“The Story of the Manawatu Railway” 5 B&W photo prints
Photographs of 5 pages (13, 14, 15, 16, & 18) of a 32 page unidentified booklet (presumed to be about the ‘North Island Main Trunk Railway’). The story is told by Mr Jimmy Rhodes (at age 82) to his young friend the author (unidentified), about the construction of the private railway, particularly the Shannon section which he helped to build. Mr Rhodes was just 14 when he went to work for the contractors John Wilkie and Clark Dunn in the winter of 1883, and remained until 1885 when that contracted section was completed. {an abridged version of the story is in the book – “From Bush & Swamp”, pages 24 & 25}
Although page 17 of the booklet is not represented in these photos the story is complete, as this page probably contains an illustration. From the above information, this story was told by Mr Rhodes to the author in 1965.
Any use of this image must be accompanied by the credit “Horowhenua Historical Society Inc.”
