WHALING DAYS ON THE EAST COAST

Te Ao Hou, August 1957, Page 18

WHALING DAYS ON THE EAST COAST In this article, which is a reproduction of a Radio talk in Maori, Te Tane Tukaki talks about the early Whaling days in the Bay of Plenty particularly on the coast from Te Kaha to Cape Runaway. He states that whaling was started by certain pakehas who settled in the area and married Maori women. Their descendants in their turn became expert whalers. The whalers were organised into boat teams each one was assigned a special place and a special task in the team and as soon as ever the alarm of whales was given the boats were manned and each one knew his job. The writer himself was the cox for he was but a small boy when he joined the crew of a whaling boat. The boat he first went to sea on was called “Agnus” after Samuel Hei's sister. The recognised leading whaler at the time was Friday Hi. When Te Tane Tutaki was a boy—whaling was the chief occupation of the people—both men and women took part and the young people looked upon it as a great sport. Whangaparaoa is the Maori name for Cape Runaway and Tukaki thinks it was so named because the Maori ancestors who landed there found a huge whale or Paraoa cast up on the beach, hence the name—Whanga—(Bay); Paraoa—(Whale): Whale-bay.