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Part of Papakura’s living history was celebrated in Red Hill recently.
Each year parents and whanau of children born in Papakura in the past year were invited to commemorate their child’s birth by planting a tree.
The first trees to be planted were by the then mayor of Papakura, George Hawkins, and sporting great Sir John Walker in the Children’s Forest in 1985.
Sir George Hawkins Senior was Papakura Mayor from 1983 to 1992. Together with the town clerk Graham Tagg, he was part of the driving force behind the creation of the Papakura Children’s Forest.
“The land here wasn’t suitable for development. We found that there was movement at the foot of the hill and the land needed to
Members of the Walker and Hawkins families alongside Papakura Local Board members. George Hawkins, second row, third from right.
Photo supplied be stabilised … the first trees planted were fast-growing exotics,” Hawkins says.
While the first few years involved planting exotic trees, they instead began planting natives like rimu, kauri, kowhai, and totara.
“The children’s forest had many purposes – the maternity hospital was going to be closed, and we wanted to show that the hospital was
important. Acknowledging Sir John Walker as a hero, a New Zealand hero, achieved the purpose of making a piece of land that wasn’t planned to be suitable for housing into something that something positive, and [the forest] would keep on growing for years and years.”
Hawkins and his wife Jan also planted trees when their two sons were born.
Their eldest son George is currently a member of the Papakura Local Board.
Representatives from the board were joined by members of the Hawkins and Walker families in July, to unveil a plaque to mark the replanting of two trees first planted in 1985.
Papakura Local Board chair Kelvin Hieatt says the forest is a very significant site for the residents and community of Papakura.
Residents can access the planting maps at council service centres.
