Alpheus Hayes, born in the year 1902. As well as farming, he was a keen mountaineer and among the first 100 people to ascend New Zealand's highest mountain, Mt Cook. At an early age he also learnt to fly and was among the first farmers to use airplanes to spread fertilizer onto his Hakataramea Valley farm. With a local group of Christian friends, they initiated a public health scheme for workers and management at a large local construction site. This worked so well that some of his friends entered parliament where they legislated NZ and the world’s first public health scheme available for all.
Alpheus found what he had been looking for when he saw an MRA play, The Forgotten Factor in Dunedin in 1950. Through a visit by a Canadian farmer Billy Wake, his marriage was remade, and their lives turned around. Within a year both he and Anna were visiting friends in America and traveling with the play, Jotham Valley. In 1956 he and Anna plus Major Kahi Harawira represented NZ whilst travelling with the musical play The Vanishing Island through Asia.
After farming for many years Alpheus became blind with glaucoma. In 1972 with his son Garfield and Helen home he was offered the chance of a cataract operation with only a 50% chance of success. He took it! The result was a miracle, He had regained nearly 90% of his vision so he quickly had the second one done with the same result. John Newton's words “Once I was blind now, I see,” meant so much to him. Alpheus was wholeheartedly involved in the work of Moral Rearmament.
