Southland’s Prohibition Story, with Artefacts and Attitude
The Old Hokonui Museum and Distillery sits in central Gore and turns a local legend into a hands-on history lesson. You walk through a beautifully told story shaped by temperance campaigning, Scottish migrants distilling mooshine, and the illicit trade known as sly grogging, then finish at the Visitor Centre, where the modern legal version of “Old Hokonui” can be tasted and purchased legally.
Temperance votes, “no-licence”, and sly grogging
The museum’s story section describes how local prohibition was passed in the Mataura electorate in 1902, closing 15 licensed hotels and triggering a 51-year “drought”. That local political backdrop is what makes this museum unusually good. It is not just about secret stills; it is about how communities voted, enforced, and argued over alcohol for decades, then lived with the consequences.
There is also a modern echo of this theme in a couple of places in New Zealand: Invercargill and Waitākere in Auckland, where local alcohol licensing trusts still shape how alcohol is sold, even though there are no longer liquor bans.
What you’ll see inside
This museum leans hard into detail. Large interpretive panels cover the social forces behind prohibition, with voices on both sides of the liquor debate. Scottish influence in the region was a notable feature, with the McRaes and others bringing their whiskey recipes and long resistance to taxation on their products to Gore and the Hokonui. Rebels, waiting for a cause. On the other hand were the more pious Scots who detested the demon drink.
The exhibits are not just text and photo-based: you will see life-size dioramas of period scenes, a clever recreation of a small church, a list of police prosecutions and some wonderful artefacts from the moonshine period.
Early in the exhibition, a large, colourful wall artwork that explores European perceptions of New Zealand in the 1830s, featuring boozy mermaids, sea monsters and other crazy ideas about the hellhole of the South Seas. The right tone for a museum that is serious about history without being overly solemn.
Why Moonshine Belonged to the Hokonui Hills
The landscape around Gore helped the legend along. The Hokonui Hills are close to town and are widely associated with moonshine folklore. The logic is simple: good water, difficult, forested terrain, and tucked-away gullies made it easier to hide a still and harder for police to reach it quickly, which is why names like Whiskey Creek are pertinent to the story.
Tours, tastings, and taking a bottle home
Tours are booked through the Gore Visitor Centre, which also serves as the museum's front-of-house. At the end of the experience, you can sample the product and, if you like it, purchase a bottle on-site. The museum operates its own off-licence and sells whiskey made to the original McRaes recipe, distilled on-site in a purpose-built still. The recipe is also on display in the museum, handwritten in a 1895 letter. The product branding echoes the illicit era, including the skull-and-crossbones moonshine label, which reappears on the modern products.
How to Get There
Gore is on State Highway 1, a 115-minute drive and 150 km from Dunedin, and a 50-minute drive and 64 km from Invercargill. The Old Hokonui Museum and Distillery is accessed via the Gore Visitor Centre at 16 Hokonui Drive, near the corner of Hokonui Drive and Norfolk Street, with the entrance on Norfolk Street (also the corner of State Highway 1 and State Highway 90).
Over the road is the superb Eastern Southland Gallery, while beautiful Bannerman Park is a short drive away. In the Hokonui Hills, you can visit Dolamore Park and walk the Whiskey Creek Track.
