Story: West Coast region

Shantytown

Shantytown

The tourist attraction Shantytown, a reconstruction of a gold-mining town, was built as a community effort in 1969–70. Different organisations built separate buildings. The Greymouth Jaycees took great pride in building the Golden Nugget Hotel – initially the only two-storey building in Shantytown. The picture shows the crowd on opening day in January 1971. Since then it has attracted more than 3.5 million visitors.

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Private collection
Photograph by Judith Nathan

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How to cite this page:

Simon Nathan, 'West Coast region - Tourism and outdoor recreation', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/photograph/21157/shantytown (accessed 29 March 2024)

Story by Simon Nathan, updated 1 Sep 2016