The Hickling Family in Richmond

John Hickling, has recently loaned us a family photo album which includes pictures of the family’s tomato-growing business in Richmond, between River Road & Dudley Creek. Few of the photos have dates recorded, but seem to be taken mostly before 1950. 

About 1925, John’s grandfather, William Hickling (1886–1967) bought two acres of land in North Richmond, west of Dudley Creek near its confluence with the Avon River. The purchase must have seemed a good deal to him, because the previous year he had owned an acre of land in Papanui, which included a house and four glasshouses growing tomatoes, along with other horticultural infrastructure.
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The Hickling family would live at the Richmond property for the next 50 years. As these photos show, the business the family developed here became a considerable enterprise. When William retired in the 1950s, his son Arthur (1920–2000) took over the business, in partnership with his sisters and their husbands. Later, when North Island tomato growers began flooding South Island markets with cheaper tomatoes grown outdoors, the family switched to growing carnations. Arthur sold the property in the mid-1970s and went on to sell real estate with Drewery’s Estate Agency in Christchurch.

The aerial photo, above, taken in 1961, shows the Hickling property outlined in white, and how it fitted into the surrounding neighbourhood between Dudley Creek and the Avon River.

​William Hickling and his wife Agnes were married in Birmingham, England in March, 1909. They must have emigrated to New Zealand soon after, as their first child, Ivy Lillian, was born in New Zealand in 1910. The couple would have two more children: Elsie, b 1913 and Arthur, b 1920. From 1925, the family lived at 389 River Road. William established the property, building glasshouses for growing tomatoes. 

Something of a family portrait. William Hickling and his wife, Agnes, centre. On the left is their younger daughter, Elsie, and at right, her sister Lillian. The photo was probably taken by Arthur.

Smoko: William, 3rd from left, and Arthur 4th from left.

This picture was probably taken after the big snow, August 1945.

Building the chimney stack for the No.1 boiler. The boiler burned coal or slack (fine coal).

The packing shed, where tomatoes were sorted and packed for shipping all over the South Island.

Always something to do…William, left, and Arthur. The vehicle is a Hudson Terraplane car, highly modified for use as a tip truck!?

The main paddock, north of the main glasshouse. Here the family grew a range of produce: lilies, vegetables, berries and blackcurrants.

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The main glasshouse (No 1 & 2), ready for planting out. Taken in the days before the family installed raised beds, which made this work much easier on the back!?

A Burrel traction engine served as a boiler to sterilise the soil in the glasshouses. On occasion, the engine served to pull vehicles out of Dudley Creek.

Sterilising the soils, No. 1 glasshouse. The pipes were pushed into the beds (raised by this time!) and steam was pumped through the soil.

Repairs after a hail storm. Handwritten caption on reverse reads: “In front: C. McLean, W. Hickling, C. Carson. Up ladder, Gef [sic]. Arthur on top, head cut off. “

Another large tomato crop underway.