Kokonga is a pastoral district seventy-four miles north-west from Dunedin, on the Otago Central railway. The Taieri river winds through the district; hence the name “Ko-ko-nga”—the Maori for “Bending River.” Some small patches of arable land have been brought under cultivation, with good results, and there are two small runs, the property of Mr. Glendining and Mr. Logan respectively. Kokonga has a school, post office, store and hotel. Good shooting is obtainable at the Taieri Lake, about half way between Kokonga and Waipiata.

Mr. James Gillies was born at Barrhead, Renfrewshire, Scotland, in 1856. He was educated at Rothesay and was brought up to the soft goods trade in the wholesale warehouse of Mr. J. R. Harrington, Hanover Street, Glasgow, in whose employment he continued for fourteen years. Mr. Gillies arrived in the Colony, via Melbourne, in 1889, and became manager for Mr. Robert Neill, of Middlemarch. Subsequently he entered the employment of Mr. Alfred Arthur, and at the opening of that gentleman's branch business in Kokonga, in 1895, he was appointed to the managership. Mr. Gillies was married, in 1892, to a daughter of Mr. William Brown, and has four daughters.