A Notable Plaque in the Wairau Valley

It was nearly 130 years after the first sheep station was established in the Upper Wairau when, in May 1976 the notable Marlborough historian, the late Frank Smith and his wife unveiled a cairn and plaque to mark permanently the spot where Dr John Henry Cooper and Nathaniel George Morse established the first sheep run in the Wairau. The erection of the plaque had been a long-standing ambition which Mr Smith realised in his later years.

Members of the Nelson and Marlborough Historical Societies, and regional Committees of the Historic Places Trust, Marlborough Federated Farmers and other organisations helped to swell the crowd. The visitors walked across the paddock to the site of the first home built on the station and inspected the ruins of buildings erected over the years.

Two of the older members of the patty, Jack Tomlinson and John Solomon, had special reason to be interested in the occasion as they had lived in the area and mustered on the various back country runs. It was a happy reunion for them as they recounted many incidents and talked nostalgically of "those good old days."

The plaque on the cairn depicts a merino sheep and carries the wording: Nearby Stood the Home of Dr John Henry Cooper and Nathaniel George Morse who, in November 1846, Brought Over the Tophouse Saddle to this Locality the First Flock of Sheep to the Wairau.

The cairn is located by the highway and is of great interest to people travelling through. The original track passed close by the old home site, but had the cairn been built there very few would have been able to see it.