Newspaper Article 1929 – Thomas Walter Williams

The
Taihape Daily Times

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER  22, 1929.

THOMAS WALTER WILLIAMS

The sad news that one of the oldest residents of the Taihape district, if not the oldest, has just passed away, in the person of Mr. Thomas W. Williams, of Mataroa, will be a shock to all those who were personally acquainted with that venerable and highly revered old pioneer.  Thus another link with the remote past – as pioneering progress is measured in New Zealand – is severed, and another of the sturdy type who courageously carried on in the face of the great difficulties and hardships that were inescapable in the early days, has passed on to the place  where the “weary are at rest.”  Mr. Williams came to the Taihape district 54 years ago, at a time when he was in the first flush of early manhood for he was then only 22 years old.  Shortly after, he returned to Hawke’s Bay whence he had come to Taihape, and there married, but, subsequently found the lure of the Taihape district too strong to be resisted.  Thirty years ago, he invested his savings in land at Mataroa and from that time had been prominently associated with the public and social life and also the frustrating fortunes of the district.  Mr. Williams was a man of great uprightness of character, and through all the vicissitudes and sorrows and pleasures of a long career preserved unblemished his record of conduct.  Another strong characteristic of his was his unfailing cheerfulness of demeanor.  He was one of those fortunate individuals who always look on the bright side of the picture, and are ever ready to snatch victory from defeat.  A great writer once said that “A youth rarely lives to old age unless he keeps himself in health with exertion and be cheerful heart with joyfulness.”  Whether Mr. Williams deliberately adopted the philosophy of this precept it is impossible to say; but that his life was an exemplification of its truth cannot be denied.  He fulfilled in his humble sphere the highest duties of life, and fulfilled them well and now that he has finished his course, his surviving children, relatives and friends to whom sincere sympathy will be widely extracted can find abiding consolation in the fact that Thomas Walter Williams ran a good race and left a record which they may justly be proud.