Our hostess, Ruapehu District Councillor Elaine Wheeler, was explaining how a green tide of forestry had displaced sheep and beef farming in the Kaitieke Valley.
"Seedlings are purchased, planted, managed and felled by out-of-town contractors, trucked out to the wharf and, apart from possibly a pie purchase at the dairy on the way through, not a dollar contributed to our district's economy - just a lot of damage to roads."
In later life, a Taranaki Daily News reporter, Eric Clark, claimed that as a young man he had a premonition where the Kaka had crashed.
As families moved off farms, Kaitieke Valley, which proudly sent dozens of soldiers off to World Wars I and II, was becoming under-populated and fighting for survival, said Elaine.
By way of breaking the following uncomfortable silence, I asked if anyone recalled the Kaka crash, and several of those present did. As a young child, farmer Michael Petersen recalled the plane flying over his house, on its way to oblivion. Though several also remembered Eric, none had heard of his premonition. I was determined to look into it once and for all, so back in Auckland I contacted Taumarunui historian Ron Cooke and former Daily News editor Denis Garcia.
This is what I came up with:
During the late 1940s a young Maori named Eric Clark was, we think, a telephone operator in Ohakune, and a part-time correspondent for the Daily News. His big break came in October 1948, with the entire country galvanised over the fate of ZK-AGK Kaka, which went off course and vanished in mist on its way from Hamilton to Palmerston North. Military and civilian aircraft scoured the North Island for six days, then deerstalkers came out of a densely wooded area on the western side of Ruapehu with a clue. They'd heard aircraft engines cut out near the mountain the day the Kaka went missing.
On October 29, aspiring young freelancer Eric had a strong feeling the missing plane was on Ruapehu. Unable to shake this hunch, he drove towards the mountain and apparently came upon an early police party heading for the suspected crash site. Eric tagged along, climbed the mountain, and helped recover bodies and carry them down to Horopito. His scoop story and photos went around the world and launched his career.
Eric Clark tagged along with a police search party, helped recover bodies and carry them down the mountain to Horopito.
By 1952 he was in charge of the Taumarunui office of the Daily News and received the Cowan Memorial Prize for his coverage of the Kaka crash.
Then, the following year, as if one world-wide scoop wasn't enough, Eric was first reporter to the scene of the Tangiwai rail disaster. He phoned in first reports of the Wellington-Auckland night express plunging into the flooded Whangaehu River at Tangiwai, on Christmas Eve, 1953. Of 285 passengers and crew, 151 died.
Eric officially retired in December 1983 and died a month or two later. A carved archway at the Taumarunui Library was unveiled in March 1985 - but that's far from his only legacy.
In 30 years as chief reporter for the Daily News Taumarunui office, he trained scores of cadet reporters. Beginning with the cadet who assisted at the scene of the Tangiwai Disaster, Ngaire Cook, his method was to throw us in the deep end, with plenty of affable encouragement. Maybe 20 journalists, who got their start at the Daily News, can credit Eric's kindly hands-off training style.
The cadet who replaced me in the Taumarunui office in 1977 was one Tom Mockridge, who a year or two ago left his position as CEO of Rupert Murdoch's News International to become CEO of the $4 billion Virgin Media. Okay, some of us are driving buses (or writing Mini Mysteries), but you get the idea.
Eric was a giant in Maoridom, too, nurturing a generation of leaders, including film director Don Selwyn and Whanganui River iwi leader Sir Archie Taiaroa. Historian Ron Cooke says he quietly helped countless Taumarunui people.
He was a police photographer, part-time undertaker and speech writer for former Taumarunui Mayor Les Byars.
After we put stories through for the day and sent our films to head office on the railcar, Eric told his stories and that's when I heard of the Kaka premonition.
Eric was a good Catholic and I believe the Almighty tapped him on the shoulder, with the "cosmic news tip" which got his career going. To any who doubt it, I'll simply quote the Bard: "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
