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T. C. Moorhouse when working the Ashburton run, for use in dipping sheep.

The exhibition which ran from 24 to 28 March, was a social success. The Governor, Sir Arthur Gordon, opened the display. He was welcomed by Hugo Friedlander, as mayor, by Walker and Wright as county chairman and local member of Parliament and by parades of the Ashburton Rifle Volunteers and the Caledonian Society. The pipe band played an appropriate Gordon air. The Premier, Sir John Hall, attended and spoke of hunting wild pigs on the site of the town, then a ‘wilderness’. The temperature in the great tent soared to 110°F, and the fire brigade called in to spray the canvas, managed to wet the visitors, though not more than to cause amusement. Two thousand people visited the show.^[1]

The value of the exhibition in other respects was not so evident. The Ashburton Industrial Association acquired a number of articles for which it wanted a museum. It also continued to investigate schemes such as that for a river-mouth port. In the following years, Ashburton acquired a small reputation for inventions closely related to the main local industry—farming.

The same group was indirectly responsible for the establishment of a woollen mill. The association itself was wound up at the end of 1881, after having declined an offer of the necessary plant from a ‘Mr Miller’ who had brought it from Scotland but was unable to finance the erection of a factory. However, within a week or so, Bullock had no apparent difficulty in securing support for his proposal to acquire the machinery. The purchase price was contributed at one meeting. Directors were elected. Hugo Friedlander, again in England, was asked to negotiate for additional plant and Scott Brothers, the Christchurch engineers, were engaged to set up the factory. But immediately the company faced increasing demands for capital. The first amount proposed was £25,000; then it was £100,000. Shares proved unsaleable and the company went into liquidation. Investors lost nearly £12,000.

This set-back, however, proved to be temporary. Another company was formed with G. H. Greenwood of Christchurch, a one-time manufacturer, H. Friedlander, D. Thomas, C. J. Harper and G. Jameson as directors. They bought the factory for £4450 from Scotts and opened it with considerable ceremony in April 1885. For over three years the business appeared to flourish. It employed a hundred hands for long hours and exported ‘large quantities of tweeds and other woollens of most excellent quality’ to markets