CHAPTER 10

THE PASSING OF TAIERI GEORGE

With Emerson’s brewery evolving into a new stage — moving to bigger premises, winning awards, gleaning national attention — George Emerson decided to take early retirement from the university’s biochemistry department in 1999.

He wanted to spend more time at the brewery with his son, taking a stronger hand in guiding the business to further growth and success. Besides which, as Ingrid observed, he’d seen the writing on the wall at the university. The emphasis on research rather than lecturing didn’t suit George, who loved to teach. Not quite at retirement age, he threw in his lot when the university looked to cull staff by offering early retirement.

But just as George decided to take his life in a new direction, his health wavered. He lost his balance and complained of headaches. When Richard first contacted Helen, who was living in London, with the news George was unwell, she took it at face value. ‘I got this funny email from Richard saying, “Dad’s got a bump on his head.”’

SELF-PITY WAS NOT PERMITTED, WALLOWING WAS NOT PERMITTED IN OUR HOUSE — STOICISM WAS THE ORDER OF THE DAY; YOU BUCKLED DOWN AND GOT ON WITH IT. YOU DIDN’T SHOW EMOTION OR CRY.

While she wondered why Richard had emailed her in the middle of the night in New Zealand about a seemingly innocuous accident — she assumed her father had lost his balance, fallen and hit his head — she didn’t place any urgency on the information. That evening, she phoned home to speak to her mother, only then discovering her father had not bumped his head but had collapsed. An ambulance rushed him to hospital and he’d undergone an operation on a cancerous brain tumour. ‘When I asked Richard later on why he’d been so vague, he said he didn’t want to alarm me until he knew what was going on.’

The surgeon removed George’s ‘ping-pong ball’ of tumour, but couldn’t get all of the cancer. He gave George 18 months to live. Helen returned home to Dunedin every six months or so, and on these visits she saw a new side to her father. ‘The doctors gave him a year to 18 months and, because he was George Emerson, he was bloody well getting the full 18 months’ worth.

‘There was anger and frustration for Dad — he was not long retired and he was asking: “Why me? Why now?” It was a side I’d never seen before — the anger and the frustration — but he refused to let anyone else have pity or sympathy for him. He didn’t want anyone to wallow. Self-pity was not permitted, wallowing was not permitted in our house — stoicism was the order of the day; you buckled down and got on with it. You didn’t show emotion or cry.

‘Throughout our lives, Dad had not been demonstrative or affectionate, but he was actually quite an emotional person — it’s just that we never properly saw that until he was ill. Richard is also emotional, a heart-on-the-sleeve person. In that regard, Dad and Richard were peas in a pod — so similar — which is why they clashed. Richard seemed to suffer the most as George deteriorated. Ingrid remained her pragmatic self in response to Dad’s illness.’

On one of Helen’s trips home to Dunedin, the family went together to Central Otago — they checked out a lot of the spots George held dear, places where he used to photograph trains on what had since become the Otago Central Rail Trail. He loved Tiger Hill near Omakau, and the emotion was as stark as the landscape as George stood there for the last time.

‘Dad got incredibly sentimental and emotional, and wanted to visit old haunts because he would never see them again — it was very dramatic — and Richard would respond with sentiment and drama, and Mum and I would try to balance it out with pragmatism.

‘We took a trip into Central and went over Ophir Bridge — one of those iconic, Central Otago postcard bridges — and then we went to Tiger Hill. Dad broke down and started crying. He said, “I’m never going to see this again,” and that just set Richard off. Richard broke down and started crying. We all started crying.’

In that moment, the family realised the enormity of the situation. Ingrid, Richard and Helen knew their patriarch, husband, father, friend would soon be gone … and George knew he had to leave behind everything he loved. That moment brought together everything important in George’s life: his family, trains, Central Otago, everything he’d done for the Otago Excursion Train Trust, the Taieri Gorge, Richard’s brewery — and the knowledge all would outlast him. Like the steam trains he loved, George Emerson’s time had come.

George Emerson, seen here on Tiger Hill, loved photographing trains in Central Otago.

Tiger Hill was one of George’s favourite spots. It was a formidable grade on the Otago Central Railway for trains travelling from Alexandra towards Omakau. It is one of the steepest climbs on the line with added twists that increased the difficulty of the one in 50 climb. The engine drivers were faced with the task of nurturing their locomotive with a good head of steam as they roared past the Chatto Creek pub, crossing State Highway 85 for a mile of straight running then hitting the one in 50 grade into the first right-hand leg of the S-shaped climb across the hill. The locomotives would slow down with massive huffs and puffs, the smoke stacks barking.

The train would cross State Highway 85 a second time then swing into another hard left-hand curve before disappearing out of sight from the road. As you drive up the road from Chatto Creek, you would see the train again on the right. The engine would struggle, wheels slipping on the greasy rails as it made its way over the final ascent to the peak of the hill where State Highway 85 crosses the railway for the third time on an overbridge and then the locomotive could relax as the train coasted down the grade to Omakau.

Dad loved watching those steam trains from strategic spots on Tiger Hill, where you could see their progress for miles, as far as the Chatto Creek pub. The smoke from the steam locomotive would signal the presence of the train approaching. He would check the light conditions with his exposure meter to prepare his camera with the correct shutter-speed and aperture combinations as the steam engine puffed up the hill.

It was fun watching the drama of the train puffing across the landscape. The formidable grade was not the only feature Dad was fascinated with, it was the beauty of the landscape with the railway cutting a large S shape into the side of the hill, the beautiful, massive Dunstan mountain range in the background.

Depending on the time of the day, the lighting conditions would transform rolling Tiger Hill into a surreal scene not too dissimilar to a Rita Angus painting. The gullies blacked out, sunshine on the ridges, shadow-play at its best. George would frequently travel back to Tiger Hill to try to capture the ‘perfect shot’. I have plenty of photographs in the collection to attest to that!

Bill Cowan’s book Rails to Cromwell has a tribute chapter to my father that explains his photography. ‘The late George Emerson had a theory about railway photography. He contended that the average railway photographer never strayed more than a few metres from his car to take a photo. George believed that this self-imposed restraint, a laziness perhaps, call it what you will, severely limited the range of photo opportunities available. He was never bound by this restriction; he got out and about.’ That quote pretty much sums it up, we had so much fun photographing the trains together before the line was closed in 1990.

George and I would travel in the well-worn Triumph 2000 over the farm track to get into the ridges of the Poolburn Gorge then hike over the farm country until we got the wonderful vista view of the railway on the other side of the gorge. Then it was a game of patience, waiting for the train to arrive. Our worst-case scenario was that the train had already gone through the gorge and we’d be waiting in vain, but this never happened as George always allowed enough time to be ahead of the train. We’d be there, waiting … waiting, listening for a faint rumble of the diesel climbing up the grade.

First there was that sound! Then a headlight … we’d jump up, check the camera exposure and regain our composure ready to take that perfect photo. Click, click and then we’d watch the train snaking around the curves in the gorge before disappearing into the tunnel. That was our photo for the day, as to try and catch up with the train would be futile as we would have to run across the country, jump into the car, drive over the rough road. There was no point.

The memories of the great times we had there are still emotional for me. Dad loved spring in Central Otago, the blossoms, the green landscape, the shadow-play on the hills, a whisper of snow on the ranges — it’s magical country.

In March 2002, just as he turned 67, George deteriorated further and was placed into hospice care. He remained stoic — urging Richard to keep working at the brewery, to not let up because of his illness. When he spoke to Helen in London on her thirtieth birthday, he told her not to rush home for his sake: ‘He said, “In your circumstances I wouldn’t be coming back to New Zealand to see your dying father either.” I could hear Mum across the room saying, “It’s just the drugs talking.”

‘But that was Dad. He’d been in similar circumstances when we were in Edinburgh in 1983. At the time both his parents were quite ill, but he stayed the full duration of his sabbatical. His mother died within days of him getting home and his father just weeks later. We were told his mother had hung on for him to get home. As soon as he got back to New Zealand she went downhill and died very quickly, but he didn’t cut short his trip for her.

‘Dad’s attitude to Richard and the brewery was “Get on with it”. Dad’s view was that you’re not going to throw this away because of me. Richard would have seen the sense of it but nevertheless found it difficult.’

Richard also contacted Helen around the time of her birthday and told her, ‘Dad hasn’t got long, you should come home.’ He also talked his father’s doctor into ramping up George’s medication to keep him alive and coherent until Helen could get home.

‘I flew out at short notice,’ Helen said. ‘And he was so jacked up on steroids, we had three pretty good weeks in the hospice. We were all there every day. Towards the end, George realised it was borrowed time and asked the doctors to reduce his medication. At one point he said, “This can’t go on forever, Helen has to go back to London.” And he asked the doctor to stop the steroids.

‘While he was working hard, Richard would also be there every day. One night, Richard arranged for a slideshow on the wall of the hospice room — slideshows were part of our family life growing up, it’s what you did when you didn’t have a TV! And I remember Richard and I feeding Dad teaspoons of beer and whisky.’

Barely conscious, George didn’t react when Richard came into his father’s room and asked to borrow George’s camera gear. He’d decided to take a trainspotting trip up the coast with George’s camera as a way to honour him. George couldn’t respond, but Ingrid told Richard to go, to take the camera, it belonged to him now.

‘It was absolutely the right thing to do, but it meant he wasn’t there when Dad died,’ Helen said. ‘Mum and I both thought it was appropriate he was out doing what Dad would have wanted to do on a gorgeous autumn day — using Dad’s equipment to photograph trains.’

‘DAD’S ATTITUDE TO RICHARD AND THE BREWERY WAS “GET ON WITH IT”. DAD’S VIEW WAS THAT YOU’RE NOT GOING TO THROW THIS AWAY BECAUSE OF ME. RICHARD WOULD HAVE SEEN THE SENSE OF IT BUT NEVERTHELESS FOUND IT DIFFICULT.’

In fact, no one from the Emerson family was in the room when George passed away. A cleaner had come in, so Ingrid went into the small kitchen to make a cup of tea and Helen stepped through the sliding doors into the garden. ‘Suddenly I realised I couldn’t hear him breathing — he had this rattling breath at the end. He was gone.’

George Emerson died on 24 March 2002.

Ingrid, Helen and Marian all tried to contact Richard. He had a mobile phone, but had either turned it off or the battery had died. ‘There was no way of contacting him,’ Helen said. ‘We just waited for him to come back.’

Richard returned to a room with the curtains drawn and the doors locked and the news that while he’d been away, his father had died.

I had been visiting George on a daily basis, finishing work and driving up to the hospice. The experience was quite stressful. George always kept telling me, ‘Don’t lose focus on the brewery. Keep it going.’

On one hand, I had to keep work going and, on the other hand, I wanted to take time off to be with Dad. It was all very frustrating and it didn’t take much for me to snap when someone asked me a silly question. George was then struggling, he had faded in and out. At one stage, we thought we had lost him. In fact, he had kind of slipped into a self-induced coma and came out of it after a day or two.

At the hour George Emerson passed away Richard was living out his father’s passion — he was in Oamaru taking photographs of trains with George’s camera.

Richard and Helen share a beer.

That particular day, I knew the mainline steam locomotive Ab663 was going to be steaming back north to the Christchurch depot having completed several excursions while temporarily based in Dunedin. So, I decided to take the opportunity to take a break, grab George’s camera and chase the steam engine up the coast as far as Oamaru.

Unbelievably, the weather was good and the Ab-class steam locomotive was only towing a tank wagon with its supply of waste oil. I felt like I had my own steam train for the day as there were no other rail fans around chasing the locomotive — it was awesome. Because it was such a small train itself, I had to think how I wanted to take the photo, pretty much what George would have been thinking.

All this thinking helped to cast aside all my problems, the brewery, Dad’s illness and my emotions for the day. It was fantastic to be dashing ahead of the engine looking for the next photo stop, jumping out, preparing the camera and composition … click, click and then running back to the car.

At Oamaru, I took the last photograph of the day: the steam engine with the Oamaru town clock in the background, it was a surreal moment as the time shown on the clock is immortalised in my image. It was only when I got back to the hospice later in the day that I realised Dad had passed away at almost that same moment. It was a bittersweet moment. I was glad Dad’s camera was being used as a kind of finale, doing what he loved — photographing steam trains.

The beers Richard and Helen had fed to George at the hospice included a trial batch Richard had worked on for years, trying to perfect it, but always coming up short. In that way, it resembled George’s attempts to frame the perfect photo at Tiger Hill. Richard knew he had a good beer, but he needed everything to be right — from the flavour, to the name, to the label.

But the beer refused to come fully into focus. It started life as Winter Warmer — a lightly spiced dark ale for the cooler months. It then evolved into 40 Winks — a name that honoured George to a degree because he tended to nod off in his chair after a few drinks.

We used the image of character Ted Bovis from Hi-de-Hi! in a bowler hat and holding the beer on his belly. It was the only time I broke away from the established Emerson’s format — the label was bright yellow and cartoonish. People didn’t like it. They didn’t want an arty-farty label, they wanted a good conservative label. New Zealand craft brewing wasn’t ready for it, compared with now when you look at a supermarket shelf and it’s full of bright, colourful, loud cans.

TAIERI GEORGE

Taieri George is a spiced ale released every year on George Emerson’s birthday – 6 March. With spices such as cinnamon and nutmeg, and added honey, the beer is also perfect for Easter. Richard struggled with a name for the beer as he developed it. At one stage is was called Winter Warmer and then 40 Winks. When George passed away, Richard wanted the beer to honour his father, and the inspiration came from an unlikely source when Tom Jones, an Emerson’s staff member noticed a certificate on the wall of the Emerson residence. It was given to George by the Dunedin City Council for work he’d done on the Taieri Gorge Railway. Except it featured a typo that said: ‘Thank you George Emerson for your work on the Taieri George Railway.’ And so Taieri George came to life, a beer dedicated to George Emerson and the trains he loved so much.

As the name and label went through various iterations, Richard battled with the balance between sweet malt, spice and alcohol. Richard had lifted the alcohol to a heady 6.8 per cent, upped the spice levels of cinnamon and nutmeg, and added honey.

One night at the hospice, Richard gave his father a sip of the latest version through a straw. George, unable to speak, simply raised his hand and gave it the thumbs up. Spot on. The chief taster for Emerson’s Brewery had given it his seal of approval.

When George passed, Richard wanted the new winter ale to honour his father in some way, and his inspiration came from an unlikely source.

At the reception following George’s funeral, ‘Tom, one of our staff members, was reading a framed certificate on the wall given to Dad by the Dunedin City Council for work he’d done on the Taieri Gorge Railway. Tom said he’d spotted a typo and he read aloud: “Thank you George Emerson for your work on the Taieri George Railway.”’

And so Taieri George came to life, a beer dedicated to George Emerson. A beer dedicated to trains and the railway that George Emerson so loved, and brewed by his son in the brewery George had helped create. The label carries a picture of a train and its annual release date: 6 March — George’s birthday. ‘I made it Dad’s birthday rather than the day of his death as I wanted it to mark his life.’