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ELLERSLIE DURING THE
TWENTIETH CENTURY
Picture: Former Ellerslie Businesses.
 Businesses, Shops, and Shopkeepers
With the exception of the racing industry, employment in Ellerslie was extremely
limited during the nineteenth century. Businesses in the township included several
slaughterhouses, a timber and joinery factory near the railway station, and a
blacksmith shop established by Mr Wilkinson at the Harp of Erin. Economic development
occurred more rapidly in Panmure and Mount Wellington, the most prominent business
being a tannery established by Barton, George and Frederick Ireland on the banks
of the Panmure Basin. From the 1880s land was opened up for industrial development
in the Mount Richmond area and by 1883 the Union Oil, Soap, and Candle Company
had built a factory. Following the turn of the century Kempthorne Prosser, formerly
devoted to pharmaceuticals, began acid and manure production in the district.
The largest business established near Ellerslie was a brewery owned by the firm
of Campbell and Ehrenfried.
For many years the town was without a store and early settlers made the journey
to Newmarket or Auckland for their supplies, although bread was delivered regularly
to the township and Arthur Pickering delivered meat by horse and cart. However,
by 1882 the first grocery store opened near the railway station and at the turn
of the century the village possessed a bakery, a bookshop, and a drapery. In
1894 Sidney Hill, known to many residents as the 'Ellerslie Mad Butcher', opened
the first butcher shop on the main road. Yet as late as the 1920s and 30s a village
atmosphere prevailed and milk, bread, fish, and groceries continued to be delivered
by horse and cart. It was not until the mid 1950s that a second shopping centre
was established in Marua Road.Picture: Robert Graham. Leon Leicester Collection.
 Some
of the most well known personalities in histories of the township are men
and women who became shopkeepers. Sid Hill is fondly remembered for his great
sense of humour and his patronage of the Ellerslie hotel during working hours,
his terrier dog placed outside to bark loudly if Mrs Hill approached. Another
favourite shopkeeper was Mickey Bain who opened a grocery store on the corner
of the Main Highway and Robert Street. Described as a generous and well-liked
man, many residents recalled him giving free biscuits or lollies to favourite
customers. During the Depression he extended credit to anyone who required it
and almost everyone returned to repay his kindness. He later left the district
to become proprietor of a hotel near Huntly and Lord Elsmore, another prominent
resident who later became mayor, converted the store into a bookshop. Elsmore
eventually moved to the centre of town where he opened a Four Square store. For
many years George or 'Jordy' Chapman was the local bookmaker and ran a popular
billiard room in the village, while Frank Corrigan opened another butchery on
the corner of Ladies Mile and the Main Highway until 1919 when it was destroyed
by fire. By 1950 the main shopping centre contained the post office, a number
of grocers, a haberdashery, a dairy, a bakery, a draper, two pharmacists, and
several banks. Perhaps the longest serving of the shopkeepers was Max Ward who
arrived in 1948 to form a partnership in the pharmacy of Humphrey Williams. Max
remained in the business for 50 years, dispensing medicine not only to residents
but also, as a veterinary chemist, to their livestock and pets.
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