Te Awamutu is a town in the

Waikato region Waikato () is a local government region of the upper North Island of New Zealand. It covers the Waikato District, Waipa District, Matamata-Piako District, South Waikato District and Hamilton City, as well as Hauraki, Coromandel Peninsula, t ...

in the

North Island The North Island, also officially named Te Ika-a-Māui, is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but much less populous South Island by the Cook Strait. The island's area is , making it the world's 14th-largest ...

of New Zealand. It is the council seat of the

Waipa District Waipa District is a municipality in the Waikato region of New Zealand that is administered by the Waipa District Council. Its most populous town is Cambridge. The seat of the council is at the second most populous town, Te Awamutu. The district i ...

and serves as a service town for the farming communities which surround it. Te Awamutu is located some south of

Hamilton Hamilton may refer to: People * Hamilton (name), a common British surname and occasional given name, usually of Scottish origin, including a list of persons with the surname ** The Duke of Hamilton, the premier peer of Scotland ** Lord Hamilt ...

on State Highway 3, one of the two main routes south from

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

and Hamilton. Te Awamutu has a population of making it the fifth-largest urban area in the Waikato behind Hamilton,

Taupō Taupō (), sometimes written Taupo, is a town on the north-eastern shore of Lake Taupō, New Zealand's largest lake, in the central North Island. It is the largest urban area of the Taupō District, and the second-largest urban area in the Wai ...

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

and

Tokoroa Tokoroa ( mi, Te Kaokaoroa o Pātetere) is the fifth-largest town in the Waikato region of the North Island of New Zealand and largest settlement in the South Waikato District. Located 30 km southwest of Rotorua, close to the foot of the M ...

. The town is often referred to as "The Rose Town of New Zealand" because of its elaborate rose gardens in the centre of the town. Many local businesses use "Rosetown" in their name, and the symbol of the rose is widely used on local signs and billboards. The local paper, ''Te Awamutu Courier'', has a symbol of a rose in the masthead on its front page.

History and culture

Tainui Tainui is a tribal waka confederation of New Zealand Māori iwi. The Tainui confederation comprises four principal related Māori iwi of the central North Island of New Zealand: Hauraki, Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Raukawa and Waikato. There are oth ...

Maori first settled in the area in about 1450, according to noted Tainui historian Te Hurinui-Jones. Te Awamutu means "the river cut short", as it marked the end of the navigable section of the

Mangapiko Stream The Mangapiko Stream is mostly a low-lying peat stream that flows through the heart of the Waipa district, Waikato. The stream begins near the summit of Mt Maungatautari and then weaves westward through low-lying dairy farmland and eventually b ...

. Te Awamutu was the birthplace of the first Maori

King King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

Pōtatau Te Wherowhero Pōtatau Te Wherowhero (died 25 June 1860) was a Māori warrior, leader of the Waikato iwi (confederation of tribes), the first Māori King and founder of the Te Wherowhero royal dynasty. He was first known just as ''Te Wherowhero'' and took the ...

(died 1860). The first European missionaries visited the area in 1834. A missionary settlement was set up by Benjamin Yate Ashwell of the

Church Missionary Society The Church Mission Society (CMS), formerly known as the Church Missionary Society, is a British mission society working with the Christians around the world. Founded in 1799, CMS has attracted over nine thousand men and women to serve as mission ...

(CMS). and Māori Christians in July 1839 after they observed Tainui warriors, who had been fighting at

Rotorua Rotorua () is a city in the Bay of Plenty region of New Zealand's North Island. The city lies on the southern shores of Lake Rotorua, from which it takes its name. It is the seat of the Rotorua Lakes District, a territorial authority encompass ...

, return with 60 backpacks of human remains and proceed to cook and

eat Eating (also known as consuming) is the ingestion of food, typically to provide a heterotrophic organism with energy and to allow for growth. Animals and other heterotrophs must eat in order to survive — carnivores eat other animals, herbi ...

them in the Otawhao Pa. In 1842 the Rev. John Morgan moved to the Otawhao Mission Station. Otawhao was to the south west of Te Awamutu, on the rise overlooking what is now Centennial Park. The CMS missionaries established a flourishing trade school that focused on developing agricultural skills. The missionaries introduced European crops such as wheat, potatoes and peaches. In 1846 Morgan provided advice and some capital to help local Māori to construct eight water mills to grind wheat into flour. Morgan assisted in finding a suitable miller to operate the mills and to train Maori in this skill. St John's church in Te Awamutu

Possibly the oldest surviving building in the Waikato is St John's church, built in 1853 as part of the mission station. It is in

Gothic Revival Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

style.During the 1850s the wider area prospered on the back of sending surplus farm produce to Auckland. For a brief period wheat was even sent overseas. By the late 1850s prices dropped as cheaper flour and other foodstuffs were imported from Australia. This caused huge resentment among local Māori who had grown use to the wealth provided by trade. Some of the more warlike Māori such as

Rewi Maniapoto Rewi Manga Maniapoto (1807–1894) was a Ngāti Maniapoto chief who led Kīngitanga forces during the New Zealand government Invasion of Waikato during the New Zealand Wars. Kinship Rewi, or Manga as he was known to his kin, was the child of ...

blamed the missionaries for having a negative influence on Māori ''tikanga'' (cultural practices). He attempted to kill the local missionary and burnt down the trade school and other mission buildings. Some Christian Māori warned Europeans to leave the Waikato as their lives were in danger. Te Awamutu was a major site during the

New Zealand Wars The New Zealand Wars took place from 1845 to 1872 between the New Zealand colonial government and allied Māori on one side and Māori and Māori-allied settlers on the other. They were previously commonly referred to as the Land Wars or the M ...

of the 19th century, serving as a

garrison A garrison (from the French ''garnison'', itself from the verb ''garnir'', "to equip") is any body of troops stationed in a particular location, originally to guard it. The term now often applies to certain facilities that constitute a mil ...

town for the colonial settlers from 1864. European settlement began at the conclusion of the Waikato Wars (1863–1865). The local Mangatoatoa Marae and Te Maru o Ihowa meeting house is a meeting place for the

Ngāti Maniapoto Ngāti Maniapoto is an iwi (tribe) based in the Waikato-Waitomo region of New Zealand's North Island. It is part of the Tainui confederation, the members of which trace their whakapapa (genealogy) back to people who arrived in New Zealand on the ...

hapū In Māori and New Zealand English, a ' ("subtribe", or "clan") functions as "the basic political unit within Māori society". A Māori person can belong to or have links to many hapū. Historically, each hapū had its own chief and normally opera ...

of Ngutu, Pare te Kawa and Parewaeono, and the

Waikato Tainui Waikato Tainui, Waikato or Tainui is a group of Māori ''iwi'' based in Waikato Region, in the western central region of New Zealand's North Island. It is part of the larger Tainui confederation of Polynesian settlers who arrived to New Zealand o ...

hapū of

Ngāti Ngutu Waikato Tainui, Waikato or Tainui is a group of Māori ''iwi'' based in Waikato Region, in the western central region of New Zealand's North Island. It is part of the larger Tainui confederation of Polynesian settlers who arrived to New Zealand ...

and

Ngāti Paretekawa Ngāti Paretekawa (Paretekawa) are a very numerous hapū (sub-tribe, or clan) of the Ngāti Maniapoto Ngāti Maniapoto is an iwi (tribe) based in the Waikato-Waitomo region of New Zealand's North Island. It is part of the Tainui confederation, t ...

Local government

Rangiaowhia Rangiaowhia (or Rangiawhia, or Rangiaohia) was, for over 20 years, a thriving village on a ridge between two streams in the Waikato region, about east of Te Awamutu. From 1841 it was the site of a very productive Māori mission station until the ...

, or Rangiaohia Highway Board administered the roads in the town until Te Awamutu Town Board's election on 1 November 1884. The board first met on 8 November, though there had been an earlier attempt to form a board and there was an unsuccessful challenge to the legality of the election. Te Awamutu Borough Council took over from the board and first met on 10 May 1915. It was merged into Waipā District Council on 23 October 1989.

Geography

Te Awamutu literally means in English "The River's End". The town is on gently undulating land close to the banks of a tributary of the

Waipā River The Waipā River is in the Waikato region of the North Island of New Zealand. The headwaters are in the Rangitoto Range east of Te Kuiti. It flows north for , passing through Ōtorohanga and Pirongia, before flowing into the Waikato River at ...

. The

Waikato Plains The Waikato Plains form a large area of low-lying land in the northwest of the North Island of New Zealand. They are the alluvial plains of the ancient Waikato River, the country's longest river that over the last 1800 years has changed course man ...

lie to the north and east, and the

promontory A promontory is a raised mass of land that projects into a lowland or a body of water (in which case it is a peninsula). Most promontories either are formed from a hard ridge of rock that has resisted the erosive forces that have removed the so ...

Mount Pirongia Mount Pirongia is an extinct stratovolcano located in the Waikato region of New Zealand's North Island. It rises to 959 metres and is the highest peak in the Waikato region. It was active in the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene times. ...

, 20 kilometres to the west, is easily visible. Inside the township are two streams called the

and the Mangaohoi Stream. The Mangaohoi ends and becomes the Tributary of the Mangapiko near Memorial park. The town is close to the extinct

Kakepuku Kakepuku (Kakipuku-o-kahurere) is a volcanic cone which rises from the plain between the Waipā and Puniu rivers, about NW of Te Kawa and SW of Te Awamutu in the Waikato region of New Zealand's North Island. Geology The 'Geology of the Wa ...

and

Pirongia Pirongia is a small town in the Waipa District of the Waikato region of New Zealand's North Island. It is 12 kilometres to the west of Te Awamutu, on the banks of the Waipā River, close to the foot of the 962 metre Mount Pirongia, which lies in ...

volcanoes (and other volcanoes of the Alexandra Volcanic Group).

Maungatautari Maungatautari is a mountain, rural community, and ecological area near Cambridge in the Waikato region in New Zealand's central North Island. The New Zealand Ministry for Culture and Heritage gives a translation of "mountain of the upright ...

, another extinct volcanic cone, now the site of New Zealand's largest ecological restoration project, is also nearby. Other towns surrounding Te Awamutu include

, 25 kilometres to the northeast, Otorohanga, 30 kilometres to the southwest, and Raglan 50 kilometres to the northwest. The small town of

Kihikihi Kihikihi, a small town located in the Waikato region of the North Island of New Zealand, serves as a satellite community of Te Awamutu, five kilometres to the north, and lies 35 kilometres south of Hamilton. The 2018 New Zealand census recorded ...

lies just to the south of Te Awamutu. The main thoroughfare is Alexandra Street, so named because it was once the main road to the town of Alexandra (since renamed to

to avoid confusion with the town of

Alexandra Alexandra () is the feminine form of the given name Alexander (, ). Etymologically, the name is a compound of the Greek verb (; meaning 'to defend') and (; GEN , ; meaning 'man'). Thus it may be roughly translated as "defender of man" or "prot ...

in the

South Island The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman ...

Demographics

Te Awamutu covers and had an estimated population of as of with a population density of people per km². Te Awamutu had a population of 12,198 at the

2018 New Zealand census Eighteen or 18 may refer to: * 18 (number), the natural number following 17 and preceding 19 * one of the years 18 BC, AD 18, 1918, 2018 Film, television and entertainment * ''18'' (film), a 1993 Taiwanese experimental film based on the sho ...

, an increase of 1,578 people (14.9%) since the 2013 census, and an increase of 2,052 people (20.2%) since the

2006 census 6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and the smallest perfect number. In mathematics Six is the smallest positive integer which is neither a square number nor a prime number; it is the second small ...

. There were 4,656 households, comprising 5,787 males and 6,414 females, giving a sex ratio of 0.9 males per female, with 2,421 people (19.8%) aged under 15 years, 2,208 (18.1%) aged 15 to 29, 4,944 (40.5%) aged 30 to 64, and 2,631 (21.6%) aged 65 or older. Ethnicities were 81.8% European/

Pākehā Pākehā (or Pakeha; ; ) is a Māori term for New Zealanders primarily of European descent. Pākehā is not a legal concept and has no definition under New Zealand law. The term can apply to fair-skinned persons, or to any non-Māori New Ze ...

, 23.2%

Māori Māori or Maori can refer to: Relating to the Māori people * Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group * Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand * Māori culture * Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...

, 2.7% Pacific peoples, 4.5%

Asian Asian may refer to: * Items from or related to the continent of Asia: ** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia ** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia ** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...

, and 1.7% other ethnicities. People may identify with more than one ethnicity. The percentage of people born overseas was 14.7, compared with 27.1% nationally. Although some people chose not to answer the census's question about religious affiliation, 50.4% had no religion, 37.1% were

Christian Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...

, 1.1% had Māori religious beliefs, 0.8% were

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

, 0.2% were

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

, 0.5% were

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

and 1.9% had other religions. Of those at least 15 years old, 1,317 (13.5%) people had a bachelor's or higher degree, and 2,442 (25.0%) people had no formal qualifications. 1,296 people (13.3%) earned over $70,000 compared to 17.2% nationally. The employment status of those at least 15 was that 4,587 (46.9%) people were employed full-time, 1,308 (13.4%) were part-time, and 393 (4.0%) were unemployed. For earlier censuses, Te Awamutu was divided into four area units, central, east, south and west, as in this table. Māori formed 19.7% of the population in central, 22.8% in east, 23.2% in south and 25.7% in west.

Facilities and attractions

Te Awamutu Museum was established in 1935. The museum has a number of permanent exhibitions focusing on the history of Te Awamutu and the surrounding area. There is also an exhibition, 'Everyone is here' focusing on Tim and Neil Finn, brothers and Te Awamutu natives, of the bands

Split Enz Split Enz were a New Zealand rock band formed in Auckland in 1972 by Tim Finn and Phil Judd and had a variety of other members during its existence. Originally started as a folk-oriented group with quirky art rock stylings, the band built a ...

and later

Crowded House Crowded House are a rock band, formed in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, in 1985. Its founding members were New Zealander Neil Finn (vocalist, guitarist, primary songwriter) and Australians Paul Hester (drums) and Nick Seymour (bass). Later ban ...

. The museum contains one of the most famous early

artifacts, a large carved post known simply as ''

Te Uenuku ''Te Uenuku'', or simply ''Uenuku'', is an early Māori carving housed at Te Awamutu Museum in the North Island of New Zealand. ''Te Uenuku'' (literally "The Rainbow") represents Uenuku, a tribal atua of war who manifests as a rainbow. The taong ...

''. This impressive carving has caused much controversy because its style is markedly different from any other early Māori work, yet it is clearly of a Māori design. Te Awamutu itself is located on SH3, one of the major routes used when touring the North Island of New Zealand. The town has three large supermarkets, electronics retailers, a well equipped sports / leisure centre and The Kihikihi Trail cycleway, which opened in 2017. The town has a large dairy factory, and serves as an important centre in the local dairy industry.

Education

Te Awamutu has two co-educational state primary schools: Te Awamutu Primary School, with a roll of and Pekerau School with a roll of . Many of these students then progress on to Te Awamutu Intermediate, with a roll of , and Te Awamutu College, with a roll of . There are also three other schools in the town: * St Patrick's Catholic School is a co-educational Year 1-8 state integrated Catholic primary school, with a roll of . * Waipa Christian School is a co-educational Year 1-8 state integrated Christian primary school, with a roll of . * Te Wharekura o Nga Purapura o te Aroha is a co-educational Year 1-15 state school, with a roll of as of

Notable residents

The town's best known residents are the

Finn Brothers The Finn Brothers are a New Zealand musical duo consisting of brothers Neil and Tim Finn. In June 1993 both members were awarded the OBE for their contribution to music. The two brothers began making music together at a young age; later, when ...

, Tim and

Neil Neil is a masculine name of Gaelic and Irish origin. The name is an anglicisation of the Irish ''Niall'' which is of disputed derivation. The Irish name may be derived from words meaning "cloud", "passionate", "victory", "honour" or "champion".. A ...

, whose musical careers have stretched from

through the internationally successful

to their current solo and collaborative works. The town is mentioned in Split Enz's song "Haul Away", and also in Crowded House's 1986 song " Mean to Me", the debut single from their self-titled debut album. Musician

Spencer P. Jones Spencer Patrick Jones (28 October 1956 – 21 August 2018) was a New Zealand guitar player and singer-songwriter from Te Awamutu. From 1976 he worked in Australia and was a member of various groups including The Johnnys, Beasts of Bourbon, Paul K ...

(

The Beasts of Bourbon Beasts of Bourbon were an Australian blues rock band formed in August 1983, with James Baker on drums (ex-Hoodoo Gurus, The Scientists), Spencer P. Jones on guitar (The Johnnys), Tex Perkins on vocals (Dum Dums), Kim Salmon on guitar and Boris ...

, Paul Kelly and The Coloured Girls) was also born in Te Awamutu.

References

External links

teawamutu.co.nz
{{Waipa District Populated places in Waikato Waipa District NZHPT Category I listings in Waikato