Manawatū-Whanganui: History
Pre-1769 Approximately 3% of Māori lived in the Whanganui Basin and 8% on the Taranaki coast. Coastal Māori garden and gather food but life for Māori further inland is more difficult, relying on hunting and gathering.
1820–40 Ngāti Toa and Te Āti Awa iwi displace local iwi from their lands.
1830 Te Rauparaha (Ngāti Toa) lay siege to Pūtiki Pā in retaliation for an attack on Kapiti Island, sacking the pā and killing its inhabitants.
1831 European traders arrive in the Whanganui area, led by Joe Rowe, supposedly a dealer in preserved heads (moko mokai). A dispute with local Māori leads to the death of three of his party and his own head is cut off and preserved.
1840 Jerningham Wakefield (Edward Gibbon Wakefield's son) purchases 40,000 acres (160 km2) of land, under dubious circumstances, for the New Zealand Company, including the town site for Petre (later to be Wanganui). The first European settlers start arriving in Petre.
1842 The first organised European settlers in Horowhenua arrive at Paiaka.
1847 In July the "Battle of St John's Wood" occurs when 400 Māori clash with an equal force of British Regulars.
1848 The Crown purchases Wanganui, 80,000 acres (320 km2), 8,000 acres (32 km2) of which are supposed to be set aside as a reserve.
1855 Paiaka settlers move closer to the coast at "Foxton", which becomes a port handling flax, timber and agricultural produce.
1856 The Wanganui Chronicle is first published.
1860s Scandinavians settle in the Tararua District, later founding Eketāhuna, Dannevirke, and Norsewood.
1865 A battle ensues between the Hau Hau adherents (who were largely upper Whanganui Māori), who want to expel the Pākehā at Wanganui, and the Māori of the lower river.
1866 Palmerston North (Te Papai-oea) is founded. It is surrounded by forests, with the Manawatū River serving as its only link with the port of Foxton and the outside world.
1870s The bush is gradually felled and the Manawatū opened up for European farms and settlement. Former Danish Prime Minister, Bishop Ditlev Gothard Monrad, organises a settlement of Danes near Awapuni.
1871 The first sawmill is established at Palmerston North.
1872 Wanganui becomes a borough.
1875 The Manawatu Times is published for the first time at Palmerston North.
1876 A railway opens between Foxton and Palmerston North via Longburn, later named the Foxton Branch. Wellington Province abolished.
1877 Palmerston North becomes a borough.
1878 A railway line opens between Palmerston North and Wanganui. The first portion later became part of the North Island Main Trunk railway, between Aramoho and Wanganui the Wanganui Branch, and the rest part of the Marton–New Plymouth Line.
1884 The Sanson Tramway, built and operated by the Manawatu County Council, opens to Sanson, New Zealand from the Foxton Branch at Himatangi.
1885 Mother Mary Joseph Aubert starts her community of the Daughters of Our Lady of Compassion at Jerusalem, founding a home for Māori orphans, the elderly and infirm. …