Putāruru is a small town in the South Waikato District and the Waikato region of New Zealand's North Island. It lies on the western side of the Mamaku Ranges and in the upper basin of the Waihou River. It is on the Oraka Stream 65 kilometres south-east of Hamilton. State Highway 1 and the Kinleith Branch railway run through the town.
Name
The town gets its name from a historic event which occurred nearby. Korekore a granddaughter of Raukawa, the founder of the Ngāti Raukawa iwi, was murdered by her husband Parahore. Her servant Ruru witnessed her murder and escaped into the forest where he hid and waited for Parahore and his men to give up their pursuit of him. The place where he exited the forest was named "Te Puta a Ruru" or "the exit of Ruru". This was eventually shorted to Putāruru.
History and culture
Pre-colonial history
There were several Māori settlements in the Putāruru district in pre-colonial times. Ngāti Raukawa is the main tribe or iwi in the area and Ngāti Mahana is the hapū (subtribe) within Putāruru. During Te Rauparaha's migration to the Cook Strait area in the 1820s, many Ngāti Raukawa people moved from these settlements to Rangitikei and Manawatu localities, and others followed after the Siege of Ōrākau in 1864. Te Kooti and his followers were pursued through the district early in 1870 by a force under Lt-Col. Thomas McDonnell.
European settlement
The Patetere Block, containing the future town site of Putāruru, was acquired from the Māori in the 1860s. In the early 1880s large areas in the Putāruru district came into the possession of the Patetere Land Company, and from 1883 much of this land passed into the hands of the Thames Valley Land Company. Roadmaking commenced in the late 1880s, but the railway, begun by the Thames Valley and Rotorua Railway Co., was the most important factor in the progress of settlement in the area.
The first settler in the district bought his section in 1892.
In the 1880s Putāruru consisted of little more than a hotel and a blacksmith shop.
Exotic afforestation was begun in the district some time after 1910 by a land and timber company with an outlet to the Hamilton-Rotorua railway near Pinedale. Commercial tree planting with Pinus radiata took place between 1924 and 1928 on the Pinedale Block. Milling began in 1940–41 and by 1951 the area had been cut out and replanted. Larger areas further south were planted in 1924 for future milling and to provide the raw material for pulp and paper manufacture. The town of Putāruru was surveyed in 1905 and on 18 December an area of 50,987 acres (206 km2), which had been acquired from the Thames Valley Land Co. by the Crown and included town allotments in Putāruru and Lichfield, was opened by ballot.
The history of the local timber industry is preserved in the New Zealand Timber Museum.
Much of the land in the Putāruru district suffered from a cobalt deficiency, which made farming practically impossible, but since 1935 measures have been taken to restore fertility, and farming has expanded. Putāruru was created a town district in 1926, and on 1 July 1947 it was constituted a borough.
Railways
Putāruru railway station was near the junction of Arapuni and Princes Streets, north of the junction of the Kinleith Branch with the now mothballed Rotorua Branch.
The Thames Valley and Rotorua Railway line reached Oxford (Tīrau) on 8 March 1886 and Putāruru and Lichfield, further south-east, on Monday 21 June 1886. New Zealand Railways Department (NZR) took over the line on 1 April 1886. In August 1886 the station had a by shelter shed, three cottages, a by goods shed and an incomplete station master's house. Putāruru was still a flag station in 1890, when the daily train took about 3 hours to cover the between Putāruru and Frankton (Hamilton).
In March 1887 the contract for the Putāruru-Ngātira section of the line to Rotorua was let to Daniel Fallon, work had begun by April 1887 and the whole branch opened on 8 December 1894. Putāruru was then served by the Rotorua Express. About that time station was rebuilt and extended to about long. It had a refreshment room and a bookstall and, from 1907, the railway yard had a turntable and handled much livestock, as well as timber. The refreshment room, run by the hotel until 1919, burnt down in 1925 and was replaced by a room to the south of the main building, which closed in 1968.
In the 1920s a Railway Board investigated the feasibility of a line of about to Arapuni and Te Awamutu.