AROUND THE ORE FIELDS OF ONEKAKA

Grey River Argus, 22 June 1939, Page 10

AROUND THE ORE FIELDS OF ONEKAKA

An interesting trip both from a sight-seeing and educational point of view was recently made by Messrs T. Bowes and S. Morris, of the Runanga Co-operative Society, to Onekaka. - riving by car at the Main Camp they were met by Messrs P. Johnstone President of the Onekaka Branch o the Labour Party and President of the Co-operative Provisional Committee J Dunn, secretary of the Labour Party’ Branch, and W. L. Robertson, secretary of the Co-operative Provisional Committee and Editor of Ine Call.” The visitors were taken over the old Onekaka works and they thought it a sorry sight to see the wheels of this industry at a standstill and left in such a neglected condition. Trucks, suspended in mid-air over a deep gully, full of the precious ore and simplv rusting away, while the big smelting kiln was falling to pieces. Moulds, machinery and buildings—worthless for the future development of this industry. Makes one wonder what might have been! The party then went over the hills to Parapara, where the main field of ore is located. It was extremely interesting to one member of the party who had some knowledge of the iron industry and who was keen to compare the deposits of ore in the Onekaka district with the deposits known to him in the Old Country. . Bore holes were shown to the visitors, who were told that one hole was bored to a depth of 225 feet in solid ore. The outcrops from hill to hill showed no end of ore. Many tunnels have been driven into ore varying from 30 to 60 per cent. iron. The Parapara ore-bearing country is similar in formation to that of the Old Country. There, however, does not appear to be much of the hematite type of ore. The country is somewhat broken with a substance of a I clayey nature. This occurs among the deposits in the “Old Land.” The one big difference seen is that the ore can be mined by tunnel at Onekaka, while in the Old Country deep shafts have to be sunk. Experts have recently spent some time in proving the ore deposits and reports have been submitted to the Government. There does not appear to be any reason why the Onekaka works should not go ahead, and hopes I are entertained that the reports will I be favourable. Onekaka people are optimistic. The Co-operative Provisional Committee have been busy for some time laying the foundation, on an extensive scale, for the development of the Co-operative Movement in all its phases, and if carried into effect this plan will show that Onekaka knows all about co-operation. The seeds of co-operation have been, well-sown amongst the few people living there at present. It only remains U see the development of the iron industry to make that seed grow. One can visualise a busy town of Onekaka, built on a purely co-oper-, ative basis and fashioned on the gen-| uine Rochdale Plan.