An important collection of early Maori and European artefacts collected by Katikati pioneer Sam Middlebrook is going on public display for the first time at the Katikati Heritage Museum.

Sam Middlebrook on board the boat he lived in at Katikati, late in his life.

Prominent in the collection are the Maori artefacts Sam acquired in the late 1800s, mostly as payment for translating documents in cases before the Maori Land Court. The collection has been gifted to the Katikati Heritage Museum by the Middlebrook descendants.

Museum manager Paula Gaelic says the museum is honoured to show off the collection, which belonged to a man who played an important role in Katikati's development.

About 200 artefacts, including those made of stone, wood, flax, whalebone and moa bone, tools, jewellery, fishing equipment and kete are being shown. The exhibition opens 11am on March 30, with a performance by the Katikati College kapa haka group.

When Katikati's Ulster Irish founder George Vesey Stewart came to Tauranga in 1874 to look for land, the Survey Office assigned young Sam Middlebrook to assist him.

It was Sam who guided him through the trackless swamps and hills to the Katikati block and three months later George had acquired a 10,000 acre block, which became the only planned Ulster Irish settlement in the world.

Sam was born in Millbridge, Liversedge,Yorkshire. In 1862 he and his family sailed from Liverpool on-board the Shalimar to Melbourne and subsequently New Zealand. Sam's father John purchased land in Whangarei, where Sam spent his youth, becoming fluent in Maori and a keen observer of Maori life. He joined the NZ Survey Department under Captain Archibald Turner, the Tauranga District surveyor, and may have been involved in the survey of the road to Rotorua through the Mangorewa gorge and as far afield as Taupo.

Sam lived in Tauranga for about four years and then joined the second party of Katikati settlers, although he did not participate in the land grant.

Patu paraoa (club made of whale bone), found at Waihi Beach is part of the Middlebrook collection.

Sam Middlebrook in full Orange Order regalia.

British military canteen, manufactured in 1861, used at the Battle of Gate Pa in April of 1864 is part of the Middlebrook collection.