From the 1930s, to protect the Government railways, restrictions were placed on road transport. In 1936 the maximum distance trucks could travel was 30 miles (50km). This was extended to 40 miles (67km) in 1961, and in 1977 to 94 miles (150km). In the 1980s the restrictions were dropped.
For years there had been erratic services provided on the road, but nothing regular. In 1930 there was a freight passenger service operated by Mr Gaterill leaving from the Hawke's Bay Motor Company in Napier, but this operated infrequently.
In 1946 the Lumsden brothers provided a service leaving Hastings at 10am from Monday to Wednesday and Fridays. This was sold to Mr Steenson in 1950, who sold it to Noel Halstead in 1951.
The Napier-Taihape Rd was then literally a shale (fine grained sedimentary rock) track cut through the mountainous terrain, which at certain times of the year was impassable to all traffic due to heavy snowfalls.
Noel Halstead was a man with literally a driving ambition and a desperate need to succeed in all he undertook.
The exorbitant costs of maintaining vehicles, tyres and equipment on the shale road left only a slender margin between profit and loss and Noel's sheer determination, long hours of driving and hard work, kept the company afloat.
Early on Noel obtained the contract to cart kegs of beer from the cascade brewery in Taihape to the Taradale, Ahuriri and Clive hotels plus he would backload the empty kegs.
One particular driver used to consume a half dozen bottles of beer on his way to Taihape to Napier.
He also gained the cartage of fuel in 44-gallon drums from Napier to Taihape. These contracts enabled him to provide more regular services and the big farming stations started to use his services, which meant he had to expand his fleet.
Noel had a passenger licence which was well used by shepherds wanting to get to work on the stations and by odd bods who wanted to work and keep away from the law. They would get a ride to town, blow their money on booze then get a ride back to the stations.
Until 1969, the trucks were unable to pull trailers over the Gentle Annie, so this meant leaving the trailers at Kuripapango (66km from Napier), then transhipping the bagged fertiliser, wool, sheep, cattle and general freight on the trailers once the truck returned unloaded from the stations.
Noel's son Peter also drove for Overland. He remembers once going down the Gentle Annie towards Taihape pulling a trailer. There was enough room for his truck to pass one coming up the Annie, but not for his trailer, which would have gone off the road.
A solution was found to the impasse when another Overland truck behind him turned around and reversed towards Peter's truck, and hitched up the trailer at the rear and towed the trailer up the hill with two drivers manually steering the trailer so the other truck could pass.
On the Gentle Annie there were several corners that could not be driven around in one go, and the trucks had to manoeuvre back and forward until in a position to carry on. Several times passengers would hop out and walk up the road as they were frightened of the huge drops to the river on their side of the truck.
Peter remembers on one occasion in 1969 travelling from Utiku, (near Taihape) and hearing the road was impassable because of snow. He then detoured through Feilding back to Napier but was stopped by traffic police as he was then on a route competing with rail freight – and given a ticket (this was later disputed and rescinded due to the impassable Napier-Taihape Rd).
At Kuripapango, Noel organised with resident Rosie MacDonald to leave 44 gallon drums of petrol, so he could refuel his trucks as they had limited size petrol tanks in the early days.
The road onwards from Kuripapango had several rabbit gates and cattle stops and was maintained by a roadman (who lived in a roadside hut) armed with a shovel and pickaxe. Finally in the late 1960s, an old tractor with a blade on the back was able to be used by the roadman.
When Noel put radio telephones in his trucks, he had a set put into Ngamatea station. This enabled the station to communicate when telephone lines were down during snow storm time as well as providing Noel with the Ngamatea road conditions as the trucks were unable to get through to the station if it rained or snowed as the road was in those days all clay, with no shingle.
Every year in fruit growing season, the wives of station owners/managers would order as much fruit as could be loaded into the truck cabs. This was one of the many services he provided to his clients along with picking up medicine, and children of station owners/managers who were delivered at school holiday time when they were back from their boarding schools.
Noel saw the need to have a depot at Taihape, so in 1964 he brought Utiku Transport from Barry Murch and Claude Tait, which would give him more transport licences in the area.
Jock Morgan moved from Hastings to Utiku to manage the depot. In the mid-1960s Noel obtained a contract with BP New Zealand to cart and distribute fuel to clients in the Hastings-Taihape area, he converted one of his international trucks to a bulk fuel tanker.
A huge amount of credit for the successful operation of the business must go to Noel's wife, Meryle, who brought up five children while running the administration of the business, answering telephones and radio telephones, catering morning teas for drivers, picking up goods for clients, etc. There was never holidays away with the kids, they had to make their own fun.
As the road opened up, other well-established transport companies saw its potential and endeavoured to obtain licences to operate in this area. Many licensing court battles were fought, with Noel defending his rights and being most successful (as the Napier-Taihape Rd did not have a rail line, trucks could exceed the regulated miles).
However, from the outset Overland had suffered from a lack of sufficient working capital and the stage was reached where very large amounts were needed for expansion to cope with the huge amounts of produce stock and fertiliser now being transported between Napier, Taihape and the inland stations.
Overland decided in 1969 to amalgamate with six other transport companies from Taihape, Waiouru, Hunterville, Ohingaiti, Mangaweka and Mid Island Transport was formed.
The merger, while making economic sense, didn't practically work out.
Having had enough, Noel resigned as a director, and negotiated with the other directors to withdraw from Mid Island Transport and take back his trucks and transport licences.
He had put all the necessary business arrangements in place to achieve this, even verbally agreeing to purchase new trucks and trailers.
Highly elated at this, he went and told the good news to his drivers at Mid Island Transport that he was withdrawing, and all that was left was to sign the agreement the next day. This was probably one of the happiest occasions in his life, but tragically, he died suddenly in the midst of the jubilation, that day, on December 16, 1971.
Noel's wife, Meryle received a part payment for the shares in Mid Island Transport, while his son Peter continued to work for the company for six months.
Sir Russell Pettigrew, owner of Pettigrew Freightways, made an arrangement with Peter, which when legal approval was given, saw former clients of Noel's Overland Transport move to Pettigrew Freightways. Because of this, Freightways then made a goodwill payment to Meryle for the volume of work brought across.
Mid Island Transport ceased operations in the mid-1970s.
Michael Fowler (mfhistory@gmail.com) is a writer and researcher of Hawke's Bay history. Follow him on facebook.com/michaelfowlerhistory
