John McKenzie

Sir John McKenzie (6 October 1839 – 6 August 1901) was a New Zealand politician. He served as Minister of Lands and Agriculture in the Liberal Government of John Ballance. Early life McKenzie was born in Ardross, Scotland, the son of a small tenant farmer, and while young saw the hardships caused by the Highland Clearances. When he was five-years-old in May 1845 the McKenzie was woken before dawn by his father and walked on a 16-mile journey to a small Presbyterian church at Croick. En route (despite his age) McKenzie witnessed the former inhabitants of the nearby Glencalvie estate huddled together in a graveyard after they had been evicted from their homes by an exploitative landlord. This is something he never forgot and the memory would shape the attitudes and actions of his life subsequently. As a teenager McKenzie was farming with his father was farming at Baldoon where they also hired two further employees regularly. He commenced a typical rural apprenticeship, starting out as a shepherd before progressing incrementally to run a croft and eventually operating a leasehold farm of his own. Whilst still relatively young he fathered a daughter (Johan McKenzie, who was born on 23 June 1859) out of wedlock which made his social life awkward. He would later publicly accept sole custody for his daughter and gave her his surname to partially removed the stigma of her illegitimacy. Soon after he married Ann Munro, a widow six years his senior, 23 May 1860 at Dingwall shortly before they emigrated to New Zealand. He arrived in Otago in September 1860, where he eventually began working for runholder Johnny Jones in Waikouaiti. His skill and experience with farming in the hilly country there, which was very reminiscent to those in Scotland, saw him promoted rapidly and by 1863 he was managing a giant run at Puketapu for Jones. After just two years he had saved enough money to achieve the independence he had always dreamed of. He purchased a 76-acre property of ordinary land just north of Palmerston valued at 10 shillings an acre which he named Ardross after his hometown.