A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.
Opinion
My congratulations to Chris Taewa for his column in Saturday’s Weekender. As I have said, a name is just a name. Our title of Poverty Bay in no way describes the affluence of our land or the bounty we receive from it. Just ask any farmer or horticulturist. We have
had our good times and our bad times, but the bad times were in no way a result of the name Captain Cook gave us.
It appears that the populace in all of the strangely-named communities Chris wrote of voted to keep the names they were given.
We were named Poverty Bay by Cook. Let’s just leave well alone.
Also, the poll result regarding the Endeavour models being returned to our main street was an overwhelming success for two replicas, both of the Endeavour. Let’s put that matter to bed and tuck the “name change” in beside it.
Why is Gisborne/Poverty Bay historically famous? It is quite simple. This was the place Cook first landed and, like it or not, he named our bay Poverty Bay. During all of my school years, when NZ history arose, the only name mentioned to be relative to this area was Poverty Bay. Sorry, but there must be no change.
