Martinborough Golf Round Up for September

The winning Lamb & Chardonnay team (from left) Shane, Craig, Scotty & Nige.

As the first month of Spring passes us by, we’ve enjoyed some fine weather and endured some stormy weather.  The huge winds toward the end of the month brought a large number of trees down and left debris covering the course; as usual a wonderful army of guys rallied with their chainsaws and tools of the trade to clear the course and make it safe and clear.  Although it was sad to see the big mac go on the corner of the 17^th I must admit the view from the white tees is more appealing now!!

Grumpies winners this month have included Phil Reid, Griff Page and Bill Jago.

T he ladies club champs have been in full swing in the month of September – unfortunately the results will have to be printed in the next edition!  They attempted to retain the Cotter Rose Bowl but the Masterton girls used their home advantage, our girls came second.  The Wairarapa 4 ball best ball was played and Debbie Donaldson will have har name put on the trophy again this year for having the best gross score of 78 along with her partner, former Martinborough Club member, Pip Smith (nee Kirk). Wednesday winners have included Sandra Petersen, Adele Cairns, Julie Weber and Nicky Warren. … Continue Reading

Martinborough FC End of Season Review

Well another season of local football has finally ended and both the Junior and Senior teams have gone from strength to strength this year…

The Junior season finished at the end of August and we found ourselves with more players this year than ever before – being able to field 7 teams across the different age categories (12th grade down to First Kicks). Fantastic to see so many First Kicks players entering the sport at an early age).

One of our teams scored a whopping 100 goals across their matches too.

Each team had some tremendous matches against opposing sides that are very good and it was fantastic to watch them develop and hone their skills to contest the matches.

A huge shout out has to go to the Coaches of each team who give up their Saturday mornings freely every week to run the teams plus a day each week to help coach and train their kids as well – it is a huge commitment and the club would not be able to function without these guys.

The parents and players themselves also need a special mention as without them there would not be a club and they all represent the club and town with passion and commitment week in week out regardless of the weather and opposition. … Continue Reading

Maree’s musings VITAL STATISTICS

  How often do you hear people say ‘I’m just average’, I wonder? Us New Zealanders are masters at dumbing down our abilities or peculiarities in the hope of fitting in; it can be uncomfortable being eccentric – something I’m an expert at at times.

We have maths whizzes who are paid well to provide us with statistics on all sorts of stuff. I’ve just found out, for example, that the average Kiwi (human variety) eats 28 pies a year. Now I’m partial to a pie once in a while, and might consume five or six over the course of a year. This means that someone else is gobbling 40 or more. One a week – probably not as scarey as a daily scoff although there will be a few at the far end of the graph who can’t resist. Taken over the whole population, that amounts to about 112million down the human hatches. That’s a lot. 

Completely unrelated: at last count (!! who does this, I wonder) there were approximately 52 Lego bricks for every human in the world. There’s probably some of you out there who are collectors so will make up for me with none at all, not even a frog made of some. … Continue Reading

Early chemists of South Wairarapa to feature in new book

A medicine bottle from Valentine’s Martinborough Pharmacy. Photo courtesy Adam Simpson

By Mark Pacey of the Wairarapa Archive
markp@library.mstn.govt.nz

An idea to catalogue all the old glass bottles with the names of Wairarapa chemists on them soon developed into something more.

It was going to be a basic booklet of photos and drawings, but what about the history of the businesses themselves? It was well worth the effort to find out about these shops and those that ran them. 

But not all shops had bottles with their names on them so it was also decided to find out who the first chemists were in each of the Wairarapa towns and write about them too. What began as a simple catalogue was now becoming a fully-fledged history book.

Daniel Keir was the first chemist in the South Wairarapa region, setting up his shop in Featherston in 1880. He was in business just six years before selling to William Fife. 35 years and six owners later the business was now in the hands of Thomas Ernest Lang and continues to this day under the name of Lang’s Pharmacy. … Continue Reading