Page 7 - Volume 1

Most buildings were miners’ married Margaret Muir and had a family of 14 children.
cottages of three to four rooms. New
arrivals sometimes lived in Māori Before the turn of the century it became apparent
whares.” that a local school was necessary to cater for the
increased juvenile population, the result of closer
In those early days Kimihia boasted a railway settlement.
station, a shop and a boarding house (this railway A petition was presented by some of the local
station was situated where Kimihia Road settlers to the Auckland Education Board for such a
originally intersected with State Highway 1, school.
off Hakanoa Street). One of the houses acted as a At the time the children who were old enough to
post office. Family names listed in the Kimihia Sixty stand the rigors of the daily return
Years booklet are some which are still in Huntly today - journey had to tramp over the old
names like, McGlynn, Evans, Soppet, Troughear, swamp road to Huntly school,
Clinch, Hall, Skellern, Taylor, Dunn, Patterson, which had opened in 1879.
Foote, Johnson, Wilson, Russell, Holland and In due course the
Valentine. Education Board agreed to
Most of the land on the east side was obtained provide a school and a site
from the Māori people in the early 1870’s and given was selected on part of a
or sold to soldiers who had taken part in the land wars. University endowment as indicated in
From this time until the 1900’s it was mainly the following letter:
owned by the Ralph and Muir families. Robert Riley (continued on page 16)
Ralph, son of Anthony, the first settler in the district,

The Holland Farm and buildings in the early 1900s.