The Catlins village of Tahakopa was once brimming with life.
It was at the end of the line of the Catlins River Branch railway in 1915 and the logging industry filled the valley with men and their families .
Eleanor Sinclair (65), a third generation member of the Tahakopa Valley community, remembered those days, when the valley had been better connected to the towns nearby.
Mrs Sinclair recalled taking the train from Tahakopa, through Balclutha to Dunedin on shopping excursions.
''We rattled along in the old carriages and got filthy dirty.
''It used to leave at six o'clock in the morning. I think it got to Balclutha at 10am or 11am, or maybe later, and then we got to Dunedin.
''And my mother would literally run around to catch the express train back to Balclutha at 4pm, then we'd be rattling back on this train back here.''
Today, there are 35 ratepayers in the valley, excluding Papatowai. Seven people live in the Tahakopa village.
Six children attend the school she went to as a child.
''It was such a vibrant community at one time,'' she said. Nowadays ''it's not humming''.
Mrs Sinclair left the valley when she was 13 years old for boarding school in Dunedin.
She returned to the valley with her husband Don 11 years ago. Her grandfather, Claude Martin, helped to build the community hall - named Our Hut - in 1921.
It still stands in the heart of the community but is in serious need of repair.
Mrs Sinclair and the rest of the Our Hut Tahakopa committee are restoring the hall, which still needs paint on the exterior, concreting and pathways, and a pressure pump for the dishwasher.
When the work was completed the 93-year-old hall would be good for another 50-60 years.
''It was usable, but it was just awful inside.''
The hall's fortunes changed in November 2013, when the committee decided to spend $6000 it had sitting in the bank.
Putting life back into Our Hut had cost a lot more - $25,000 so far, she said.
The Clutha Licensing Trust granted $10,000, the Otago Community Trust, gave $2300, and the committee has run fundraisers, such as garage sales, an election candidates night, raffles, and bring'n buys.
In some ways, the vibrancy of the valley life of her childhood had been forgotten, Mrs Sinclair said.
The Catlins railway closed in 1971, causing concern among the locals.
The village, and Our Hut, had paid a price for being off the beaten track.
''`It's in the sticks. It doesn't matter'.
''Places like this don't go ahead as long as that attitude keeps being here,'' she said.
''There's still that mentality of Tahakopa being rough and drinking.''
People in the area were used to ''getting away with things. There is a saying in this area, you're either a `knee bender' or an `elbow bender'''.
Our Hut was built for the knee-benders in the valley, especially the women who needed a place for some ''social intercourse''.
The deeds to the hall read: ''drinking and dancing and gambling shall be prohibited''.
And it's honoured.
The cottage next door was once home to a woman who wrote a letter to the Otago Daily Times, in 1925.
The letter, by Alice S. Ford, which claimed to voice the concerns of ''all the decent men and women of Tahakopa'' was entitled ''An Outrage in Tahakopa'' and pleaded for a constable to police the village.
Mrs Ford had spoken in Dunedin against the sale of whisky in Tahakopa, and it had brought about ''some startling results'', she wrote.
''On the evening of June 6, a raid was made on my cottage ... '' The veranda was set alight and ''great stones'' were heaved on to the roof and through the window, scattering shattered glass inside.
''The language of the men who took part in the outrage was of a most revolting character,'' she wrote.
''And all was directed upon my head.
''I want the public to take a good look at this picture. Night: a cloud of men with bombs and stones, a widow and her children, the constable over 20 miles away.
''Truly, the courage of drinking men is a thing to marvel at, and all this, Sir, because I dared to put my finger on the thing that is ruining the district.''
Today, Our Hut is still used by the Women's Institute and the Tahakopa Fellowship. Religious paintings hang on the wall.
But Mrs Sinclair said, despite the fortnightly services at the hall, Our Hut was not being used as much as it used to be.
She said she saw its future as perhaps a ''quirky wedding venue'', the site of any number of random meetings or a picnic spot for travellers.
The work on the building had taken the committee ''all year'' and was finished last month.
