New Zealand Odyssey: Two Buildings in Old Cromwell - Before the Flooding

'New Zealand Odyssey', published in 1989 by Heinemann, was authored by me, Don Donovan (who did the text and illustrations) and Euan Sarginson, who did the photography and design. In this series of blog posts, I will publish some of my drawings.

In the late 1980s, when I painted these two buildings, they stood on the old main street of Cromwell and had done so since the beginnings of the town back in the gold mining days of the late nineteenth century. The street then sloped downwards to where the Clutha and Kawarau rivers met at 'the junction' before flowing swiftly though the Cromwell Gorge below.

The buildings still stand although since the Clutha Dam was filled and Lake Dunstan formed - after 1993 - their inclined highway became a traffic-less back street that disappears under water - a fate the buildings just escaped. 

The upper illustration is of the Masonic Lodge; the lower, a simple schist structure, is Hanson's Cottage, variously owned by a brewer, watchmaker and 'toothpuller'.

© DON DONOVAN
donovan@ihug.co.nz
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New Zealand Odyssey: The Old White Horse Hotel, Becks, Central Otago

'New Zealand Odyssey', published in 1989 by Heinemann, was authored by me, Don Donovan (who did the text and illustrations) and Euan Sarginson, who did the photography and design. In this series of blog posts, I will publish some of my drawings.

 Travelling in Central Otago in 1988 it was still possible to find historic buildings that were going to the dogs. One such was this schist stone and clapboard pub on the road from Alexandra to St.Bathans, at Becks - The White Horse Hotel. 

It was the OLD version, across the road is another, later, White Horse Hotel of good character. The barge boards and signwriting of the old inn were still intact and the building was still capable of repair but - would anybody care?

Well, yes, actually. I believe a group of enthusiasts has restored the old pub, rescued it from oblivion. And that must be a good thing.

© DON DONOVAN

donovan@ihug.co.nz

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Mitchells Cottage, Fruitlands, Central Otago

Completed in 1904, Mitchells’ Cottage at Fruitlands, above the winding highway from Alexandra to Roxburgh, is an outstanding example of the drystone mason’s craft. It was built with painstaking skill, each stone carefully considered and cut so precisely that no mortar was used or needed. It was made by men who knew of no other way to work – no short cuts, no shoddiness – simply the best.

From the Shetland Islands by way of the Australian goldfields Andrew Mitchell arrived in New Zealand in 1866, followed by his brother John in 1872. They worked around the Otago goldfields until, in the 1880s, Andrew discovered a quartz reef on the hills of the Old Man Range above the Clutha Valley. Unlike most gold mining ventures it prospered over a long period and John and Andrew, using skills they’d learned from their father, started to build the cottage below the mine.

John and his wife Jessie brought up ten children in Mitchells’ Cottage (while Andrew lived nearby, alternating between a small stone cottage close to the mine shaft and a smaller iron hut next to John and Jessies’) and although the mine was sold in 1890 and John died in 1922, the cottage stayed in Jessie’s ownership until 1929. It is now in the care of the Department of Conservation.

© DON DONOVAN

donovan@ihug.co.nz