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European Settlement
In the early 1880's King Tawhiao laid down the King Movement arms and the King Country was made accessible to Europeans by being made open to road surveying and in the late 1880's by regular steamship communication, at first between Wanganui and Pipiriki, and then being extended in the 1890's with shallow-draught vessels, to a terminal berth built a short distance up the Ongarue River at Taumarunui.
MV Ongarue in Taumarunui, 1909.
At the same time the Colonial Government began considering plans for a railway from Auckland to Wellington. Construction of the North Island Main Trunk Line began in 1855 and finished in 1908. The river vessels maintained the services between Wanganui and Taumarunui until the late 1920's, when the condition of the river deteriorated. In 1928 the upstream terminal was moved down stream to the junction of the Retaruke Stream, and in 1934 regular services on the upper Wanganui River ceased. However the progress of European settlement accelerated with the building of roads and the opening of the Main Trunk Railway Line. So Taumarunui grew in size from its Maori village origins to a sawmilling, farming and railway town with inhabitants of mainly both Maori and European descent.