Fire in Te Awamutu
Meghan Hawkes takes us back to 1885 to find sparrows and leeches were causing huge problems – and then there was the fire.
Fire takes hold. Photo: pexels.com
A gentleman went up with a light into the belfry of the Kihikihi Roman Catholic Chapel and culled about 70 sparrows. The birds were getting very troublesome – they built nests in every place they could get into. The spouting round buildings were favoured, with the result that the pipes were stopped up and did not carry off the water. In a school, water was observed running down between the lining and the weather boards, and flooding the floor. The guttering was stopped up with nests.
It was small black leeches causing problems at Alexandra (Pirongia) prompting the local reporter to ask for advice through his columns. Cherries, plums, pears and quinces were completely smothered with them, the leaves devoured and the trees apparently dying. “Does anyone know what should be done to them?” he asked. “All the whitethorn fences are affected in the same way.” His cabbages were also being fast consumed by either caterpillars or brown beetles but he thwarted them by placing elder tree leaves around the cabbage plants. “The ravages have entirely ceased” he reported. “Try it.”
Half Te Awamutu township was burned down when fire broke out in a small block of buildings at the south of Lewis’ Hotel in the early morning hours. Mr Ford, an elderly rheumatic tailor, awoke and gave the alarm. The front shop was full of smoke, and the fire had firm hold of the partition wall between his house and Sloane’s store. With some difficulty the old man was got out. There were hopes of saving Lewis’ Hotel, and arresting the spread of the fire, but the wind was blowing steadily along the line of buildings. The lack of long ladders and water also prevented controlling the flames. From Lewis’ Hotel to Bridgman’s store the weatherboards and shingles grew heated, smoked, and burst into flames. Nothing could save the rest of the block, and the fire soon spread down to Gibson’s butcher’s shop. Great difficulty was experienced in preventing the fire’s advance across the road but wet blankets were laid on the roofs and that side of the street was saved. The conflagration destroyed Ford’s tailoring shop, Dalley’s tailoring shop and dwelling, Sloane’s chemist shop and dwelling, Lewis’ Hotel, Bridgeman’s drapery and grocery store, bake house, and stables, Hunter’s saddlery shop, Holmes’ survey offices, and Gibson’s butchery. The fire was the largest which had yet taken place in Waikato and Kihikihi, 2½ miles away, was brightly illuminated.
Butter making for export would soon be one of the leading features in the operations of Waikato dairy factories. The Paterangi factory was doing admirably out of its butter and was the only factory which was worked on the co-operative principle. A number of respectable farmers had agreed to build a factory and supply the milk and the entire management was in their hands. They paid all expenses connected with the factory, and the balance was divided according to the amount of milk delivered. This was a sound principle started in America, and on which they continued to prosper.
