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WAECKERLE’S COTTAGE

A humble cottage at the entrance to Akaroa was the home of one of its original German settlers.

Category: Dwellings
Date: 1876-77
Street Address: 2 Rue Lavaud
HPT registered? Yes
District Plan Listed? Yes

This cottage was the retirement home of one of Akaroa’s first European settlers.

Christian Jacob Waeckerle was in his mid 20s when he arrived in Akaroa in 1840 on board the Comte de Paris. In the early 1840s he married another Comte de Paris settler, Marie Judith Eteveneaux. He was, in turn, blacksmith, flourmiller, mail contractor and hotel keeper (see the Grand Hotel).

In 1876 he sold his hotel to his son-in-law and built a cottage next to the hotel. The cottage remained his home until his death in 1901. His wife died in 1880. In his retirement, he had time to enter local politics and served as Akaroa’s mayor from 1878 to 1880. The cottage is a reminder of the handful of Germans who were among the Comte de Paris settlers and of the long life of a pioneer who contributed much to Akaroa in its early years. The cottage was originally a simple gable-ended building with attic rooms. Later a second wing was built at right angles to the first and a verandah added.

The cottage is an appealing example of small-scale colonial domestic architecture.

 

 
   
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