Margaret Pullar, of Gore, started preparing a document back in 2005 for a Century Farm Award and ended up writing a book, covering more than 150 years of Trapski and Pullar family history in New Zealand.
The Trapski-Pullar Family: Carse Head & Crichton Park Farms: A story of the land and its people will be launched at Crichton Park homestead at Pukerau tomorrow. The first of the family arrived in Otago in the very early 1860s, with the Pullar ancestors - the McIntosh family - settling at Disputed Spur and then Moa Creek in the Ida Valley.
Another catalyst for the book was Mrs Pullar's helping to raise money for the restoration of the Moa Creek cemetery.
Prof James Gow Black, the first owner of the farm that Trapskis and then Pullars farmed in Southland, was appointed the first professor of chemistry and mineralogy at the University of Otago in 1871.
Originally from Perthshire, he supported and educated himself from the age of 14 by setting up his own school.
He married Jennie Crichton, and named his property Crichton Park Downs.
In 1920, much of it was sold for soldiers' settlement. The homestead block was purchased for a recently returned Trapski son and another portion for a recently returned Pullar son.
Both blocks are part of the present farm. The Trapski family's Carse Head farm - purchased by Frederick Trapski in 1896 - was also now part of the farm. A series of tragedies in the family began with the death of the first Frederick Trapski after a horse coach accident, very soon after he and his wife Alicia signed to take up land in Waipahi in 1874. Although suffering a terminal illness, his widow paid off her land in 1883 before she died, leaving her four children to carry on.
Margaret Pullar's husband Gordon left school at 15 to work on the family farm.
The couple retired to Gore about 14 years ago.
The property is now farmed by their son Phillip, his daughter and her husband.
It used to be a sheep and cropping farm, until Phillip Pullar converted to dairying in 1997.
Gordon Pullar gave some land for Camp Columba, which opened in 1957 as the permanent home for the Mataura District Bible Class Easter Camp.
The site was now used by school camps, churches and community groups throughout the year. It had developed over the years into a ''wonderful complex'', with many local people contributing to both its building and development, Mrs Pullar said.
While the book project had ended up larger than she expected, she was delighted with the result.
Guest speaker at the launch will be Wairuna farmer John Clarke, whose family has also been farming in the area for 150 years.
