John Cathcart Wason (1848 – 1921)

 

My great great uncle, John Cathcart Wason, was born at Corwar, near Barrhill in Ayrshire, Scotland. He emigrated to Canterbury in 1868.

 

Wason paid £10,000 for the Lendon run of 20,000 acres on the south bank of the Rakaia (17 km from Rakaia). Wason renamed it Corwar. He grew the first large shelter belts south of the Rakaia, using Pinus radiata. He also planted oaks, walnuts and poplars. By 1884 600 acres of plantings gave shelter from the prevailing NW winds, and wheat could be grown. Wason imported Lincoln sheep breeding stock, exported refrigerated merino mutton, and used the local water race to power agricultural machinery.

 

In the mid 1870s Wason established a model village, Barrhill - one of the few estate villages in central Canterbury. Houses were built using the estate's Pinus radiata; the schoolroom, teacher's residence and Anglican church were built from concrete. They were surrounded by oak trees. Wason planted sycamores, birches, poplars, limes and oaks in four outer avenues, each lined with a different type of tree. The avenues form a square, which is bisected by two avenues forming a cross. At the intersection of the cross was the market square, which had a post office, a bakery and 15 cottages.

 

Barrhill’s highest population was about 50. Wason expected a railway to be built nearby, but it was built further south, and within 10 years the village began to decline. Wason saw his project as doomed, and sold up in 1900. The mansion burned down soon afterwards. Because most of the buildings were constructed from pine only three concrete buildings remain today: the school closed in 1938, and is now used as a hall; the teacher's house is now used as a bach; the church is still used for its original purpose.

 

Because Barrhill's public buildings, oaks, poplars and other trees remain, this part of the Canterbury Plains has retained the character Wason originally sought to create. The gate lodge at nearby Corwar now houses the Corwar Lodge Museum and the Barrhill Village Preservation Society offers walks around the area.

 

Wason served on the Ashburton County Council and the South Rakaia Road Board. He was president of the Ashburton Racing Club and the Ashburton Caledonian Club, vice president of the Ashburton Acclimatisation Society and a steward of the Canterbury Jockey Club. Wason was six feet six inches tall, and on one occasion he dealt with a troublemaker at a Christchurch ball in a controversial way: by picking him up and standing him on his head in an enormous dish of trifle.

 

In 1876 Wason won the Coleridge seat in the NZ House of Representatives. He advocated compulsory secular state education. In 1879 he resigned from Parliament and the County Council. He opposed women getting the vote but was not a member of parliament when women gained the vote here in 1893. He was MP for Selwyn from 1896 to 1899, then retired from politics in NZ.

 

In 1873 he married Alice Seymour Bell in Sydney. In 1886 he became a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in London, and in 1887 he was admitted to the Bar, but did not practice law.

 

In 1900 he returned to the UK permanently, and became MP for Orkney and Shetland – but lived in London. He was an MP until his death in 1921. In the House of Commons he supported New Zealand's interests, but not women getting the vote (which they finally got in 1918, 25 years after NZ). He was often seen knitting while in the House of Commons! He also loved flowers. He was a member of the Viking Club and a patron of the Shetland Collie Club. He was survived by his wife; they had no children.

 

 

Details mainly obtained from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cathcart_Wason

and http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/biographies/2w10/1