Langdale settlement

Langdale Station was purchased by A. Elder and company in 1877. His sons H.R. and A.A. Elder and their cousin John Austin managed it until the government bought the property in 1900-1901, under the 1894 Land Settlements Act, and broke it into smaller holdings as part of a wider land reform programme.

A map showing the area covered by the Langdale Estate

The Langdale Station woolshed with the shed for the steam engine nearest the camera. A pile of firewood is against the side of the shed, 1901.

From reverse of photograph: This was a 16 stand shed. The shearing plant was driven by a steam engine. You'll note the chimney stack and the heap of firewood. After the Langdale subdivision the shed was reduced in size and parts were used to build outbuildings on some of the smaller blocks.
05-39/P-N-7-1

A 1949 photo of the Whareama Valley by photographer Leslie Adkin. https://collections.tepapa.govt.nz/object/132609

Langdalereport-Don-Kinnell.pdf

In 2008, local farmer and historian Don Kinnell wrote a paper entitled The Langdale Settlement that was published in the New Zealand Journal of History. This is very interesting reading.

Abstract

Langdale Station is a 40-minute drive east from Masterton. This Wairarapa sheep, beef and grain farm is the remnant of a large estate owned by an English family until 1901. It was a four-hour coach trip from Masterton in those days.

1 The Langdale Settlement, Wellington, New Zealand, Wellington: T.Y. Duncan, Minister of Lands, 1901, p. 7

Modern travellers can journey down the picturesque Mangapakeha valley oblivious of the infamous swamp, and the role it played in the Liberal Government's purchase and settlement of Langdale. It seems incongruous in a colony founded on British principles of individual property rights that a government should embark on a programme of land redistribution. The Liberal Government purchased, by compulsion if necessary, large estates, and leased the subdivided land to settlers without right of freehold. Although the tenure strictures were relaxed, land-for-settlements remained in the New Zealand ethos and was later used to settle returned servicemen. Subsequent governments spent taxpayers' money settling 'productive people' on farms.

2 Economic Management: Land Use Issues, Wellington, Minister of Finance, 1984, pp. 60,67-68.

Ironically, the 1980s' neo-liberal revolt ended government involvement in land settlement. [From Introduction]

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