MAORI GATEWAY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23817, 19 November 1940, Page 9

MAORI GATEWAY

MUSICK MEMORIAL SITE OF AN OLD PA PROPOSAL TO GOVERNMENT Drawings embodying a scheme for a large Maori gateway and palisading at the entrance to the grounds of the Musick memorial radio station, on the headlands of Musick Point, are being considered by the Government. They were submitted by the Akarana Maori Association in conjunction with the Auckland Historial Society, and they were prepared by Mr. L. Kelly, an authority on Maori history. The purpose of die scheme is to commemorate ■ the fact that the site was once an important Maori pa. .Bordering the cliffs of the headland are the pits of old huts and store sites, and cutting across is a depression four to five feet in depth which was the chief trench of the fortifications. Apparently, when it started operations in preparing the grounds for the memorial the Public Works Department was in ignorance of the historic significance of the site, and its chief roadwav cuts across the remains of the entrenchment. In levelling the grounds on whirh it has now planted several hundred native trees, its workmen began to fill the depression marking the old trench, but when the origin was discovered the earth was thrown back. The trench will be preserved. As part of the scheme of design of the Musick memorial radio station, plans were drawn for a large gateway that would bo in architectural conformity with this scheme. A suggestion lias now been made that the .Maori gateway should be erected within the grounds, giving entrance to an inner area preserving the relics of fortification and the sites of the vanished Maori habitations. Supporters of this idea consider that the Maori gateway and palisading at the entrance to the grounds would be out, of harmony with the building scheme. Mr. Gcorire Graham, secretary of the Akarana Maori Association, said the plans submitted were in ac-ord with accepted Maori technique and design, and it was proposed that the carving should be done by the carvers employed at Ngaruawahia. The na. the identity of which it was intended to preserve, was probably occupied up to the middle or end of the 18th century. Work is now in full swing m constructing the Musick Memorial Station. Tt is being erected by the T). C. Street Construction Company at a cost of £II.OOO.