Josh is a PhD student in history at Massey University.
The flax trade played a pivotal yet often overlooked role in the history of New Zealand.
What has been equally underestimated is the importance of the Manawatū in this industry. If you live in a home that is at least 50 years old, it is very likely that you may have your own relic of flax history.
Wool and frozen mutton often come to mind when recalling the economic or provincial history of New Zealand.
However, there was another product which built tribal empires as well as this province, the nation’s first export product: flax.
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Unlike wool, flax had an economic continuity that spanned the pre-European contact period through to the mid-Twentieth Century.
While the flax trade and Manawatū’s contribution to it have largely been overlooked by the history books, some local historians have helped keep this important story alive, such as Catherine Knight, Margaret Tate, the late Ian Matheson, and in particular, Tony Hunt.
The history of flax in this place is the intersection of so many aspects of New Zealand’s culture and heritage.
Harakeke or New Zealand Flax was named Phormium tenax by J.R. and G. Foster, the botanists aboard Cook’s second voyage in 1772. When William Colenso explained to Māori that this type of flax did not occur elsewhere in the world, they were perplexed as to how a society could function without it.
Flax was pivotal in many ways to traditional Māori life, health, and commerce. While Māori relied on the fibre of the flax for clothing, twine, rope, sails, fishing, and construction, they also had a use for every other part of the plant.
During the Musket Wars, Te Rauparaha’s mass export of the fibre to Sydney backed his empire-building endeavours. Before mechanisation, stripping the flax for its fibre was intensively laborious, done by hand with mussel shells.
Flax is a unique and durable fibre. It is among the strongest in the world and also has fire-retardant properties.
The fibre was recognised for its potential by early explorers and settlers, as it became evident that it was the only raw material suitable for manufacturing rope.
The high value of the product was rendered almost uneconomic by how time-consuming and difficult it was to prepare.
On January 4, 1841, a meeting was held at Barrett’s Hotel, Wellington, attended by many leading colonists and chaired by Colonel Wakefield. The purpose of the assembly was to raise and advertise a cash reward for anyone who could develop a machine to efficiently strip flax.
Within months of that meeting several machines were developed across the country, and by the 1860s the industry, now mechanised, was transformed.
Later in the Nineteenth Century, the trade was industrialised.
As the industry in New Zealand developed, research was required to combat plant disease-related issues and to improve efficiency. Dr. L. Cockayne conducted some of this research, but pressure from the industry caused The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research to create the ‘Phormium Research Committee’.
During the 1930s this advisory group appointed Massey Agricultural College to be responsible for botanical research to develop a stronger flax cultivar less resistant to pests and diseases, this task being led by Dr. J.S. Yeates.
This was appropriate as Phormium tenax is a lily, having no relation to European linen flax, and Dr. Yeates was an expert on lilies.
Trade union activity was strong amongst the flax workers.
Flax wages nationally were determined by the Manawatū union’s awards. The Manawatū Flaxmills Employees’ Industrial Union of Workers is renowned for stories of its militant period; however, its history is richer than these anecdotes alone.
Prominent New Zealanders emerged from this union, including John Robinson, Tim Armstrong, and the first labour Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage.
The union was deeply committed to pacifism with over seventy defaulters during The Great War. Trade unionist Mark Briggs suffered field punishment No. 1 alongside Archibald Baxter.
During The Second World War detained conscientious objectors were put to work in the region’s flax swamps including Rex Hillary (the brother of Sir Edmund Hillary), Terrance John Baxter (the brother of James K. Baxter), and future P.S.A. General Secretary, Dan Long.
The Union’s political influence contributed to the birth of the New Zealand Socialist and Labour Parties. High numbers of Māori worked in the industry, having a deep influence on both operational matters and trade union ideology. Many of the region’s flax mills would close to observe Matariki.
The pacifist tradition within the union was inspired both by Anglican and Methodist pacifist clergy and the Māori peace movement.
The industry grew through mechanisation and industrialisation and by the 1890s Manawatū became the epicentre of flax cultivation and production in New Zealand. The flax trade operated all over Aotearoa, but what has been overlooked, is the scale and sophistication of the industry in the Manawatū.
Many flax mills once straddled the Manawatū River. The largest mill, Miranui, in Shannon, employed 300 men at its peak.
Flax, however, never became the industry that it was envisioned to be. Due to international market volatility, the New Zealand flax trade went through enormous booms and busts.
In many parts of the country, flax was a transitional industry where flax was milled as part of swamp clearance for farmland, or where mills were set up during periods of high fibre prices.
Manawatū, on the other hand, had a permanence and longevity unmatched in Aotearoa. In the end, the last flax mill in the country was New Zealand Woolpacks Ltd in Foxton.
They made many products using flax. Including floor coverings, carpet backing and underly, insulation for hot water cylinders and wool packs.
Chances are if you have an old Axminister carpet, an old hot water system, or an ageing wool fadge in the garden shed, you possess a piece of the history of an industry that helped build this place.
Those who wish to lean more about the flax industry should visit the Ian Matheson Archive at the Public Library and the Flax Stripper Museum at Foxton.
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