History of Huntly

Huntly (population 7,067) is a town in the Waikato region of the North Island of New Zealand. It is on State Highway 1, 93 kilometres south of Auckland and 35 kilometres north of Hamilton. It is situated on the North Island Main Trunk Railway and straddles the Waikato River. It is within the Waikato District and Waikato Region local government boundaries.

Huntly was called Rahui Pokeka when migrants settled the town some time in the 1850s. The Huntly name was adopted in the 1870s when the postmaster named it after Huntly, Aberdeenshire in Scotland. He used an old 'Huntley Lodge' stamp to stamp mail from the early European settlement. The 'Lodge' was later dropped and the spelling changed to also drop the additional 'e'.[1]

Huntly Power Station is a large coal-fired power station, prominently situated on the western bank of the Waikato River. It is New Zealand's largest thermal power station, situated in the area which is New Zealand's largest producer of coal, producing over 10,000 tonnes a day. The area has a very long history of coal mining, with both open pit and classical mines operating or having operated here.[2] The major New Zealand clients for the mined coal are the power station and the New Zealand Steel mill at Glenbrook. Huntly is also surrounded by rich farmland and beautiful lakes (many of them former open-pit mines) which are used for coarse fishing, yachting and waterskiing.

[1] www.teara.govt.nz/en/interactive/35230/roadside-stories-coal-and-clay-from-huntly

[2] The coal seams around Huntly have been mined since the 1870s, and today provide about 40% of New Zealand’s coal, feeding the massive Huntly power station and the Glenbrook steel mill. Local clay is the source of Huntly’s distinctive bricks, as well as of iconic Crown Lynn pottery

Article sourced from Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huntly,_New_Zealand