History House
Museum
The History House museum houses a wealth of
information about the western regions and coast of Greymouth,
New Zealand that also include historical information about coal
mining, timber and shipping, but specializing in pre-1920
records of living conditions, the region, photographs and social
commentaries. Their excellent photographs include many of gold
mining, coal mining, shipping, timber milling and the rest of
the information listed above. The region would be explored in
the 1840s, with Thomas Brunner, Arthur Dudly Dobson and Charles
Heaphy, with James Mackay finishing a huge land sale from the
Maori in 1860. Then a government supply depot would be built in
1863 and operated by Charles Townsend until he would drown while
trying to cross a river in October of that year. Gold would then
be discovered in the area, in the Taramakau and Greenstone are
in January of 1863, and would eventually begin to grow in all
directions by 1866, so that the needs of the diggers that
arrived here could be met. In 1865, the population was 16,000
and during the next year, another 14,000 would arrive on the
west coast, with a reported gold recovery of some 553,000
ounces. The Canterbury provincial government would make the area
south of the Grey River and west of the Southern Alps as a
goldfield, with more people arriving and building. These first
structures would be little more than shacks, made of canvas, but
as businesses arrived and became established, the buildings
would become more substantial. Gold and passengers would become
the mainstay of the shipping industry that began, during the
1860s and 1870s, and in 1865 and 1866 in Hokitika, the biggest
number of passengers would arrive. In 1864, the first coal would
be mined to supply steamers trading on the west coast and coal
mining would become another rich revenue.
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