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This post introduces a new photograph to the story of 'Hotels' in Ohingaiti's pioneering heyday. This print is notable for presenting the arrival of 'a coach and four' (the symbol of a bustling transport industry through to the township prior to the completion of the Makohine Viaduct) at A.J.Hurn's Commercial Hotel.

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This image was taken between September 1899 and June 1901 by local photographer, Edward George Child. The original print was located in the Foxton area int he late 1980s when it was referred to the late Ian Mathieson, Archivist at the Palmerston North Public Library. Ian forwarded this copy to me in 1992, shortly after Ohingaiti's centenary celebrations thirty years ago.

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The Commercial Hotel was built by William Meehan, of Bulls, in 1892 and granted a liquor licence in 1893. William Meehan and a number of licensees operated the hotel until June 1901 when the Liquor Licence was transferred to the Taihape Hotel. Margaret Coyle then purchased the building and transferred the licence, and name, from her Royal Hotel (where the former Ohingaiti Post Office building is located) and continued trading.

Ambrose John Hurn was born in Surrey, England, in 1869 and is recorded in ‘The N.Z. Mail,’ 31 August, 1894, as being the Chief Steward on the 3000 ton cargo/passenger ship, ‘Port Melbourne’. He had served previously on the vessels ‘Australia’ and ‘Maori’ and an August 1899 comment noted that he was ‘late of the Union Company’s fleet.’

A.J. Hurn’s lease of the Commercial Hotel at Ohingaiti was intended to be seven years, commencing in August 1899. But the imminent completion of the Makohine Viaduct and the pressure to transfer liquor licences to Taihape saw A.J. Hurn’s time in Ohingaiti over by June 1901. He married Helena Hausmann in Wellington on 12 November 1901 and then took over the Taihape Hotel licence (formerly the ‘Zealandia hotel’) a month later. Helena and Ambrose Hurn’s eldest child, Cyril, was born in 1902.

By 1905 Ambrose and Helena Hurn were back in Wellington at the Grand Hotel (Beveridge and Hurn) where their second child, Georgina, was also born. Following a trip to England in 1909, Ambrose Hurn took over the licence of the Denbigh Hotel in Feilding, the licence being transfer from William Hook in 1910. The third child of the family, Howard, was born at this time. Sometime after 1916 the family returned to Wellington and, from their residence at 330 Oriental Parade, the children completed their education.

In 1926 Ambrose Hurn, of Laery, Beveridge and Co., was recorded as being an elected member of the Wellington Rotary Club. June 1928 saw the engagement of Cyril Hurn to Thelma McColl, and in April 1933 Georgina Hurn married Noel Grant.

Helena and Ambrose Hurn saw out their lives in Wellington where Helena died in August of 1945, aged 73 years. Ambrose died in 1951 aged 82 years.

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Facebook post data for Hurn’s Commercial Hotel arson attempt.
Ohingaiti, Oct-Nov 1899.
While searching files online in "PapersPast" I matched up two related items concerning Hurn's Commercial Hotel in Ohingaiti in 1899. The first report came from the Evening Post on 31 st October, 1899. I laughed out loud after reading a follow-up note printed two weeks later in the Wairarapa Daily Times (15 th November.)