Davey Gunn

A farmer and bushman, he ran his almost wild cattle in the glacier-cut Hollyford Valley in Fiordland, South Westland, New Zealand.

He increased his Hollyford landholding in 1929, just before the onset of the Great Depression, by acquiring four leases totalling more than 25,000 acres.

Gunn came to public attention on 30 December 1936 with a speedy journey to assist the injured passengers of a de Havilland Fox Moth cabin plane he had seen crash into the sea at Big Bay.

[4] He covered the 90 km (56 mi), four-day journey in just 21 hours, a feat which earned him a King George VI Coronation Medal the following year.

On Christmas Day 1955, Gunn was fording the Hollyford River on horseback near Hidden Falls, with a 12-year-old boy mounted behind him.