THE MOA DISTRICT

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 271, 16 April 1914, Page 3

THE MOA DISTRICT

- OLD TIMES RECALLED. The other day a resident of the Moa district met the remark, "You must ■have been in the Inglewood district a ] long time" with some interesting tales of the early days. "Yes, I have,' he said. "When we settled in one of the old Government cottages provided for immigrants, and which were placed on the section just over the third Ngatoro from Inglewood, all this country.was just bush, and the main road was simply a winding, earthy • track. There was no metal then. ■ Settlers had little bits of houses and whares here and there, and neighbours - were few and far between. The tracks i to each other were just through nothing . but bush. "Many a time I have seen Mr. and jli ss trudging- to Inglewood, with • loads on their backs, and the woman as ; she walked working her knitting needles, j and then on their way back home loaded the same. Don't I know what it is to see mothers left at home in a sort of shelter (called home) with their young children around them, and the only break in the silence or monotony would be the song of the tui and the twitter of other birds, while the men went away on bush jobs or the road and railway work to earn money to pay the instalment of their deferred payment cheque, or to carry out improvements such as felling bush, or grass seed and wire. I'm not likely to forget such things, and I do not think the back-blocker of to-day has the same trials and risks as those of the old-hack time. "Inglewood was a mass of stumps and logs, and a few tiny shacks, though the stores were not at all bad for the period. ! Speaking of stores, if it had not been | for the help given at that time by the storekeeper many a man of affluence j now in the district would have had to 'chuck up the sponge.' Fancy a man swagging flour all the way from New Plymouth! And many did it. No proper road, no bridges, bush on all sides, a little clearing here and there, with possibly a shanty of split timber. I remember the excitement of our first cow. Wo called it ours, but it was bought by others co-operating, and the time spent I in watching,' in tracking and providing I native s'hrub leaves for fodder, \*** to us interesting, because of the dense bush in which we had to get about, j "I remember, when living in the eot- ' tage I just mentioned and which had no j wooden floor, some of the big offlciali of | the town of New Plymouth coming out | to see how things were progressing, ind I when speaking to mother as to things j in general, she turned on the gents, and | asked if something couldn't be done to j improve the cottage and its fireplace. From the latter we had bailed bucket after bucket of water (it was one of the old style of bush chimney). No boards ' were needed for floor and door. I'm not likely to forget how the mater let loose all the pent-up feelings of months on the heads of the gents; but we got the .improvements. People nowadays hardly conceivo how things were then. "Why, there was a case of a poor man—a Mr. Noler —who took ill and died of pneumonia, and the wife, worn out with nursing and with the caro of six ycung children, woke up to find her husband dead. Imagine what the poor woman had to do to get assistance! Tramp through dense hush to neighbours, and people were neighbours then! However, the roads, such as they were, were too bad to enable the body to be taken out, so a rough collin of slabbed wood was knockeed up, a grave was dug on the place, and Mr. Joe Corney, senior, read the burial service, and poor Noler still sleeps on that Durham Road section. "The Maori troubles! were a constant anxiety to mother, and when father had to be responsible for a rille and cartridges it was about the last straw, and when one day, just in the middle of the ' week's bread-making, a party af natives stopped at the whare for a drink, we all ( thought our last day had arrived. Catching sight of the bread, they began jabbering, and getting excited, as none in the house understood them. I do not know what would have hrfppcncd had it not been for a Mr. Julian, who was sloshing along with a team of bullocks and cart. He could make the .Maoris understand and could under- " stand their talk, and after a violent tongue duel, he made them get into the | cart and took them to Inglewood. This iwas enough for mother, and all of us. "Father and the older hoys were preparing a homo on the section on the Surrey Road: so packing some goods on [ the back of an old horse, and loading i each of us with some household goods and food, we set out for the farm. Would it not have made a. picture for the back-blocker of to-day to study! I do not think they could consider themselves hard done by. Now-a-days people consider themselves in the back-blocks if they are a few miles from town or railway, but they have conveniences of telephones, nurses, and there are heaps of doctors; but of the time I talk there were very few. so when Mr. tramped t all the way into New Plymouth for assistance for his wife, the time taken [ in tramping and waiting was all wasted \ j —the wife was dead when he returned. ; "And then the rough bush roads we j had to endure for years, the hard work t I necessary to got our requirements in, I the little we could get for our produce, and the general risk of fire destroying our all was sufficient to put people to their last sleep long before the proper time. Yes I've seen some alteration in the Moa district; I should think I have. e The building of the bridges over the : - three Ngatoros was quite an event to a the settlers, and of course were great 0 conveniences. Before they weie built '"• the women folk had to wade each river y before they could get to Inglewood. "I am not likely to forget one day mother and Mrs. D had gone to get stores. It came on to rain (one of the Moa district downpours), and the rivers y were up in no time, and they had a hard J job to get home, having to wade two ' ' Hooded rivers, while the other was t'.o m ( high, and they risked their lives bystraddling a fallen tree. You see, ther. 1 were a lot of young children in the two ,•„ houses, and that made then anxious. A "I have seen Inglewood in all its s stage's, and the coming of the railway t, v made a tremendous alteration in everviii- thing. The. cattle in those days were i ; ,l cattle, and could be depended on. Not f like the weedy, stunted h Hides of t0,,,. ~,. ! day, and it was a great mistake to let dv that class disappear. Even with the low ~jl price for butter (4d to lid) 17 cows ' could keep a big household going, and

f such a thing as disease was unheard of. The cattle when dry, were turned adrift in the bush for the winter, and when hunted up in the spring, would come out frisky and fat. How the boys enjoye; l the hunting then! And the sacks of pigeons they used to bring in! I have seen the by-roads getting clearer and clearer, and metal going on, old-time houses disappear, and up-to-date structures, in their place, the old past and rail fence disappear in favour of wir.'. and live hedges in place of the latter, and of course must notice the grey hairs and the tottering steps of the old settler who went through it all and still lives on the land. Yes, I think I've teen some changes in the Moa district—just some!"