Māori workers strike for equal pay on Sumner Road

Back in July of 1849, Captain Thomas looked at this route and thought a four-mile road over Tapuaeharuru Evans Pass, with a tunnel through the summit, could be built in time for the immigrants. This would connect Matuku Takotako Sumner to the site of Ōtautahi Christchurch, a further seven miles away.

Laborers came from Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington, about half of them Māori. At first, the local Māori seemed hesitant to join the road gangs, but after a few weeks, Thomas wrote that they were joining in considerable numbers because they were pleased with how the working Māori were being treated.

In November, one gang stopped working because they were offended by their supervisor swearing, and the man, Joseph Compton, ended up leaving his job. Another gang worked on the uphill road from Ōhinehou Lyttelton’s Oxford Street toward Officers Point, a spur of very hard rock. They blasted their way as far as Sticking Point, which is now called Windy Point.

The day before the settlers arrived, there was a dispute. The European workers objected to the Māori receiving the same wage as themselves, which was sixpence an hour. Chief Agent JR Godley fired the Europeans who were causing trouble and hired more Māori. The European men came back to work the next day. Godley described the Māori working, saying they "struck, shovelled &c., altogether, keeping time to a song... most civil, good-natured fellows, laughing immoderately at our questions and chattering broken English very fast in reply."

By late 1850, it was clear the road wouldn't be finished in time. Charlotte Godley wrote that it was "still very unfinished; several shoulders of rock that come in the way, and have to be blasted, stop it up completely, and in some places along the line even the path is quite a climb, with a rope to pull yourself up by."

When the immigrants arrived in December 1850, the Bridle Path to Ōpāwaho Heathcote was the only land route to the plains. The Canterbury Association was dissolved in 1853, and the new Provincial Council, under Superintendent JE FitzGerald, continued with the Sumner road. Provincial Engineer Edward Dobson chose a different, much cheaper route. The road on the harbor side skirted the coast to Gollans Bay at a lower level than the problematic bluffs, then rose to the top of the pass in a series of tight zig-zags. The original plan for a tunnel never happened due to lack of funds.

On the Sumner side, Dobson chose a route on the other side of the valley, adjusting the gradient based on the hillside. This resulted in a very steep section and a hairpin bend near the summit. The original, partly-formed line is now the Captain Thomas Track. FitzGerald was so determined to see the road finished before he left for England that in August 1857, he risked his own life and that of his friends by driving a tandem over the half-finished zig-zag, with volunteer grooms holding the horses' heads and a crowd holding onto the dog cart behind.

His vehicle had two six-foot high red wheels and was known as the Circulating Medium. Pedestrians went with them and they received a big welcome and dinner in Lyttelton. When FitzGerald came back to New Zealand in 1861, he found that Superintendent WS Moorhouse had started a railway line and tunnel to Lyttelton via Ōpāwaho Heathcote. FitzGerald strongly disagreed with this, and even though he had been the first editor of the Lyttelton Times, he started a second newspaper, the Press, just to criticize the railway.

This first Sumner Road did provide a daily carriage and mail service. Lady Barker made the journey in 186