Inventor’s testy phone exchange
About The South columnist Lloyd Esler looks at the famous inventor’s Southland visit – and donkey difficulties in Fiordland.
Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, visited Southland on August 29, 1910, having arrived at Bluff from Australia on the Moana.
He and his wife were accompanied by Canadian aviator Frederick Baldwin, and the party travelled by train the following day to Queenstown, then north through New Zealand on a sightseeing trip.
Time did not permit him to visit the Invercargill exchange.
Bell said the penalty for being the inventor of the telephone was being constantly questioned about it.
He said: ‘‘That is the thing I know least about. I have had nothing to do with telephones for 30 years. The telephone was invented in 1874, made in 1875, and in 1876 it was introduced to the world at the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia.
‘‘In 1877, the first companies were organised. I have had nothing to do with telephone business since 1880.
‘‘I am not a business man, and when the instrument became adapted to ordinary commercial uses, it was no longer of interest to me as a man of science.’’
Fred Baldwin, like Bell, was a Canadian, and in 1908 he had been the first British subject to fly an aeroplane.
Donkey difficulties in Fiordland
The first donkey in Fiordland was liberated by a party of deerstalkers. The prospect of carrying heavy packs for seven hours from the end of the road at Monowai wasn’t a pleasant one, so the group hired a donkey from a nearby station.
The animal was not in favour of the deal, and when loaded for the 22km journey, it walked a few steps and then stopped, and had to be prodded into activity again.
At every fallen tree, the donkey waited patiently for someone to lift it over. Then it would stop again. It took the group two days to get to the head of the Borland.
Once camp was set up and a fire lit, the donkey was advised to find itself some grass, and it wasn’t long before the hunters had a huge pot of stew simmering.
In the early hours of the morning, one of them woke to see the donkey’s head inside the tent. It had eaten most of their supplies.
The sudden roar of rage startled poor Neddy, who put a hoof into the pot of stew which had been expected to last for a couple of days.
In Fiordland, author Jack McClenaghan writes: ‘‘With nearly all their supplies gone, the deerstalkers had to cut short their trip, but nothing would have persuaded them to take the donkey back with them so they abandoned him at the head of the Borland.
‘‘Some day, someone may come across his bones, and they will be gazing at the remains of the first and last donkey liberated in Fiordland.’’
No longer a vilified beast of burden, the ass would have enjoyed his freedom. Plenty of free fodder, and numerous deer for company.