FARLY AUCKLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 229, 26 September 1936, Page 10

FARLY AUCKLAND.

MEMORIES OF A PIONEER. VIVID RECOLLECTIONS. Memories of early Auckland were recalled to-dav by another of the city's oldest residents, Mr. John Stewart Kelly, who this week celebrated his 87th birthday at his home in Ewington Avenue, Mount Eden. Mr. Kelly was born at Avondale. and has lived most of his life in Auckland. As one of the first surveyors who mapped out the land about Auckland, Mr. Kelly's father arrived in New Zealand from Ireland in the 'thirties or 'forties of last century. There was not a house within miles of their Avondale home, and he remembers how the furniture was carried out across the countryside on horse-drawn drays. There was no bridge across Oakley's Creek in those days, and the drays had to be hauled across one at a time with a full team of horses. There was no school within reasonable distance, and so a teacher lived at the house and gave the children their daily lessons. "Upper Queen Street was just a track down the hill then'/' Mr. Kelly related, "and the sea used to come up to Shortland Street. Maoris from Orakei would draw their canoes up on the beach and sit round the corner of Shortland and Queen Streets, where they offered huge kits of peaches for sixpence. "After farming at "VVaitakeve for some time I took up contracting and other jobs, such as fencing work a fid felling and clearing trees. If I had all the wood now from the pines which I felled 1 would have a tortuue. We just used to burn them off then, for pine .was not considered useful for anything much." Of incidents in those distant days Mr. Kelly spoke with a' twinkle in,his eye. Chuckling, he told a story to illustrate the state of the town roads. A little way up Wyndhani Street there was a bootmaker's shop, and the bootmaker was wont to do all his repairing work out on the street. One day a lady and gentleman of high rank came picking their way down the muddy street. When they came to where the chippiiigs of leather were scattered on the roadway, the lady exclaimed, "Oh, what a nice piece of road this is!" and stepped on to it —and almost up to her knees in mud. ! "There's been a lot in the paper these days about-Partington's mill," he said. "When I was going to the Wesley College sometimes it was not handy for my mother to cut a lunch, so she gave me a penny to buy it at the mill. For that penny we got as many biscuits as we could carry. ... It would be a jiity to see the old mill pulled.down. "I remember the first man hanged in Queen Street," he said, as fresh memories began to flood his mind. "The courthouse was just about at the corner of Victoria Street West, and the man was hanged outside. His name was Kelly, too, and the other boys used to howl after me, 'Oil, Kelly, Kelly, your father was hanged this morning!' There were stocks outside the courthouse then and old drunkards used to sit in them for people to have a 'squint' at." Another house in which he lived was the old dwelling still standing in Kelly Street, Mount Eden. It was built by Maoris of mud and rushes, and later his father covered it with some of the first roofing iron brought to New Zealand. Married in 1873, Mr. Kelly had nine children, while there are 14 grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.