Joseph Denham Brain - by Shirley Arabin
In 1881 an English boat builder Joseph Denham Brain took over the slip yard that Charles Wood operated on the beach at the north end of The Strand below the Monmouth Redoubt. Little did the people of the small town realise what an experienced and able man had come to live amongst them. Born near Ventnor on the Isle of Wight off the south coast of England in 1841 Brain brought the skills he learnt from his father and both grandfathers, for the Brain and List families built ships at Fishbourne near Cowes back to the time of the Napoleonic Wars.
He sailed in the Pacific and the earliest record of Joseph Brain in New Zealand is a testimonial dated 19 March 1866 recording his service as a ship’s carpenter and mate on the Pioneer and Rangiriri, the gunboats on the Waikato River during the New Zealand Wars. He then began work as a carpenter in the naval dockyard at Devonport, Auckland. Working with another boat builder William Bishop, a Devon man, they had their own yard in Mechanic’s Bay.
Brain had his own trading vessel of 52 tons, the schooner Aurora. In January 1869 on returning to Auckland from Napier with a cargo he took part in the Anniversary Regatta with the Aurora, racing in the class for vessels over 20 tons. The race began in the central harbour and involved sailing to Tiritiri Island and back. Brain won the Shaw Saville Cup and ₤20. A few days later the shipping news noted him sailing out of Auckland for the Kaipara.
There must have been another slip yard at Whangaparoa for he built the Kate Brain there in 1873, a brigantine of 118 tons and 89 feet long that unfortunately foundered near Palliser Bay in 1877. The ship was named after Brain’s wife, William Bishop’s sister Kate, whom he married in October 1871. The Brain family lived in Cracroft Street in Parnell and their first three daughters were born in Auckland.
The General Gordon, a ketch, is considered to be the first boat built in Tauranga by Brain at the boatyard on the beach at the north end of The Strand below the Monmouth Redoubt. He also built his own three scows, Ventnor, Vectus and Dream. Brain named Ventnor after his home town, and Vectus was the Roman name for the Isle of Wight. They were used to trade up and down the coast, and were able to navigate up the estuaries delivering sand, gravel and timber and bringing out flour from Blundell’s Waimapū Flour Mill. Many steamers owned by the Northern Steamship Company, like the Katikati, Fingal, Kaituna and Result, had repairs made on the Brain slipway.
He also built two whaleboats, the Esther (the name of his third daughter) and Tarawera. Other boats he built included two coal barges for the Waihī Mining Company that were to be stationed at Bowentown, and in 1896 he produced a naphtha-fuelled launch, the Coy, and a shallow draft punt for the Matatā flax mill. He continued with his interest in sailing in Tauranga, and won a silver punch bowl in the 1911 Regatta with his yacht Arrow. Brain retired from his work on the slipway in 1923 when the land was required for reclamation for the tracks for the East Coast Main Trunk Railway.
He was a major contractor in the district and built and repaired many bridges in the County, including the Ruahihi, Waitekohe (1882), Judea (1886), Hairini (the first, in 1897), Ōmanawa (1906), Whatakao (1907) and Wairoa bridges. He was working on the Ngamuawahue Bridge when Tarawera erupted in 1886.
On reaching home that day Joseph Brain brought his horse inside his house so that she would not be frightened by the eruption. He built the concrete seawall on The Strand and effected repairs and additions to the Tauranga wharves. In 1888 he constructed a 250-foot tramway on Mōtītī Island on which a cradle launched a punt that ferried sixteen head of cattle each trip to a waiting steamer. In 1901 he built the belfry at Holy Trinity Church, and in 1911 the Durham Street Fire station. In 1893 Brain’s cutter the Dream with a cargo of 250 sacks of maize foundered at the entrance to the Tauranga Harbour; luckily with no loss of life.
The Brain family home, built of Coromandel kauri in Cameron Road, was completed by 1881 in time for his fourth daughter Bessie to be born there. The Brains had their fifth daughter Elva ten years later but, with no sons, the family tradition of boat building would die with him. The house was later extended at the back to enlarge the kitchen and add a sitting room. Although Joseph Brain signed the petition for Tauranga to become a borough he was not impressed when the new borough valued his land in Cameron Road, Lot 147, at ₤45 and he unsuccessfully appealed for it to be reduced to ₤35. One could wonder what he would think of recent valuations of over a million dollars.
Another of his houses that has survived is the home in Fourth Avenue he built for his eldest daughter Ada, who married William Teasey. In 1913 Brain built the Horseshoe Wharf at Mount Maunganui, including a railway line that ran on to and off the wharf to enable ships to land heavy cargo of railway lines and sleepers for the East Coast Railway. The Memorial Gates at Tauranga’s Wharepai Domain were designed by the architect Ward, and Brain was the major contractor. This was his last major contract before he died in 1924.
His boat building skills, where accuracy and quality is important, meant that his houses, bridges and other buildings were also well built. A member of the School committee, chairman of the Domain Board, prominent member of the Methodist church, and Borough Councillor, Joseph Denham Brain made a considerable contribution to the town in which he chose to spend the rest of his life.
