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__//**Background to Botany**//__

= **Social studies assignment** = = **The European's** = During the 1830s,Otara was among many present day suburbs of manakau and auckland in the original boundaries was the Tamaki block. Between 1836 and 1839 the newly arrived missionary William Thomas fairburn began to move itno his mission of establishing a mission station at Maraetai while also trying to obtain a huge tract of land from numerous Iwi of auckland.Brokered as a "act of Christian peace making" between warring tribes on the Tamaki isthmus,Fairburn gained/obtained "signatures" to the deed of purchase from over 30 Rangatira; few if any could actually read or write. Fairburn originally accounted the absolute area to contain 40,000 acres, but it was later assessed as being around 83,000.

European settlement of Ōtara

European settlement of Ōtara started in earnest from the 1850's onwards, with most settlers on the wider east tamaki area being Scottish and Irish presbyterians. The most prominent settler of Otara duiring this period was the wesleyan missionary Reverend Gideon Smales. Smales had come from England in 1840, and settled in east tamaki upon his retirement, purchasing a 400 acre block from the government in 1855, which included Te Puke O Tara. Smales farmed the land at the foot of Te Puke O Tara and open a quarry on the mountain; which has entirely been destroyed. Matanginui Pa was also largely destroyed by quarrying from 1870and is now the site of the Greenmouth landfill. 13 acres from the Smales Mount/Puke O tara estate on the remains of the early cone now form a reserve now known as Te Puke O Tara Hampton park, which includes a stone church constructed in the 1860's and the remains of extensive stone walls from Smales farm; both of them are built from the quarried scoria.

Meanwhile December 1830 Tensions arise between the Waikato tribes and the Ngati Whatua and Maratuaha exiles. A fierce but inconclusive battle is fought at a Ngati Haua pa in the Maungatautari foothills. Ngati Paoa subsquently decide to return to the Hauraki Gulf area, but the Ngati Whatua chief Apihai Te Kawau and his people stay on the Waipa.

1831 Accompanied by the trader and the Pakeha Maori John Rodolphus Kent, the Waikato chief Te Wherowhero visits the Manukau Harbour on bourd the Brig Tranmere. In honour of the visit area chief Te Kanae Wetere gifts Te Wherowhero with a choice piece of land at Awhitu. The trader Charles Marshalls goes ands visits to the Tranmere while it is in the Manukau.

January 1832

Charles Marshall undertakes a journey by Canoe and footvia Awaroa portage, Manukau Harbour, Pukaki, Otahuhu, Manga