They decided businesses were allowed to clear away building debris and use corrugated iron and wood to rebuild temporary buildings.
Some businesses, such as F L Bone Limited, started on the afternoon of the earthquake. They placed their temporary building facing Eastbourne St, as their store fronting Heretaunga St required major cartage of rubble.
One of the major areas for the depositing of earthquake debris in Hastings was the St Leonards Park area. Some ruins were saved and turned in bridges and fences at Windsor and Cornwall parks, and in the Art Deco-style of the day.
Napier's central building district was on fire shortly after the earthquake, and without a firefighting water supply business owners could do nothing but watch it all go up in smoke.
When the fires had burned themselves out, the Napier Citizens Control Committee, which took the place of the Napier Borough Council the day after the earthquake, did not allow any "shanty town" buildings.
When hotels that had been destroyed, such as the Masonic, Criterion and Provincial, told the Napier Citizens Control Committee that they would lose their liquor licences if they stopped trading after a couple of weeks, they were allowed to build temporary bars made of corrugated iron and wood.
Almost every bar glass in Hawke's Bay had been broken during the earthquake, so the Wellington Victuallers Association shipped up to Hawke's Bay for free hundreds of glasses.
Instead of allowing tin sheds to pop up all over the Napier central business district, a large temporary shopping block in Clive and Memorial squares was erected and nicknamed "Tin Town" due to its corrugated iron prominence.
Tin Town remained for around two years while the rebuild took place.
In order to speed up the clearing up process, navvies (steam-powered excavators) were used.
A newspaper report said, "With the use of the motor shovel, steam navvies, etc, the work of clearing had proceeded rapidly. Handled skilfully the motor shovel is an instrument which never ceases to attract the interest of residents and as it dips its massive jaws preparatory to taking a colossal mouthful either of loose debris upon the earth, or out of a badly shaken wall, it appears to assume almost human intelligence."
At first the navvies' presence did create quite a bit of excitement amongst residents. But as the weeks went by the locals got used to them, and only visitors and returning people from the evacuation of Napier after the earthquake showed any interest.
Two were used to clear the Masonic Hotel's basement's (now Art Deco Masonic Hotel) earthquake debris.
Tractors and traction engines were also requisitioned for demolition and removal of debris, but around February 10, they were required for wheat threshing.
If an owner did not want their building to be demolished, it could become a slow process to get the necessary permissions, so the police, who could act if they felt it was in the interests of public safety, could give a demolition order.
On March 3, a month after the earthquake, bricks at the Masonic Hotel site that were loaded by a navvie into two motor lorries (trucks) were still hot enough to set fire to both vehicles.
Rubble cleared was moved to the Napier port to continue reclamation work. It was also deposited at Hardinge Rd, the junction of Taradale and Hyderabad roads and the Marine Parade foreshore.
In the late 1960s, Napier mayor Peter Tait decided that Napier should have a sunken garden on the Marine Parade. When the area was being excavated, many items from the 1931 Hawke's Bay earthquake that had been dumped there were found, such as monogrammed crockery.
* Signed copies of Michael Fowler's Historic Hawke's Bay book are available from the Hastings Community Art Centre, Russell St South, Hastings for $65.
* Michael Fowler FCA (mfhistory@gmail.com) is a chartered accountant, contract researcher and writer of Hawke's Bay's history.
