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Above, Graham’s Tararu
location, with St. John’s
Anglican Church in foreground.
LEFT: Grahamstown mid-
development.
Zoom in on
this photo and you would
see a few streams and many
gullies, muddy streets, a
soggy plateau and boarded
sidewalks. Lower, near
centrefold, is a building with
a waterwheel. Tram tracks
lead down the slope.
Most simple tents and huts
have been replaced with real
structures, some sporting
verandas. Paddocks for
farm critters are fenced.
Businesses are now
clustered near the Firth or
along the edge of the gold
mine’s hills.
Shortland, upper left, was
built up first, under the
planning of James Mackay
and the Taiparis.
An informal oval race track, used even before
Graham’s purchase, was located on the yet
undeveloped beach side of Tararu.
By 1871, a
steam tramway,
thought to be the
first passenger
carrying tramway
with a steam-
driven locomotive
in New Zealand,
replaced the horsedrawn tramway.
Unfortunately, a destructive storm hit the
area in the mid-1870s. “The fine new hotel
was badly strained, the wharf was gone, only
some of the piles left; the tramway was so
wrecked as to be unusable. It was a sad blow
to Graham, who had done so much to make
Tararu attractive.”
(
Robert Graham 1820-1885: An
Auckland Pioneer
” by George Cruikshank, 1940.)
Graham abandoned the Tararu project and had
his hotel shifted to Waiwera north of Auckland,
a hot spring resort he started developing
shortly after his arrival from Scotland.
One only wonders what Tararu could have been
had the gold mines been more successful, or
if the storm had not damaged the wharf and
tramway.
Dickson Holiday Park, with its lovely Butterfly
and Orchid Garden, sits on the site of those
original pleasure gardens. And there actually
does now exist a residential community in
Tararu, with a planned retirement complex filling
its entire centre.
(See aerial photo above.)
HISTORY LIVES IN THAMES OF TODAY
Thames today still has that robust Victorian
Gold Town feel, with dozens of historic hotels,
churches (see centre spead), and residences
still standing for you to view. Also visit the
Gold Mine Experience (a small working gold
mine), the School of Mines, and the Bella Street
pumping station at the Tech Museum.
Stop by the Thames Historical Museum and
Thames iSite for maps, walking guides, and
information. For real history research, visit The
Treasury archives on Queen St. or see online
www.thetreasury.org.nz/.(See article page 32.)
A DEVELOPER WITH FORESIGHT
W
hen Graham arrived from Scotland in
1842 at the age of 22, he went into
partnership as a merchant with brother David
(who preceded him to NZ) in Russell and later
in Auckland.
This ambitious young businessman already had
foresight: three years later in 1845, he bought
land in Waiwera, north of Auckland, that had
tourist potential. This shoreline property had
natural hot springs, well known to Maori.
In 1848, he bought another 500 acres, this time
inland farmland south of Auckland, where he
raised livestock with another brother, James. He
named this Ellerslie, and had ‘leisure destination’
visions for it as well, centered around formal
gardens and horse racing.
But full development of both properties would
wait; he could not resist the ‘Forty-niner’ draw
to California; and from 1849, he spent three
years in the Golden State visiting gold fields
and shipping wheat and potatoes. While in San
Francisco he met and married Sophia Swann
and they had their first child.
This recent aerial view shows the
Tararu Retirement Village, which
evolved from the early District
Homes built in 1894 to care for
the elderly who had no family
(see top right corner of above
photo). – Photo by Alan Duff
Source: Sir George Grey Special Collections,
Auckland Libraries 4- 8717
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FOUNDING VISIONARY
BY CARO L WR I GH T
Shown in this sketch by Henry A. Severn, is
Curtis’ Wharf below in Grahamstown at the
end of Albert Street. At the shoreline to right of
the wharf is the Park Hotel (aka Wharf Hotel).
Directly below is the Wesleyan Church to right
of the government buildings
(with flags).
Severn, Henry A: Sketch
Panorama of Thames Goldfield
[Section two and three of seven]. c 1875.
Alexander Turnbull Library