GENERATION OF SERVICE

Taranaki Daily News, 12 September 1934, Page 6

GENERATION OF SERVICE

PRESERVING A BEAUTY SPOT SOCIETY WITH CIVIC SPIRIT. GOOD WORK ON BAINES TERRACE. CARE FOR AN HISTORIC GLADE. There still exists at New Plymouth a society of citizens whose efforts receive little publicity but which now has the enviable record of nearly a quarter of a century’s service almost solely dedicated to the maintenance of one of those many minor beauty spots for which the town is famous in the Dominion. The New Plymouth Beautifying Society was formed in 1910 by a small coterie of enthusiasts who realised that the town would one day have an asset of no inconsiderable value in Baines Terrace. In the 24 intervening years the original enthusiasm has not flagged, although membership has been reduced from the original eight to four. Baines Terrace, as not least of a multitude of small, pharming public reserves, in an about New Plymouth, still has their keenest interest.

From an overgrown and rather forlorn strip of native bush along a river bank, isolated by the bare building plots of a growing town, volunteer labour and the enthusiasm of a generation have transformed it into a well planned and well tended park in miniature which, seldom fails to bring comment from the visitor who discovers it. Trees and shrubs, notably the more decorative varieties of natives, have been systematically planted. Flower plots, paths, steps and rockeries have been made and maintained solely by the efforts of the society’s members. Even considerable work has been done on the banks of the Huatoki to prevent the stream’s floods encroaching too far into the reserve. Notable among the works done by the society in recent years is the azalea plantation which is now making so effective a display of spring blossoms on the hillside. Pohutukawas planted recently on a site which the previous year had been a plot of unsightly blackberries and weeds, are now three feet high and flourishing. Two of the largest pongas in the district were not long ago rescued from strangulation by rank growing acacias and now border a well kept path. ENTHUSIASM UNDAMPED. In the old days the enthusiasm of society members was undamped even by labour that would give pause to a navvy. One tree removed from the terrace because it was too old yielded nine cords of firewood. Another giant to yield at last to the ravages of time was a giant willow reputed to have come from St. Helena, the island of Napoleon’s exile. It, however, is perpetuated. After dismemberment and removal slips of the old giant were planted at Lake Mangamahoe and now flourish as a plantation of fine young trees. One uneven spot in the society’s history was the blasting of inconvenient boulders in the stream bed to lessen the effects of erosion. After eight shots had been fired an official deputation arrived with the information that the boulders were no less than the cooking stones of an historic Maori encampment and of interest as relics of pre-war days! Slightly® shattered but unmovable still, the slabs remain—still menacing the stability of the bank when a freshet comes down. Freshets are the society’s bugbear. There is always a litter of driftwood to be cleared from projecting bends and boulders. A visit to Baines Terrace is of no small interest to the amateur historian and investigator. The relics of the Maori encampment are numerous and well enough hidden to provide an interesting game for an afternoon. There are, too, the ruins of an old watermill and the traces of far gone days when the railway crossed the Huatoki in that vicinity. Once the society made tentative excursion into other fields. The (original cleaning of Fort Niger, a small reserve near the Esplanade and another area on the seaward side of the railway station are further evidence of its work.

The hobbyists are a select body and conservative. Their president, Mr. R. C. Hughes, - has been president since the society’s establishment, but there can be no doubt that they are faithful to their ideals and do their job.