1814 Hansen Family in New Zealand

Have you heard of Rangihoua Heritage Park? It's a bit off the beaten track, but this spot was once the place where Māori oversaw the first permanent Pākehā settlement in Aotearoa New Zealand. As well as loads of history, there is so much space and plenty of beautiful views.

📷: Tohu Whenua

From Sue Hansen
It is with a heavy heart that we advise that Frederick Stanley (Stan) Hansen died suddenly on Sunday evening 17 July. A service is to be held at 12.00 noon, Thursday the Chapel inside the Selwyn Village Grounds, Pt Chevalier. For anyone that would like to contact my Mum, Kath Hansen, she can be reached on (09)8497091 or [email protected]

Check out this rose which is flowering in the Treaty House gardens, The Active. The rose was bred by Ken Nobbs (1909-1996), a well-known pioneer missionary, historian, writer and horticulturist. On his property called the Rosary, he bred many roses and went on to name a number of them after the wives of missionaries as they “had very little recognition”. This rose, was named after the brigantine Active, bought by Reverend Samuel Marsden in 1810. Thomas Hansen captained the Active’s first voyage to New Zealand in March 1814; an exploratory visit with Thomas Kendall and William Hall to explore establishing a Church Mission Society (CMS) mission station. The ship returned to New Zealand in December 1814 with a party of CMS missionaries and New Zealand’s first mission was set up near Rangihoua Pā.

The business began on land owned by the Mountain family, around 1898. That year, they entered an exhibit at the Auckland Industrial Exhibition.

"BAY OF ISLANDS FISH. An important industry of North Auckland represented in this court is that of the fishing and canning operations carried on at the Bay of Islands by the Purerua Packing Co., for which Mr A H Nathan is agent. The company shows a pyramid of tins of fresh mullet from the Bay of Islands, the tins all bearing the 'Penguin' brand on neat labels. Mullet are exceedingly plentiful in the vicinity of Russell, and the catching and tinning industry gives employment to a considerable number of persons." (Auckland Star, 12 December 1898)

Walter Clapham Mountain accepted first prize at the exhibition for the tinned mullet.

The business continued through to Mountain's death in 1930, and a bit beyond under new ownership.

"The canning of New Zealand mullet is a small industry which has existed at the Bay of Islands' for well over 40 years. The fish abound with other edible varieties in the waters extending from the Bay of Islands to Whangaroa, but it has been left to the local enterprise of settlers of the district to convert them into a marketable product available to the consumer at all times. At present the plant at Purerua is operated by Messrs Hansen Brothers, who maintain a small but steady output from a factory conducted as a side-line to farming operations.

"Auckland is the principal market, the outlet through the city being sufficient to absorb practically the whole of the factory's production. In some years the pack has been below requirements and inquiries received from overseas, opening possible export markets, could not be met. Consequently the possibilities in this direction remain unexploited. Recently, however, there have been developments which promise an expansion of interest in the rich harvest to be won from the seas bordering the northern coast." (Poverty Bay Herald, 2 February 1934)

The Hansens themselves were Bay of Islands identities at the time, descended from Capt Hansen, reputedly the first white child born in the area. Stan Hansen's two-year-old son Thomas Lloyd drowned at Purerua in 1940.

Today the site of the fish packing works is identified as that of a holiday house named Poukura. The Stone Store at Kerikeri, once one of the outlets for Penguin-brand tins from the plant, displayed tea towels in 2009 with a facsimile of the tins' label on them.

Image: Auckland Weekly News, 30 July 1903, Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections AWNS-19030730-4-2

Rufus Cruller 1837–1919 + Rachel Bowyer 1848–1913
Rufus Cruller was born on October 14, 1837, in Whitehall, New York, the son of Lavina and John. He married Rachel Bowyer on November 9, 1864, in Auckland, New Zealand. They had 16 children in 26 years. He died on August 5, 1919, in Kaeo, Northland, New Zealand, at the age of 81, and was buried there.
Rachel Bowyer was born on February 19, 1848, in Whangaroa, Northland, New Zealand, her father, Samuel, was 28, and her mother, Harriet, was 23. She married Rufus Cruller on November 9, 1864, in Auckland, New Zealand. They had 16 children in 26 years. She died on November 22, 1913, in Kaeo, Northland, New Zealand, at the age of 65, and was buried there.

Granddaughterof Harriet Hansen

Adelaide Leslie BOWYER 1895–1949

Adelaide Leslie BOWYER (Lessie) was born in July 1892 in Kaeo Whangaroa, Northland, New Zealand, her father, Thomas, was 39, and her mother, Emma, was 32. She married Charles Alfred Dixon and they had five children together. Her husband Charles Alfred passed away on November 16, 1918, in Otahuhu, Auckland, New Zealand, at the age of 41. They had been married 6 years. She then married Joseph Colquhoun and they had six children together. She died on June 7, 1950, in Glen Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, at the age of 57, and was buried in Auckland, New Zealand.

Kaeo homestead of Samuel Sydney Bowyer and Harriet Bowyer

(Samuel Sydney Bowyer B1819 New South Wales, Australia - D1891 Pupuke, Whangaroa)

(Harriet Bowyer Nee Hansen B1824 Oihi, Bay of Islands D1911 Waiere Road, Kaeo)

Pā denuded but no dead kiwi or nests found at explosion site DoC staff searching the fire scene found 'no direct evidence' of kiwi deaths.