Pye, who grew a vast potato farming empire on both sides of the Tasman, died on Saturday, aged 83, according to a death notice in his local paper, The Timaru Herald.
A funeralservice will be held at a South Canterbury farm on Friday.
Pye left school at 14, leased two acres of land and started growing potatoes.
Seven decades later, the Spud King’s family business is estimated to be worth $1 billion.
His South Canterbury farm, where he lived in a humble house, now amounts to almost 3000 hectares where he grew lots of spuds, carrots and other crops. He also owned nine dairy farms, milking 9000 cows.
Despite his huge success, Pye eschewed many luxury items coveted by other wealthy businessmen like flash cars, big houses or international travel.
Allan Pye enjoyed nothing more than working on the farm. Photo / George Heard
Instead, he was never happier than when he was working on the farm.
“I love sitting on a header. There’s nothing more satisfying than sitting on a header and harvesting 10 to 12 tonne per hectare crop of wheat. It’s better than anything. Sex is good but only lasts for a short time. Driving a header, it goes on all day and all night,” he said.
Pye was born in the South Canterbury pottery town of Temuka in 1941.
At 14, he left school and started growing potatoes.
The determined, self-taught young farmer gained early success and kept slowly building his enterprise.
The goal was always to make money, he said.
“It seems a bit stupid really, there should be something else in life than just money but that was important to me.”
And when asked how he likes his spuds, perhaps with a Sunday dinner, there are shades of shrimp enthusiast Bubba Blue in Forrest Gump.
