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The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Otago & Southland Provincial Districts]

Riversdale

Riversdale is the headquarters of a district on the Waimea Plains, where, years ago, the New Zealand Agricultural Company bought large tracts of land, with the object of sub-dividing and selling to small settlers. The company is still represented at Riversdale. A considerable proportion of the land has been disposed of for closer settlement, and the township has had a career of much prosperity. It consists of two hotels, two stores, two saddlers' shops, three blacksmiths' shops, a butcher's shop, a livery stable, a dairy factory, and a large grain store owned by an Invercargill firm. The district has a rifle club, and is the headquarters of the Mataura Mounted Rifles, who have a drill shed. The Riversdale public school, under the care of a master and mistress, has an average attendance of ninety. The local railway station is eighteen miles from Gore, and nineteen from Lumsden, and stands 413 feet above the level of the sea. The work of the post office ana telegraph office is conducted at the railway station. Riversdale is in the Hokonui riding of the county of Southland, and in the Wakatipu electorate, and its population, at the census of 1901, was 312. It lies to the north-west of Gore, and four miles to the south of the Mataura river. The Waimea stream, a tributary of the Mataura, flows through the settlement and joins the Mataura five-miles to the southward. The severe winter of 1903 left its mark on Riversdale, by the destruction of nearly the whole of the gum trees, and of the pines which beautified the settlement. Riversdale is connected with the Waikaia district, fourteen miles off., by daily coach communication. A branch railway to connect Waikaia with Riversdale, was commenced some years ago, but up to the present (1904–5) the formation extends only four or five miles.