HISTORY remembered: (from left) Pam Bryan, Carlie Ormsby, Stuart Ormsby, Sheryl Stewart at Awaroa Sports Day 2024, the event's 80th birthday.
HUNDREDS of people came to Awaroa Sports Day last weekend for its 80th birthday.
Co-organiser Nick Riley said it was a good turnout with 550 people, including children, at the event.
They raised nearly double the usual amount from entry fees, which will go towards supporting the community.
The overcast weather was ideal for horses because it wasn’t too hot for the games, flat classes and jumping.
Peta Taukiri had a great day woodchopping, winning the Tony Kerr Memorial Shield, 10-inch standing, 11-inch standing and the 11-inch underhand, among other achievements.
He hadn’t expected to win.
“I just turned up for the fun of it, but sometimes you get lucky.”
Peta enjoys the sport because it is an individual challenge.
“I started when I was 8 or 9 years old, watching Dad, and slowly got into it.”
One of seven siblings, Peta is the only one who loves the sport. His father, Ian Taukiri, is also a champion woodchopper, set to compete in Adelaide later this year.
Sheryl Badger, husband Stephen Badger and daughter Jane were thrilled to return “home” for a day.
The family have spent about 30 years overseas, in Singapore and the UK. Growing up, Jane connected with her Ngāti Hikairo heritage through kapa haka, even on the other side of the world.
Many decades ago, Sheryl’s parents ran the community store and post office. Her father grazed the property where Awaroa Sports is held.
“I rode in the horse events with varying degrees of success, on my pony, Creamy, who had a mind of her own,” Sheryl said.
Around 1958, from ages 10 to 12, she entered the pony events. After that, she went to boarding school.
She said the sports day exceeded her expectations.
“We had a lovely time, and everyone was so warm.
“Sometimes, people go back and find that things have deteriorated in a sense, but they were better than ever,” she said.
Kaumātua including Stuart Ormsby and Aunty Margaret Kerr enjoyed the event having attended many times over their lifetimes; Stuart was a baby at the first sports day.
They shared memories of community life in the 1940s, a time when rangatahi rode their horses to school and a social highlight was a trip to the picture house at Ōpārau.
“I was born in Ōtorohanga in 1940, and my father Fred farmed just up the road here,” Stuart said.
The first Awaroa Sports was on the family farm, in an area called Ingarangi flat.
“It brings back a lot of memories,” he said.
“My first was of seeing the big marquee on our flat.
“Around 1946, there was a measles epidemic, and my sister and I shared the same room. Mum said we weren’t allowed to have any light in our bedroom. But we opened the blinds and looked at the cars going past, on their way to the paddock. We weren’t allowed out.”
Sheryl and Stuart both recalled that the big party had traditionally been at the clean-up on the Sunday, when they would bring crates of beer in on a truck.
She remembers listening to a piano accordion, and the kids being bedded down in the back of the cars.
Stuart, a runner and woodchopper back in the day, recalls the Green brothers, champion woodchoppers from the area.
They were so good that they were handicapped to the point that they stopped competing, he said.
