An eight decade-old mystery involving an Otago amateur photographer has now been solved. Bruce Munro details the twists, turns and tears of a nationwide, intergenerational search culminating in a moving meeting on a Bay of Plenty marae.
A man stood on a wharf holding a camera. He was well-dressed, as always. Before him sat an old woman with piercing eyes and three youngsters busy devouring melons.
Pale fingers lifted the camera, composed the shot, depressed the shutter. Twice he did that, capturing brown faces and bodies in repose; literal snapshots in time.
Did he know them? Did they talk to him? What was it about the scene that arrested his attention? How did the family group feel about this intrusion?
He walked away, not yet knowing whether the split-seconds of light exposed on celluloid film encased in the camera’s metal body had captured the essence of what he saw. They watched him walk away, unable to guess the brief encounter between two vastly different worlds would spiral through the generations to intersect again a lifetime later.
In early spring, two years ago, Dunedin couple Gavin and Nimi Hendry talked to two friends about photographs they had come across while sorting the personal effects of Gavin’s late father Graham. The photos were in two thick binders of family images taken over the years by Gavin’s grandfather, Gordon Hendry, a keen amateur photographer.
Among the well-composed, quality photos depicting formal and informal family scenes from the middle of last century, were two unexpected, surprising images. In one, an elderly Māori woman with striking eyes and distinctive moko kauae sits on a wharf with two young girls; all three looking at some unknown point of interest over the photographer’s right shoulder. In the other, with the same headland and rail bridge faintly visible in the background, the kuia and, presumably, one of her mokopuna, sit with a crouching boy, all eating what appear to be melons; in front of them on the wharf several small fish lie on a sack.
To Gavin and Nimi, the two photographs seemed plainly out of place. But it was equally clear the images had been deliberately placed in the collection of Gordon’s photos, compiled decades earlier.
"I loved the photos as soon as I saw them," Nimi said.
"There is a specialness and a relational warmth that really attracts me to them."
The couple had considered framing the original prints and proudly displaying them at home; beautiful, historic New Zealand images with a strong family link.
"But we wondered who the people in the photos were and whether their descendants had any photos like these of them," Nimi told the two friends.
"We thought they might be very precious to the family, if we could find them and gift the photos to them."
One of the friends, Paul Bernard, pointed at the photos’ indistinct background and said he thought it was a rail bridge in Tauranga, in the Bay of Plenty. However, the consensus was that because many of the other photos in the albums were identifiably in the lower South Island, these probably were too.
The other friend, the author, said he would like to try find out who these time-locked individuals were and whether there were any descendants. Permission was given. The search began.
In September, 2022, digital copies of the photos were sent in all directions with a request for information.
Ōtākou rūnaka upoko Edward Ellison soon got back, saying he did not recognise the people nor the setting. He suggested searching further north.
Christchurch-based Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu generously offered to include the photos in its next iwi-wide magazine. But that was called off when Awhina White, a friend of North Island-based historian Monty Soutar, got in touch to say the wharf and rail bridge had been linked to Tauranga.
Paul was proved dead right.
"I think this was taken on the Tauranga wharf where Bobby's fish’n’chip shop is," Awhina said of the photos.
"The Island people — Matakana, Rangiwāea, Motuhoa — used to catch the ferry from there. That is the Matapihi bridge in the background.
"It won't take long for people to recognise who they are."
While waiting for that, Gavin was plied with questions about his paternal grandfather.
He was the owner of J Hendry & Sons Menswear, 272 George St, founded by his father.
"In all the photos, even when away camping with family, he was nattily dressed, always in a jacket and tie," Gavin said.
Gordon and Ethel (nee Hilliker) had two children who died young. They then adopted two children, Graham, Gavin’s father, and Joan.
As was often the practice in Pakeha families then, the children were not told they were adopted until they were young adults.
The family had a comfortable life that included regular holidays, mostly in Central Otago and Southland.
Gordon was a capable amateur photographer with the means to pursue his hobby, including a home-darkroom for developing film.
But family, including Graham’s sister Joan, could not recall any holidays in the North Island, let alone the Bay of Plenty.
Awhina did not get any definitive answers about who was in the photos. What was not known, however, by her nor those in Dunedin, was that names had already been put to the faces.
In late-2022, the Dunedin-based search was suspended for a year.
Then, in December, last year, it looked like the mystery would be solved on Matakana Island. An afternoon spent at a marae on the island that spans almost the entire length of Tauranga Harbour yielded a possible persona for the kuia.
But in late-January, with doubts still nagging, the photos were again cast on to the waters of the worldwide web, including the site, Tauranga History Online.
There, the thread blew up.
"Wow, amazing photos. The dear kuia and maybe her mokopuna," stated one of dozens of online reactions.
Among them, the same afternoon, someone posted, "Didn’t Patrick Nicholas and Monty Soutar sort this a couple years back? ... Mōtītī".
The next day, Tuhapo Tipene, of Mōtītī Island, confirmed the question, providing the long-sought answers — the names of everyone in the two photos taken by Gordon Hendry.
"I was approached by Patrick Nicholas about these two photos," Tuhapo wrote.
"The names were confirmed by kaumatua of Mōtītī.
"The kuia in this photo is Ripeka Rihara (1856-1955), sitting here with her granddaughter Hera Sarah Aukaha (later Mrs Mui) and her great-granddaughter Paretaihinu Aukaha (later Mrs Nuku). The boy in the photo is her grandson, Ngairo Aukaha, brother to Hera.
"Ripeka was in her 90s in this photo. We were able to identify her because of her moko kauae."
Over the next several days, the original post got 85 comments, 42 shares, 372 "likes" and 317 "loves".
Other online comments included, "These photos have left us all in astonishment", "Photos are beautiful. Thank u cameraman, an hz whanau, for bringing them home" and "I am a direct descendant of Nanny Ripeka Rihara and Nanny Polly Paretaihinu Nuku ... [We] are all very lucky to have our Nanny Pare with us still alive today ... If the descendants of the man who took the photo wish to meet her, our family is happy to make that happen".
Direct contact was made with Tuhapo, a great-great-grandson of Ripeka Aukaha (nee Rihara) and a walking encyclopedia on Mōtītī Island, the Patuwai hapu of Ngāti Awa and the genealogy of the the Rangitikei and Aukaha whanāu.
Through Tuhapo — and with the slightly nervous but eager consent of Gavin and Nimi — plans coalesced for a meeting at a Bay of Plenty marae, to present the original prints to descendants of those in the photos.
On an overcast Saturday morning in late-August, karanga, haka and waiata rung out across surrounding farmland, as Gavin and Nimi, accompanied by Tuhapo, walked across the marae ātea at Pupuaruhe Marae on the outskirts of Whakatāne, an hour south of Tauranga. This marae was chosen because it is on mainland whenua of Mōtītī Island’s Te Patuwai hapu and is just down the road from the urupā where Ripeka is buried.
Ripeka was one of the last generation born into the old Māori world, Tuhapo said.
Born in Whakatāne, about 1856, she was the granddaughter, on her mother’s side, of Ngāpuhi chief Hongi Hika. She was a member of the Ringatū Church, founded by Te Kooti when Ripeka was a teenager. At an unknown age, she married Aukaha Rangitkei, one of the leaders on Mōtītī.
The island, 22km east of Mt Maunganui, has always been a special place, a world of its own. Low and flat, Mōtītī has no natural harbour on its rocky, pohutukawa-lined coast to encourage easy access. But it is a fertile, volcanic island that, for 50 years either side of the beginning of the last century, was known for its abundant crops of kūmara and maize.
"Mōtītī was a thriving community," Tuhapo said.
"And Ripeka and Aukaha lived in a villa with huge gardens, next to the marae."
The couple had five sons, of whom two survived to adulthood. Aukaha died in 1925.
The elder surviving son, Rurangi Aukaha, was the father of Awaroa and two of the children in the Hendry photos, Ngairo, and Hera. Their mother died of birth complications shortly after Hera was born. The girls were then raised by relatives, while Ngairo stayed with his father.
Ripeka and Aukaha’s other surviving son, Pene, had six children. One of the daughters of Pene’s second child, Roora, was the other child in the photo, Paretaihinu.
When Ripeka was in her 90s and Ngairo, Hera and Paretaihinu were young children, life on Mōtītī Island was land and sea-based, healthy and communal; crop diseases that would precipitate a mass migration to the mainland were still a couple of decades away.
By the 1940s, Faulkner’s Ferries provided a regular service between Tauranga, Mt Maunganui and the various surrounding islands, including Mōtītī.
It was probably while waiting for a ferry to take them back home that Ripeka and her mokopuna were approached by Gordon carrying his camera.
Most likely, he was taking in the sights while on a business trip that included Tauranga and was captivated by the sight of the intergenerational family group; captivated to such an extent that for decades his family and theirs sat kanohi ki te kanohi, face to face, in his photo albums.
Ripeka died one year short of her centennial birthday.
Ngairo died just a few years after the photos were taken, aged 8.
Paretaihinu, who had two children, was still alive when the photo presentation was being planned, but died in April.
Hera, who died in 2009, had three children. Two of them, Lina Subritzky and Salona Muollo, were able to travel from Wellington to attend the Bay of Plenty event.
"When I first saw the photos it was tangi, tangi, tangi — I cried a lot," Salona said.
"We had never seen photos of our mother at that age."
"I want to say a big thank-you to your grandfather for taking these photos, for the passion of the photos," Lina added.
"And a big thank-you to you Gavin for honouring your grandfather. This is huge."
Looking at the photos, listening to the animated chatter of people who this morning were strangers but now share connections spanning decades, it feels like a bright glimpse, in fractious times, of heartfelt partnership.
Ahakoa he iti, he pounamu. Although it is small, it is precious.
"This has been such an amazing thing for us to be part of," Nimi said.
"We were embraced and welcomed. Any cost was worth it, seeing how much it meant to the whanāu to now have the photos."
