The Shoemaker

There has been a Hannah’s on Wellington’s Lambton Quay as long as anyone can remember - and much much longer than that.
The first store was opened there in 1870.  It has changed position several times and at one point there were two factories there as well.   But that has come to an end with the closure of the Lambton Quay store last week.
While not all the stores are closing - there are others around the country - the closure of that store would have been a sad day for Robert Hannah - who came to New Zealand in 1866 from Ireland.
Robert Hanna - he added an H to the end of his name after losing a bet with another man with the same last name - was born in County Antrim in Ireland on September 10, 1846, to John and Mary Hanna and had been working as a bootmaker.  But after an argument with his father he headed to Australia.
Instead he ended up in New Zealand arriving in Hokitika on the SS Claud Hamilton where he may have been attracted by the ongoing gold rush.
He opened his first shop in Charleston in 1868.  But as the gold rush declined and people left the area, he knew he would have to move.
Originally considering going to America,  he ended up in Wellington and the store on Lambton Quay was opened.  Business boomed and he opened further stores and factories.    By 1897 there were 10 stores around the country.
By 1893, Hannah’s factory employed more than 250 people. At its peak, the factory was capable of producing 6,000 pairs of shoes a week.
Robert had married Hannah Ferguson in 1975 who also came from Ireland.  They had eight children.
They lived in Boulcott St, and Antrim House was the third of their houses in the same street. Specially built in 1904 it had modern (for the times) gas, electric lights and bathrooms inside.
Robert died on June 14, 1930, from pneumonia after a visit to the farm the couple had kept in Lower Hutt.  He was known as a shrewd businessman.  
After his death Antrim House was used as a hostel and a private hotel, and was only just saved from a fire in 1940.  
In 1979 it was gifted to Heritage New Zealand and is now their headquarters.  It is now a gorgeous house with a lawn and garden in between office buildings.
His legacy was the number of stores - a portion of Leeds St in Wellington is now called Hannah’s laneway - after the factory that had been in Leeds St.  And the no doubt thousands - if not millions - of shoes.
Two of the stores in Hawke’s Bay, run by Robert’s brother William, were destroyed in the 1931 earthquake. 
Robert is buried in the Bolton St Cemetery with his wife who died two years before him.