But the story of a district is never finished. Life must go on and things must change.
As the years after the war passed, the great wave of prosperity steadied as it had always done over the past century. The scientists have shown "How to manage Waikato peat" and the grass grows lush and green. More and more butter and cheese can be produced, but the markets do not increase as quickly and the cry "Diversify, diversify or perish" is echoeing over New Zealand.
The relocatable class rooms that were added almost as soon as the new school was built have been moved elsewhere. No longer do school children ride their ponies along dusty roads to school or parents need to convey their secondary pupils to Hamilton; a fleet of busses travels 600 km a day for the sake of education.
In the '20's, Jim Sharp and John Ballard vied with each other to grow the best potatoes. Harvesting days were fun. By ten o'clock in the morning, horses of all colours were tied to the fence. With a toddler or two perched in front and perhaps a baby tied in a shawl on the back, most of the Maori ladies came riding bareback often with the minimum of a bridle. There was much talking and laughter as they worked along the long rows of "Spuds" the men had already lifted; sorting and filling bags as they went. What teasing if they managed to catch up to the digger! It was hot and dusty work but there was a happy camaraderie that made potato harvest a time to look forward to. Now John's grandson grows 60 acres of potatoes lifted by a giant mechanical digger and sorted by machine.
Jim's grandson keeps bulls. They chump their way through the grass to the export trade.
Where Mrs. Knox refused to live because "I'll never see my friends"; strawberries and vegetables flourish so that no longer do the people of Gordonton need to grow their own or do without.
There is a feijoa orchard where Mr. Pritchard marked, "Deep water and rushes" and on Okoropong, maize rows with no stumps to trip the discs. The blueberry bushes down Woodlands Road do not look a bit like the rnanuka which grew so thickly there twenty years ago and the sundews and bog plants flourish no more. Export potential for blueberries, boysenberries, raspberries and asparagus will surely make up for the loss of markets for dairy products.
Goats and deer are replacing some of the cows and not many farms need to keep pigs and hens. Big tankers collect the whole milk, so there is no skim milk for them and feed is expensive to buy. Truly, life has changed.
And it will continue to change. The next hundred years will be different and exciting.
Will people of 2086 enjoy this story? I hope so.
Instead of Mr. Graham's "Rushes & Raupo" it is now Cows & Clover that any one passing can see... good green grass to northward and eastward and southward and westward as well - with small areas of other crops as farmers respond to the national cry, "Diversify, Diversify" The Komakorau stream is hardly more than a ditch. Lake Tunawakapeka is now green pasture land.
References:
Rushes ‘an Raupo, To cows an’ Clover by Edith Williamson