Flax mills in Foxton for 150 years

While talking to visitors at the Flax Stripper Museum recently I realised that we should be celebrating 150 years of Foxton’s flax industry this year. Alas it is too late now for that but readers may be interested in the history.

I hope what they read here will encourage them to come and visit the Museum as I know there are many locals who haven’t.

Ma¯ ori had found the plant harakeke — phormium tenax — NZ Flax very useful for everyday items. With the fibre from inside the leaf they twisted rope and wove cloaks. It was rope that started the industry when a stripping machine was developed in Waiuku in the early 1860s.

Other fibres were available for the world’s rope that could be produced cheaper than New Zealand, but there were times when there was a shortage and the NZ industry flourished.

The first occasion was in 1869 when Charles Pownall came to Foxton and built his mill on the Te Awahou Stream in Cook Street. Soon there were four others along the lower Manawatu¯ River.

This “boom” did not last long and within six or seven years all the mills ceased operating.

In 1888 John Rutherford established a mill on the Manawatu¯ riverbank and within two years there were over 50 in the Manawatu¯ area.

This “boom” began to die off in the late 90s but then in 1899 another started. There were more than 10 mills in the town, most sitting on the riverbank where they received their flax from the inland swamps.

This boom lasted until the end of World War I but the change from sailing ships to steam ships meant rope was no longer in demand and the industry slumped. Ropemaking in NZ steadily declined and in 1970 the last works, Donaghy’s in Dunedin, stopped using flax fibre.

But Foxton came to the industry’s rescue. Woolpack and Textiles set up their factory in Ladys Mile to weave the fibre into a sackcloth which was then sewn into woolpacks.

Nowhere else was the fibre used industrially for anything other than rope. From 1948 floor coverings were added to the production and later underfelt manufacture. Then artificial fibres entered the market and Woolpacks decided “if you can’t beat them join them” and started producing artificial fibre woolpacks and flooring.

But that did not solve the problem and in 1974 the mill was sold and wool carpet manufacture took over until 2010. The Bonded Felts branch kept going but it was burnt down in 1985 and so the New Zealand flax industry was finished.

The Foxton Museum was opened in 1990 with the Bonded Felt’s stripper the feature.

The only other relic of the flax industry is in Riverton where the Templeton family restored their mill, closed in 1870, and opened it as a Heritage Flaxmill museum.

It is open from 1pm to 3pm daily.