country and got some other air from the thing.” So we set off this particular time, there. Other times we’d go by coach to the back country up this other way …

Second speaker: Kurīpāpango.

Lindsay: Kurīpāpango, where there was a huge hotel there, where people used to stay at the bottom of [the] Gentle Annie.

When they were en route?

Mmm. Through to Taihape. And we had great friends that lived on that road. They had a huge station and we used to stay there on some of [speaking together] our holidays.

Can you remember their name?

Yes. Birches rented, but the Chambers bought it later, didn’t they? They had their own store and everything, you see. You had to be self-contained. You’d go up the Gentle Annie, and then go in there; there was some lovely land in there when you get on top of the hills.

Can you remember Hawke’s Bay when it was covered with more bush?

No. I can remember going down to Wellington when we had to go through … I’ve forgotten what they called the bush; now the train goes through and you drive through the bush, but that’d gone by the time I came back from school.

Second speaker: Was that the Fifty Mile Bush or something?

Seventy Mile Bush?

I don’t think it was as much as that, I’ve forgotten though; it’d been cut down, I think, a lot of it. And that had gone by the time I came back, there was no bush there at all. We used to have to go through it.

And what is your memory of the tree growth in this region?

Oh. You see, my grandfather Tanner was a great planter of trees … great planter. The Queens Square was given there by my grandpa, and then planted all in those lovely oaks. And I saved that only a few years ago; a first cousin of mine didn’t have trees or any sentiment at all. Hastings very nearly took that as a swimming area … public swimming area. And the then mayor who was Giorgetti, [Giorgi] who I liked very much indeed … I heard about this and I said, “You can’t do that! There’s a grandson that knows all the history of that, and my grandfather gave that square for recreation.” There used to be a bandstand there, and people used to go there – it was in the country in those days – d’you remember the bandstand and that sort of thing? And people used to go out there on holidays and certain days, and listen to the band. And I said, “You’re going to take all that history away, and do that?” They moved the grandstand, [bandstand] and now it’s just … just a park. ‘Cause Nancy very often goes by there, or went there or … Yes, we’ve always been tree planters; I’m a great tree planter myself.

Do you think there should be more done in the district?

Oh, I do, yes. Oh, people love cutting down trees …

You planted a lot of the trees here at Farndon?

All the trees except four or five big ones there. When we bought this there were no trees here at all; you could see the old bridge and everything from here. There were no trees here at all. I planted the avenue you see …

What is the avenue?

Plane trees. ‘Cause I always said as a child … I always remember my grandfather at Riversea had this lovely garden … beautiful garden, and a lovely drive up with plane trees, too. I always said, even as a child, if I ever have a property where I can grow plane trees, I’ll do it. And it wasn’t until we came here and saw the opportunities. And we sent down to Palmerston [North] two years after we got here, about 1923.

The trees are a great memorial, aren’t they?

Oh, these are lovely trees. Photographs have been published of it; because of the present day looting and all that sort of thing, I don’t want anyone … I don’t mind friends; and we have a lot of public things here; we’ve had an awful lot too. But I don’t want … now things’ve all changed, nothing is safe. No property’s safe today. We won’t let anyone … [a] friend of mine said, “Oh, can I park my car inside your entrance down below when I go to Napier? Someone’s picking me up.” I said, “No, you can’t; ‘tisn’t safe. You can drive up here and park your car way up here where passers-by don’t see your car.” You can’t do anything today to attract anyone.

What time would you rather’ve lived at … what period of time?

I don’t like the present time at all – I hate it.

Well, would you like to come and see the [house]? You’ve got such a big subject …

It’s easier to look at it than talk about it.

Yes. I’ll show you part, and you’ll have to draw it in your … this we had done for my sister, you see; my sister, she’s been dead now … what? Three years. And she lost her second husband; it was the end of the war when he died. And then she lived in Palmerston [North] all alone. Then we tried to get her to move here, but twenty years ago we got her to move. She rang up one day, said, “I’m ready to move.” My wife and I got in the station wagon there and then, and went up there.

[Ends]