According to his first marriage certificate Charles Walter Langston was born in 1845 or 1846 in Huddersfield, Yorkshire, England, to Francis Lee Langston, a solicitor, and Helen Jane Langston (nee Morling). Anything more precise than this can not be determined as a search of English birth records, from 1840 to 1847 inclusive, has located Charles Langstons, Langstones and Langtons, but no confirming second name or even a direct Huddersfield link. Some descendants believe that the Langstons at one time lived around Langstone Harbour near Portsmouth, were well to do and that Charles was sent out to New Zealand as a remittance man.

What is certain is that on the 29th of April 1871 Charles declared himself bankrupt at the Supreme Court in Wellington, (records in National Archives). Described as a butcher of the City of Wellington, he declared his inability to meet his debts to his creditors. He later described himself as a veterinary surgeon, and from at least 1894 to 1904 as a member of the prestigious Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.

On 25 November 1873, twenty seven year old Charles Walter Langston married twenty five year old Margaret McDermott in St Mary's Church at Geraldine in South Canterbury. His intention to marry was registered in Geraldine, while hers was in Christchurch (BDM 20/18, P65/134 and P584/2844. Some of her descendants believe she was born in India, a daughter of an Irish soldier who served in the Indian Army. However, while the General Record�s Office Regimental Birth Indices have someone of that name born in Ireland, the birth certificate for her son Arthur Ernest has her place of birth as Barbados in the West Indies. She apparently emigrated to New Zealand around 1872.

Children followed, with Katherine (Katie) Edith born 15 January 1875 and Bernard Frederick (Freddy) born 16 March 1877 in Blenheim. Charles Walter was born 6 April 1879 in Hopper Street, Wellington, but he died in 1880. Also in 1879 Charles was bankrupted by his creditors, his occupation now described as commission agent. The family then moved to Bulls as Katie began school there from 1 April 1881, Freddy began school there from 16 October 1881, Frank was born there 10 December 1881 and Arthur Ernest was born there on 1 July 1883. Bulls is a dairy farming area in the Rangitikei.

School records refer to a move of Katie and Fred to Palmerston North in 1883, but a return of Katie to Bulls from 4 July 1887 to 9 December 1887. However, whereas previously the parent was given as Charles Langstone, veterinary surgeon of Bulls, the only 1887 parent was Mrs Charles Langstone. The relationship between Charles and his family deteriorated in the 1880's. He was later described as "a gentleman who will be remembered by many in the Auckland and Waikato districts, where he practised as a veterinary surgeon in the early Eighties ... (he) generally managed to have a "good time" and was not without qualities of an entertaining character. He was "good company", and cut a dash amongst the fair" (New Zealand Sporting & Dramatic Review 19 February 1903, page 20).

Charles' lifestyle and financial problems placed the family and marriage under much strain. Probably because of a lack of ready money at the time, Frank Langstone's birth was not even registered. Margaret worked as a milliner, dressmaker and seamstress to provide money for the large family, but her health was poor. On 23 December 1890 she died on Main Street in Palmerston North. Cause of death was a liver abscess and emphysema, which her death certificate further says she had suffered for at least two months. Emphysema is a collection of pus in the lung, resulting from other heath problems including that of the liver./p>

By this time the father was well distant. Only eleven months after Margaret's death, at his second marriage in 1891, Charles was even uncertain as to in which month she had died, claiming it to have been April 1890. It was left to sixteen year old Katie to look after her younger brothers. Frank Langstone had only just turned nine years old when his mother died.

John Alexander Lee claims that Frank Langstone was sent to Burnham Industrial School outside Christchurch (Lee papers MS 828 11,23,10 at Auckland City Library). At that time children under fifteen years old were placed in Industrial Schools if they were deemed to be neglected or delinquent, and fostered out until they reached twenty one years of age. Certainly when later addressing a petition from a young man, allegedly involved in a robbery, Langstone admitted that "in my young days I felt very bitterly what the Police and other authorities could do" (P.D. [Parliamentary Debates], 1947, v277, p454), but did not expand on this.

According to Burnham Industrial School records (Archives New Zealand, CW 14 Box 10 1890 - 1898) it was his elder brother Frederick B. Langstone who was admitted to Burnham, on 15 January 1891 aged 13 years 9 months. Described as destitute at the time, Fred was not fostered out and only discharged from Burnham in March 1896. In 1909 his character was reported as �fair�.

Langstone�s own life at the time was little better. He later recalled that "when he was a boy down in Canterbury, he knew that the farmers were not very liberal with their wages" (P.D. 1929, v 223, p690). He "worked at Lincoln (south west of Christchurch), in the country, when I was under 12 years of age for 1 shilling and sixpence a week" (P.D. 1923, v 199, p266). He later confirmed he "was milking cows in New Zealand in 1892 ... for 1/6 a week and keep" (P.D. 1947, v276, p614). The fact that he regularly referred to these events indicate the searing experience they had upon him.

Langstone also recalled "when I was a boy I lived with an old Danish family. The father had been killed in the war between Denmark and Prussia over Schleswig-Holstein [in 1866], and like many other families those people had come to New Zealand to get away from military training and all that it implies" (P.D. 1949, p2631). When Schleswig-Holstein became part of Prussia, many Danish Lutherans emigrated to avoid being conscripted into the Prussian army. Some of them came to New Zealand between 1866 and 1890, encouraged by government land grants, and settled in the Manawatu and Dannevirke districts ("St. Luke's Lutheran Church 1882 - Centennial - 1982", Palmerston North, The Church, 1982).

In the early 1890�s Langstone apprenticed as a blacksmith to John Bowick, a relation of Katie's later husband, in the Rangitikei. He acknowledged that "I have shod young horses ... I put years in the job" (P.D. 1948, v282, p2074). His son Arthur believes it was 1892 when he was apprenticed, in Mangaweka. Langstone later said that he had �worked at whatever I could find to do .. worked on farms, and in quarries and was a blacksmith for a time� (Ottawa Gazette 9/101942, NASH 345 - 0447).

Contact with his father, who Langstone called Walter, had lessened even further with the father's second marriage. This was to a twenty nine year old former Londoner, Jessie Elizabeth Cooley, in St Luke's Church in Greytown in the Wairarapa on 24 November 1891. On the marriage certificate Charles reinvented himself as Charles Wentworth Langstone aged forty two years (thus born in 1848 or 1849). The couple set up house in Greytown, one of the oldest townships in the Wairarapa.

On 20 October 1892 (N.Z. Gazette, 1892, p1441) Charles applied for a patent concerning manufacturing cleansing and disinfecting fluids for sheep washing. In 1894 he applied for a patent for a parasite killer and tonic for cattle and sheep (N.Z. Gazette, 1894, p738). An article in �Fair Play� of 1 September 1894 page 3 offers a photograph of a goateed �Mr C.W. Langstone, M.R.C.V.S.�, who is described as an expert in the treatment of lung worm and other internal diseases of sheep and meat cattle, having spent the last eighteen years investigating the problem. It also describes Langstone�s vermifluge or worm expellant, the patent rights for which he had sold, and his forthcoming Parasiticide. Jessie Langstone, his wife, held the manufacturing rights. He had also produced a solid medicated sheep lick and was writing a book on sheep diseases, which was never published.

In 1895 fresh bankruptcy proceedings followed him to Greytown. In 1897 his wife, Jessie, applied for two patents, in conjunction with a Frederick Henry Wood, concerning coating and lining of butter boxes (N.Z. Gazette, 1897, p190, 1233). At the time they were still living in Greytown. In 1898 Charles was back in Wellington facing bankruptcy as a manufacturer of sheep medicine.

In 1902 Jessie and Charles applied to register patents for compressed fuel, waterproofing clothing, a preservative and on 20 August 1902 for a plug brick (N.Z. Gazette, 1902, p150, 817, 1095 and 1895). It was the brick that brought him to Court, where he was convicted for false pretences when raising two hundred Pounds on the strength of claimed orders for his bricks (N.Z. Mail, 24 December 1902, p57, �Langstone�s Brick�). In February 1903 he was sentenced to two year's imprisonment with hard labour for this swindle.

A son, Frank Langstone, briefly followed him in the field of inventions, when he applied for a patent for a gas toaster (No. 38431) in 1917. However, the application was abandoned at the end of the year (N.Z. Patent Office Journal, 1917, p71 and 538).

Charles� life eventually concluded as Charles William Langstone on 27 July 1918 at Taihape, aged seventy five years (now born in 1842 or 1843). His death certificate described him as a labourer, who before death had suffered from chronic cardiac disease, chronic bronchitis and general oedema, family not known.

Frank Langstone's formal education was poor. He is not listed on the Bulls school roll, but may have had four to five years of schooling in Palmerston North from 1888 to 1892. In his later years Langstone said �I had to leave school at the age of 11, and I�m not too sure of my grammar and that sort of thing� (NZHerald 12/9/1966). In Parliament he envied a Parliamentary colleague as "fortunate in being the son of parents who were able to give him a good education, so that he could more ably express himself than most of the working-class people of this country, who have not had the same opportunity in the matter of education" (P.D. 1923, v.200, p426).

He recalled that "... when I was a boy going to school. By the way, I did not get much schooling - like other members on this side of the House, whose university has been the pick and shovel, or something of that sort, in the early years. I ... know something of what it means to be educated in the university of the working classes" (P.D. 1923, v.199, p266). He later confirmed that "when I went to school, I am sorry to say that I did not get much schooling" (P.D. 1924, v.203, p 615). Despite this, Langstone was a great reader and was gifted with a retentive memory enabling him to recall large amounts of poetry and prose.

Langstone was too young to vote in the 1902 General Election, and his whereabouts in this period is difficult to trace. A 1905 Wises' business directory lists a Frank Langston, blacksmith, in Taihape, but he was not on the relevant 1905 Rangitikei Electoral Roll. Constituted a borough in 1906, Taihape was the largest town in the Rangitikei area.

The 1906 Wises' directory has a prominent advertisement for the "Railway Refreshment Rooms, Railway Station, Masterton, F. Langstone Proprietor, all trains stop long enough for refreshments, tea and sandwiches a specialty" (N.Z. Town Directory 1906, p503). On 24 April 1906 the refreshment room keeper married Agnes Clementine King, a year younger than himself, in the Presbyterian Church in Masterton. Their marriage certificate states that she was born in Reefton to Thomas King, a contractor, and Lily King (nee Gordon). John Lionel (Jack) Langstone was born later in that year and Myrtle Gloria was born 8 May 1908.

At the time of the 1908 General Election Langstone was listed on the Masterton Electoral Roll as the proprietor of the Masterton Railway Refreshment Rooms, this occupation also listed in the 1909 Wises' directory. The Masterton electorate stretched from Masterton, the main town in the Wairarapa area, northwards through Ekatahuna almost to the town of Pahiatua. The general election was won by the Liberals, who had been in government since 1891, and Alexander Wilson Hogg, a Glasgow born newspaper editor, continued as the local Liberal M.P. He had represented Masterton since the 1890 election.

Hogg's major interests were education, land and finance. He was a long-time member of the Wellington Education Board and a member of the Victoria College Council. He supported leasehold land settlement, that is land leased by farmers from the government but with ownership remaining with the state, was a member of the Wellington Land Board 1889 - 1904 and chaired the Parliamentary Lands Committee 1902 - 1905. He was one of the minority within the Liberal government who opposed compulsory military training (P.D. 1921, p12-14), and had been a member of the radical pro-working man Knights of Labour. Like other radicals at the time Hogg attacked bankers and financiers and supported a state bank, he also attacked private monopolies and sought the reduction of customs duties on food.

Hogg served as Minister for Customs and Labour for the first six months of 1909, before being forced to resign following his public support for land nationalisation and a state monopoly of bank note issues (Bassett, Michael - "Sir Joseph Ward, a political biography", Auckland, AUP, 1993). Later in Parliament Ward rejected the notion that Hogg had been ousted from Cabinet because he advocated a state note issue (P.D. 1928, v 220 p141), but Langstone countered that his reading of the Parliamentary Debates upheld his memory of the events he had read about in newspapers at the time.

Newman in his "Liberal policy and the Left Wing 1908 - 1911 (Auckland University Thesis, 1965), illustrates how Hogg effectively isolated himself from potentially supportive colleagues through his outspoken manner, and was made to resign because of his bad timing and manner, rather than for the substance of his offending speech to Parliament. At the time, under the 1908 Banking Act, each bank in New Zealand could issue its own notes. The "Wairarapa Daily Times" records no public involvement by Langstone in the 1908 Election, and the fact that Langstone had to rely on his memory of newspaper reports, rather than any personal contact during a time of great importance to Hogg, suggests that Langstone was not a close supporter at that time. Nevertheless, Langstone had caught �basicilus socialism� in the Wairarapa, no doubt encouraged by his contacts with working people in his business activities.

After his resignation as Minister, Hogg spoke at Trades and Labour Council meetings around New Zealand and provided the opportunity for others to spearhead the formation of a separate Labour Party. Bert Roth ("New Zealand's first Labour Party", "Here & Now", v3 n1, October 1952) describes how the Party grew from two near simultaneous but separate meetings held by the Christchurch drivers' union and the Auckland Trades and Labour Council. The latter had been addressed by Hogg in an attempt to form what he believed would become a Land and Labour League. The real impetus for the separate Labour Party came from organised unions, especially after the July 1910 Trades and Labour Council's Annual Conference, which determined the policy platform for the new political party. Branches outside of Auckland and Christchurch were then formed with the assistance of local Trades and Labour Councils.

By the time of the first Annual Conference in April 1911 the Party had 11 branches with around 3,000 members. The "N.Z. Herald" of 29 June 1968 quotes Langstone as joining the Labour Party in Masterton around 60 years before, while Bert Roth claims Langstone was President of the Masterton Branch in 1910.

Langstone was also an early subscriber to the new shearers' union newspaper the "Maoriland Worker", his subscription dated from October 1910 ("Maoriland Worker", 29 October 1910, p 4). He also assisted the Wellington Industrial District shearers' union, which was a branch of the New Zealand union. The "Maoriland Worker" referred to it as the Masterton rather than the Wellington branch, as the union was based in the sheep farming areas of the Wairarapa. The District union had been registered under the Arbitration Act in 1907 and its first Award came into force from 4 April 1908. A photograph from late 1910 includes Langstone amongst representatives of the shearers' union and the "Red" Federation of Labour, meeting to discuss both the future of the "Maoriland Worker", and the shearers' joining the Federation ("Maoriland Worker", 15 December 1910).

The "Wairarapa Daily Times" of 13 October 1911 (p 4) reports Langstone acting as a Master of Ceremonies for a dance organised by the union. The "Maoriland Worker" of 27 October 1911 (p 14) reports his election as the new president of the union, on 14 October 1911. He had obviously impressed the union leadership sufficiently for them to adopt a non-shearer as their new president. Langstone later introduced an unsuccessful amendment to the Shearers' Accommodation Act in 1924, 1926 and 1930 providing for better dining and washing facilities and more hygienic killing pens. He made no reference to any personal experience of working as a shearer. Often he used personal experiences to give weight to his opinions.

When responding to his election as union president, he told the union members that he was deeply impressed with the honour, and that he would do his best to further the cause of the union. The "Maoriland Worker" (8 December 1911, p14) reports his commitment to unionism. "Unionists always had an uphill fight as not only had they to fight the battle for the workers in their ranks, but also the workers without. It should thus be the ambition of unionists to organise non-unionists into their ranks". The "Maoriland Worker" of 8 December 1911 (p 14) also reports that he was now acting secretary and that he strongly supported the shearers' union's policy of 'One Big Union' which �must come into existence before the workers could proclaim their freedom .. workers should join the industrial army to protect their claims from falling a prey to the greed and gluttony of the capitalist class". His role as acting secretary continued until at least June 1912 ("Maoriland Worker" 21/6/1912).

The "N.Z. Herald" of 15/11/1928 (p 13) confirms his association with the shearers' union for many years, and describes him as a former member of the union executive. Proponents of the "One Big Union" criticised Arbitration unions for being small, regional, craft or industry based and dependent on the Arbitration Court for pay and conditions.

On the home front, Bernard (Bernie) James was born on the 13 of May 1909. By this time Langstone described himself as a billiard room proprietor, this was also his description in the 1910 Wises' directory. Arthur Thomas was born in Masterton late in 1911 and Langstone still listed his occupation on the 1911 Masterton Electoral Roll as proprietor of the Masterton Railway Refreshment Rooms. The 1912 Wises' directory had him instead running a Masterton billiard saloon. Either he had overlapping interests, or did not change his listing for the 1911 Roll. While in Masterton he also unsuccessfully balloted for land from the Department of Lands, particularly a block in Dannevirke (P.D. 1923, v.199, p264).

At the 1911 General Election Hogg remained linked to the Liberal Party. The local newspaper the "Wairarapa Daily Times" of 8 December 1911 describes Hogg as a "Ministry" candidate, or supporter of the Liberal government, despite his flirtation with a separate Labour Party. At the first ballot Hogg gained 2,327 votes as opposed to the "Oppositionist" Reform and Independent Reform candidates, who received respectively 2,258 and 1,308 votes. Under the electoral law of the time a second ballot was necessary if no candidate received more than 50% of the valid vote.

The "Wairarapa Daily Times" of 13 December 1911 (p 5) reports Langstone as one of five speakers supporting Hogg at a meeting in Masterton, what he said is not recorded. However, the "Wairarapa Daily Times" of 15 December 1911 reports Hogg losing by 568 votes in the second round of voting to Reform's George R. Sykes. The town of Masterton still supported Hogg, but rural voters preferred Reform to the Liberals. The electorate was only 46.4% urban. In 1912 Reform formed a government and Hogg unsuccessfully stood again as a Liberal candidate for Masterton in 1914. Hogg died in 1920.

The Langstone family left Masterton when Langstone won a contract to run the Te Kuiti refreshment rooms from 1 April 1912. (NZG 1913, p 1248). The 1913 Wises' directory still described Langstone as having the lease of the Te Kuiti Railway Refreshment Room. Te Kuiti was on the Main Trunk railway line from Wellington to Auckland, which had been recently completed in 1908. It was also the centre of a timber milling and dairy farming district. In 1916 the town had 1,982 inhabitants.

Langstone was not immune from the industrial unrest of the time and recalled that "once when I was in business in Te Kuiti I got on a train (to Auckland) at the time of the Waihi strike (around September 1912), and there was a whole crowd of constables going to Waihi", he was "crushed" out of his seat in their carriage and told he had "no business to be there" (P.D. 1947, v277, p455). The constables were getting off at Frankton Junction, near Hamilton, to travel on to Waihi.

Whether he was as innocent a bystander as he suggests is another matter. In a letter from Te Kuiti to the �Maoriland Worker� (1/11/1912, p9) he referred to the �industrial battle raging at Reefton and Waihi.. (with) 60 .. imprisoned in Mt Eden jail.� His response was that �we must demand their release.. organised labour has within itself all the necessary factors for the complete ownership of the means of production and distribution� .. (and) .. �it is war forced by the capitalist against the worker�. Calling on workers to subscribe to the �Maoriland Worker�, he further referred to the Reefton �lock out� and Waihi facing over 100 police �to force the workers into submission. And the police (the tools of the mine-owners) have been the means of sending 66 of the best and noblest men in our land to jail because they dared to encroach upon the economic privilege of the exploiting class�.

He was supported in his politics by his wife as they jointly wrote to the �Maoriland Worker� again (7/2/1913, p2) supporting a pro-Labour daily newspaper. He was still listed as the lessee of the Te Kuiti Railway Refreshment Room on the 1914 Taumarunui Electoral Roll. The Taumarunui electorate included Te Kuiti and stretched from Taumarunui Borough in the south east, to Waitara in the west and to Otorohanga in the north.

The Social Democratic Party had been formed in April 1912 and Langstone became President of the Te Kuiti Branch on 31 May 1914. He attended the national conference as branch delegate in July 1914 (Bert Roth) and first met people whose political careers would be interlinked with his for many years. Nevertheless, at the end of 1914 he also served on the campaign committee for Taumarunui Liberal candidate William Thomas Jennings (P.D. 1923, v.199, p42).

Although not publicly endorsed by the Social Democratic Party, no doubt because he remained a supporter of the Arbitration Act, Jennings had good union credentials. He had been president of the Auckland tailoresses' union 1892 - 1904, the Auckland typographers' union 1895 - 1903 (he was a printer by trade) and the Auckland Trades and Labour Council 1898 - 1899. He had also been the Auckland Trades and Labour Council treasurer 1888 - 1889 and vice-president 1899 - 1900. A Liberal member of the Legislative Council 1892 - 1902, he was Liberal M.P. for Egmont 1902 - 1908 and Taumarunui 1908 - 1911, when he was defeated. He also narrowly lost in the 1914 election, but won the seat in a by-election in June 1915. Langstone recalled "he knew Mr Jennings in political victory and in political defeat" (P.D. 1923, p 42). In 1919 Jennings won the new Waitomo seat, which adjoined Waimarino, but was defeated in 1922. He died on 6 February 1923.

Other sons, Gordon and Fred, were born to Frank and Agnes in Te Kuiti in 1913 and late 1915, respectively.. In mid 1916 the government introduced compulsory registration of all males under the age of forty six years for military service in the First World War. Thirty four year old Langstone was at that time a soda fountain proprietor of Morningside, Auckland. Having responsibility for the six children in his family excluded him from being balloted for overseas service. In 1917 financial considerations forced his wife�s mother, whose husband had deserted her, to apply for charitable aid from the Charitable Aid Board (Auckland Hospital Charitable Aid Applications 1917, A493/127, p398, YCAB). In September 1917 Langstone became manager of the Auckland Sailors' Home, where his managerial skills were matched with those of a social worker. He left the Sailors' Home in June 1918, and Auckland, and had moved back to Te Kuiti by late 1918 as his last child, Mona Lillian, was born there. He was thus fortunate in avoiding the influenza epidemic which struck Auckland from October 1918. Langstone's occupation in the 1918 Wises' directory was that of blacksmith. Soon after the family moved to Taumarunui as on the 1919 Waimarino Electoral Roll Langstone described himself as refreshment room keeper at the Taumarunui Popular Dining Rooms.

At the confluence of the Whanganui and Ongarue Rivers, Taumarunui marked the boundary for the Auckland, Wellington and Taranaki provinces. In the heart of the King Country, so called because for most of the nineteenth century the area was reserved for Maori under their King, Taumarunui was settled by Pakeha from around 1900 (Winter, N.A. "Taumarunui, old and new ...", Taumarunui, Taumarunui Press Ltd, 1913). Pakeha were able to lease land in the town from 1904 and Taumarunui was constituted a borough in 1910. By 1916 it had 1,875 inhabitants. Like Te Kuiti it was on the Main Trunk railway line.

The surrounding district was noted for both sheep farming and timber, the major industry in the King Country, and neighbouring Ohakune was the centre of the biggest timber producing area. Elsewhere in the immediate region Manunui boasted two sawmills and a box making factory owned by Pukuweka Sawmills Ltd, with 150 employees. The company supplied timber for C. & A. Odlin Timber and Hardware Co. Ltd in Auckland and Wellington. Manunui also had a separate veneer works. Raetihi had been established earlier and was more of a sheep farming area. It was linked to the Main Trunk by a branch line from 1917, and there were a number of sawmills in the surrounding area. Rangataua was known as a railway hub, timber and tourism, being situated at the base of Mount Ruapehu. The Tongariro Timber Co. had in 1906 bought the timber cutting rights to 60,000 acres between the Main Trunk and Lake Taupo, and centred its operations at Kakahi. Further south, approaching Taihape, the Rangitikei General and Co-operative Timber Co. had 38 sawmills and employed 1,150.

Under the Arbitration Act timber workers in the area could be represented by one of two Arbitration unions, as the boundary between the Auckland and Wellington Industrial Districts ran through the middle of the electorate. The Auckland Timber-Workers' Union had been formed in September 1900 and registered under the Arbitration Act in 1901. Its secretary in 1919, Edward (Ted) Phelan, was a strong Labour Party supporter. The Wellington Timber-Yards and Sawmills' Union was registered under the Arbitration Act in late 1900 and its secretary in 1919, Jack Read, was also a strong Labour Party supporter. However, while the Auckland union had included some Owhango, Taumarunui and Matapuna sawmills in its 1917 Award, the Wellington union had last included some Ohakune and Horopito sawmills in its 1913 Award. Neither had organised their potential membership in the King Country.

According to the 'Maoriland Worker" on 13 April 1919 local timber workers met to form a separate King Country Sawmill and Timber Workers' Union. They rejected what they considered the low pay rates negotiated by the Arbitration unions, and their past lack of interest in the area.

The New Zealand Labour Party had been formed in July 1916 and although not listed amongst Labour's candidates at the July 1919 Labour Party conference, by September 1919 Langstone was described as a "very genuine" and "able" Labour Party candidate vigorously campaigning around the electorate, with local Labour people optimistic that he would be elected to Parliament ("Maoriland Worker", 24/9/1919, p5). The local party organisation was very strong with the Owhango branch alone having 125 members, and around 1,000 people reputedly attended an October Waimarino Labour Representation Committee rally. The party had branches at Taumarunui, Manunui, Kakahi, Owhango, Raurimu, Horopito and Ohakune, as well as the affiliation of the King Country Sawmill and Timber Workers' Union.

Langstone's sole opponent was the Liberal incumbent, Robert William Smith. Born in Nerang, Queensland, in 1871, Smith emigrated to New Zealand and farmed at Mangaweka on the Rangitikei river from around 1900. He also had financial interests in local sawmills. According to Denis Robertson in "1894-1994, give me Taihape on a Saturday night" (Heritage Press, 1995) Smith owned two small sized sawmills in the Taihape area, and the Book of Awards for 1920 also notes one at Raetihi.

Elected to the Taihape Borough Council in 1906, Smith stood as an Independent Liberal candidate for the Rangitikei electorate in 1908. He then represented Rangitikei as a Liberal from a by-election in September 1909 to 1911, before representing Waimarino from 1911 ("N.Z.Herald" 5/11/1925 p11). A freeholder who owned rather than leased his land from the government, Smith retained support amongst established farmers who preferred Reform's emphasis on the freehold, while relying on the traditional Liberal alliance of new pioneer farmers and town dwellers. Smith had also a legacy of timber worker support, favouring a protective tariff for the timber industry, employing many timber workers and had the status of being amongst opposition M.P.s manhandled by mounted special constables during the 1913 General Strike in Wellington (Gustafson).

The Waimarino electorate had been originally formed in September 1911 and for both the 1911 and 1914 elections covered an area from Lake Taupo in the north east, bordered Taumarunui Borough in the north west, included Raetihi, Ohakune, Waiouru and Taihape, and extended south to the coast almost to Wanganui. However, for the 1919 election it was quite dramatically changed. It now approached Te Kuiti in the north, kept Lake Taupo, now included Taumarunui Borough, kept Raetihi, Ohakune and Waiouru, but excluded both Taihape and the coastal area near Wanganui. In accordance with the Country Quota, which allowed for rural electorates to have smaller populations than urban electorates, it had a full 28% allowance as it had no defined urban population (see McRobie, Alan - "N.Z. electoral atlas", Wellington, GP Books, 1989). In 1919 Waimarino had 7,506 voters on the roll while neighbouring predominantly urban Wanganui had 10,503.

The Labour Party platform for the 1919 election had been determined at the Third Annual Conference in July 1919 (see "The N.Z. politics source book" p 138-9). The objective was the socialisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange. The policy areas were electoral, constitutional, land, state ownership, education, taxation, social, industrial, defence and peace. Of most interest to a rural electorate, Labour supported a tenancy system for government land and a state bank to eliminate excessive loan charges. It also supported improved road access in rural districts, funded by taxing large estates, land development by the state prior to settlement and state farms. The state would have the monopoly of land sales and all land sold would have to be to the state, but at a valuation recognising a farmer's added value during occupancy.

The result of the 1919 election in Waimarino was 41.5% of the total roll supporting the Liberal and 32.9% for Labour, the remainder being non vote with a low 74.4% turn-out (Appendices to the .Journal of the House of Representatives 1920 H 33A, p 14). Of the actual vote, Liberal won 55.7% and Labour 44.2%, with a 643 vote Liberal majority. The biggest town in the electorate, Taumarunui, made up 14.8% of the total vote and went Liberal by 61.2%. The next largest town was Ohakune which was split into two booths. Ohakune made up 7.2% of the total vote and went Liberal by 55.5%. Ohakune East on the other hand made up 4.9% of the total vote and went Labour by 64.9%. Raetihi was the next biggest town with 10.6% of the total vote and went Liberal by 61.7%. Owhango with 5.1% of the total vote went Liberal by 62.8%. The 0.5% absent vote went Liberal by 54.9%. Labour won smaller booths such as Kakahi by 64.3% (3.1% of total vote), Manunui by 56% (0.6% of total vote and around 800 total population), Raurimu by 67.2% (0.3% of total vote) and Rangataua by 64.8% (0.4% of total vote). Geographically the strongest Labour support was in the timber milling areas to north east and east of Taumarunui, the area between Owhango and Ohakune, east of Ohakune and in the south east. Smith took the conservative freeholder farmers' votes, as they had no other candidate to vote for, and kept town and pioneer farmer support. The majority of timber workers, and some pioneer farmers looking for additional government assistance, went to Langstone. Only a third of the land area in the King Country had been developed by the early 1920's, with some bush workers remaining to farm the land they had helped clear.

Langstone's public speaking skills, demonstrated in his first unsuccessful attempt at Parliament, were soon put to use in unionising King Country timber workers. On 1 April 1920 he was elected secretary treasurer of the new union supporting the "ownership of industries by the workers" and "industrial democracy" ("Maoriland Worker", 28/4/1920, p7). In May 1920 Langstone attended the annual conference of the New Zealand Workers' Union, to which the King Country timber workers had decided to affiliate. At the conference Langstone is urged that "as soon as the worker owned and controlled the industry in which he worked he would be able to get the full product of his labour" ("Maoriland Worker", 26/5/1920, p6). In September 1920 Langstone was unopposed for the position of organising secretary of the Workers' Union's King Country Timber Workers' Section, and continued to attempt to negotiate directly with the mill owners outside of the Arbitration Court.

Mill owners on the other hand preferred negotiations within the Court framework, and supported the coverage of local timber workers by Arbitration unions. The fight for coverage was particularly fierce between the Workers' union and the Wellington timberworkers' union, with angry letters and meetings during 1920. The relationship with the Auckland union was less acrimonious, given Auckland's wider coverage of local timber workers. Langstone was also called on to organise for the New Zealand Workers' Union in the Gisborne area, including hydroelectricity camps. In urban areas the Union was trying to organise brick workers, labourers and fertiliser workers. Langstone handed over the organiser's role at the end of 1920 and returned to the restaurant business, while continuing to handle the finances of the Section. The new organiser, A.D. Devereux, had been secretary of Labour's Owhango Branch in 1919 and was a later Waimarino L.E.C. official.

In the 1920 Award round, the Auckland timberworkers' union secured Award coverage of timber workers at Owhango, Ongarue, Manunui, Taumarunui, Kakahi, Taringamotu, Piriaka and Raurimu (Books of Awards, 1920, p 1505-7). The Wellington union secured Award coverage of timber workers at Ohakune, Rangataua, Horopito, Hihitahi, Pokako, Turangarere and Raetihi (see Books of Awards, 1920, p 1328). Devereux resigned as organiser in April 1921, as most timber workers were now covered by the two Arbitration Unions. As at December 1921 only 36% of wage earners in the sawmilling and forestry industries were on the rolls of Arbitration Court registered unions, by December 1925 they were still only 43% (N.Z. Official Yearbook, 1932, p724).

Langstone's involvement with both the New Zealand Workers' union and his restaurant business took precedence over Labour Party activities. He is not listed amongst those in attendance at either the 1920 or 1921 Labour Party conferences, and may not have attended earlier conferences either. He certainly didn't attend the 1917 conference ("Maoriland Worker"). Around this time he unsuccessfully stood for the Taumarunui Borough Council and farmed in nearby Winter's Island. By 1922 Langstone was running the Crown Dining Rooms in Taumarunui, employing sufficient staff in that year to warrant coverage by the Auckland hotel workers' union, when expanding its membership in the area.

Copyright, David Verran, 2004.