Surveying Was His Ambition

Te Ao Hou, December 1957, Page 10

Surveying Was His Ambition Mr Ropiha was born at Waipawa, in 1895, a member of Ngati Kahungunu. He was educated at Waipawa district high school and Te Aute College, where he developed a strong interest in mathematics. He joined the Public Works Department in 1912 as a cadet, but it became his ambition to become a surveyor. His spare time was spent almost entirely in study. Before he could qualify, the war started and he went overseas as a bombardier with the artillery. As soon as he came back he resumed his studies and in 1920 qualified as a surveyor at Canterbury College. Shortly after, he married Rhoda Walker, from Omaio (Whanau-a-panui) who bore him a daughter Rina, and a son Peter. As a surveyor he worked both in private practice and with the Lands and Survey Department. He enjoyed the adventure of surveying. A lot of the land he worked on was Maori land, particularly Tuwharetoa and the Urewera. In his profession he established his first link with Maori land, its owners and its problems. He worked in places where surveyors are traditionally unpopular with the Maori people and had to set people's minds at ease and offer help in their difficulties. It made a big difference to the chiefs to discuss things in their own language with a young man they trusted. His-special mentor in those days was Hemi Pitiroi who is still living at Nukuhou. These frendships were still remembered many years later when Mr Ropiha became head of the Department of Maori Affairs. In the nineteen thirties, he worked for a while in the Native Department. He did surveys for land development in Waikato and the far North and some of the young men he trained and influenced were Maoris who later made notable careers as teachers or public servants in other fields. In this time of unemployment, getting land development started often meant the difference between starvation and a solid livelihood. The survey team was

enthusiastically for getting work started, worked at all hours. In a series of weekends. Mr Ropiha and his associates mapped out a plan for the Turanyawawae Estate, Taruewahia in an effort to persuade the government to pay unemployment subsidy to the workers. This was not an official duty, but it led to the government paying unemployment subsidies which enabled the Estate to be established on a firmer financial basis. His first senior appointment, to the post of Chief Surveyor, Blenheim, did not come until 1940. It came, not from ambition to climb the public service ladder, but from a certain unhappiness with the Native Department as it was then. The Permament Head tried to dissuade him from leaving, offered him prospects, and told him ‘that his real job was with his own people’. In those days very few Maoris were given responsible posts in the public service and the Native Department unfortunately was no exception. Mr Ropiha flared up and told the Permanent Head that the only job he would apply for in the Native Department would be his own. Later, among friends, he expressed great regret for this sudden and unusual burst of temper. ‘I don't know what came over me,’ he said.