George Pain the silent partner

A three-day trek from Wellington in 1865 saw then 19-year-old George Pain arrive in the Wairarapa,  where he found work as a shepherd _ with no experience, but in short order he proved himself capable of handling dogs and sheep.

Pain’s entrepreneurial talents quickly emerged and within months he was hawking clothes from horseback to station workers around the south coast of Wairarapa.

By 1872 he had built a small store at Wharekaka and was doing regular 2-monthly sales trips round the coast while his new wife ran the store.

Within a year, after Martinborough was founded, George Pain had moved his store to the town, continued his hawking trips and invested in both town and farm land. The town land included the section on the corner of The Square and Jellicoe Street where the stores remain.  

Among farms he bought – and sold – were Admiral Station, Te Mai, Clifton Grove, Tully’s Long Bush, Palliser Bay Station and Pain Estate, the latter gifted to the town by his second wife Mary when she died.

As one historical collation on Pain notes: “This seams (sic) to have been the way for George Pain (“Tiny” as he was known as) of making money and then investing into land to farm.’ 

Prior to Kershaw family involvement in 1899, Pain had partners John Gallie and Thomas Haycock. 

At one stage he sold the venture to Gallie, but two years later bought it back as he was unhappy over Gallie’s refusal to buy the freehold.

When Gallie stalled, Pain warned he would set up a rival store, a proposal Gallie “did not consider a very honourable thing to do.” Eventually Haycock joined the investment. 

By 1900 Pain had gone farming, leaving Haycock and new partner John Kershaw to run the business. When he finally sold the land and buildings, he included a condition that his name remain on the title.

Pain also had a determined streak. 

After he received what is called “some very shoddy trreatment (from the Proprietor) at the Martinborough Club Hotel” and was evicted, Pain warned the man hadn’t seen the last of him. “Two days later he was back in the hotel as the new owner with a new proprietor.”