Made with Xara Web Designer Website Design & Photography proudly sponsored by Ian Booker Photography & Web Design About Waiuku The towns focal point is the Kentish Hotel  built in the 1850’s by Edward Constable from Kent in England and of the first Europeans to settle at Waiuku. With it’s ornate verandahs and backdrop to Waiuku’s history the “Kentish”, as it is known locally, is New Zealand’s oldest licenced hotel and just “oozes” character. The Kentish continues to be a much photographed place aswell as one for civic and social occasions and an ever popular place for locals and visitors to eat and drink and spin a yarn or two! A stroll around Waiuku will reveal much more including it’s waterfront Tamakae Reserve, home to a fascinating Waiuku Museum crammed full of everything from old sailing boats and historic photographs to the earliest mobile phones the size of shoe boxes – a real treasure trove for all ages and a bargain at $2 to enter!  The Reserve also has a small historic “village” with several restored buildings including Hartmann House, dating back to 1886, now fully restored and operating as a local craft studio, Pollok Cottage (1890), Waiuku Jail (1865) and The Creamery (1890’s). A Heritage Trail around town (free information leaflet from the Waiuku Information Centre) will point out further sites of historic interest in Waiuku including Wesley Methodist Church (1883) from where visitors to the town can get a panoramic view across Waiuku and the waterfront reserve. Visitors of all ages aswell as locals to town can combine a relaxed and enjoyable weekend with all the benefits often associated with bigger towns…..except here its hassle free, low key, the parking’s free and the welcome’s genuine!! Several excellent cafes and restaurants are now open at the weekends attracting visitors from out of the city to relax, indulge and enjoy brunch, lunch or dinner as part of a family day out in Waiuku and it’s numerous neighbouring attractions, including the stunning West cost blacksand beach of Karioitahi and the Glenbrook Vintage Railway both just 10 minutes away. An increasing number of Waiuku shops are opening longer on Saturdays and many on Sundays too offering a relaxed informal and friendly shopping experience with a wide range from boutique fashion stores to antique and artifact stores, a traditional Butcher/Fishmonger, hardware store, handmade solid furniture store. Access to fuel, digital and film processing, two supermarkets, public conveniences, pharmacy needs and ATM machines are all readily available. For those of you who want to come back on a more permanent basis and enjoy the enviable lifestyle that Franklin region offers the major real estate agencies are also represented in town listing a vast range of properties, including many lifestyle properties. History The Māori name Waiuku comes from a legend that two prominent brothers, Tamakae and Tamakou, vied for the hand of a beautiful high-ranking Waikato chieftainess. Tamakae was the cultivator, provider and Tamakou the orator. Tamakou was the first to meet her, but she requested that Tamakae be presented to her. He was working in the kumara gardens and had to be washed in the wai (water) and uku (a particular type of mud) at the stream that flows into the Manukau Harbour just behind the Waiuku Museum, before he was able to meet her. Tamakae won her heart and married her. From then the place was named Waiuku. Waiuku came into existence as a port in about 1843, on the then important trade route between Auckland and the agricultural area of the Waikato. It was also the terminal of an ancient Maori portage between the Waikato River and the Manukau Harbour. Waiuku was marked out by the Government as a town in 1851. During the Waikato War (1863–64), Waiuku became a frontier stockade guarded by a blockhouse. The Waikato War ended the traffic responsible for the early development of the town as a trading post. Waiuku later grew as a farming centre under road board administration, and in 1914 became a town district. It was constituted a borough in 1955, and subsequently amalgamated into the Franklin District Council [in 1988]. A major development for the town was the Government sponsored establishment, from the mid 1960s, of New Zealand's first steel plant at Glenbrook to convert ironsand brought from the black sand deposits at Waikato Heads into steel. After many changes of ownership and name, the company has returned to being called New Zealand Steel and is a division of Bluescope Steel of Australia. The company continues to be a major employer in and influence on the town. Notable people Waiuku is the hometown of Waikato Chiefs rugby teams star kicker Stephen Donald. He played his first game for the All-Blacks against England on June 14 2008, becoming the first All-Black ever to have attended Waiuku College. Though born in Papakura on December 3, 1983, Stephen attended Sandspit Primary School in Waiuku then four years at Waiuku College where his father is a long-serving teacher, before spending his seventh form at Wesley College. Waiuku is the hometown of John Campbell Paterson, the current Bishop of Auckland Waiuku was also the birth place of rugby legend and former All Black Zinzan Brooke, but he attended Mahurangi College. Noted all Blacks Kevin Skinner and Pat Walsh were already accomplished adult players when they joined Waiuku. Elsie Locke, then named Elsie Violet Farrelly, was born in Waiuku, New Zealand on 17 August 1912. She attended Waiuku District High School from 1925 until 1929, where she was the sole student in her class during her final two years. She was widely known as a peace activist and historian but she was also a groundbreaking and successful author of children’s literature. Her literary reputation rests primarily on her historical novels set in New Zealand’s colonial past, many of which have been reprinted. Attending university during the Depression, she associated with many of New Zealand’s emerging literary figures. She also became a socialist because of her experiences and observations of poverty at this time. Her son is Keith Locke, a Green Party MP.[1] David Aspin competed in the freestyle wrestling discipline, and was the 1974 Commonwealth Games champion and 1970 Commonwealth Games bronze medalist, in the middleweight category. He was also New Zealand's flag bearer at the opening ceremonies of the 1972 Summer Olympics, in Munich, and of the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. Air Vice-Marshal F. H. M. Maynard, CB, AFC, Legion of Merit (US); RAF (retd.); England; was born in Waiuku,on 1 May 1893. He joined the Royal Naval Air Service in 1915 and served in France and United Kingdom in First World War in RNAS and RAF. He was AOC RAF, Mediterranean, 26 Jan 1940-1 Jun 1941; Air Officer in Charge of Administration, RAF Coastal Command, 1941–44; AOC No. 19 Group, Coastal Command, 1944–45.[2] One of the founders of St Andrew's Presbyterian Church in Waiuku in the 19th century was Captain Sir John Makgill, who had a large land holding locally. His wife was Margaret Isabella Haldane, sister of Lord Haldane, and their son was George Makgill who returned to Britain to be 11th Baronet of Makgill. Waiuku is the hometown of Stumpy Holmes, a national rally car driver.