into partnership with Evan Prosser, a Welsh chemist on the West Coast. The partnership prospered and in 1879 they set up a limited liability company with capital of £200,000. He became a prominent figure in the Dunedin business community, remaining managing director of Kempthorne, Prosser & Company until 1904 when he retired. He gave generous support of St. Paul's Cathedral, Dunedin. He was a member of the board of managers of the Dunedin Technical School (later King Edward Technical College) from 1911 to 1915 and made a donation of £900 towards its new building. On 29 March 1899 in Dunedin he married Annie Charlotte Rawdon Robinson, about 40 years younger than he. They had one daughter and Annie Kempthorne died in 1903 aged 31 years. In 1901 as the first Dunedin citizen to own a car he created a minor sensation when he was driven along Princes Street in his steam-operated two cylinder Locomobile with one of his company's engineers at the tiller. New Zealand, he concluded, was 'a land...in which man indeed is blest.' He became unwell at a board meeting of the National Insurance Company and died of a cerebral haemorrhage in Dunedin on 3 November 1915. Evan Prosser (1830s–1896) Prosser was elected to the County Council in 1873, and represented the ratepayers of South Ward until the 1st of August, 1875. He was a Welshman by birth, and arrived on the West Coast during the gold rush. Subsequently he removed to Dunedin, where, with Mr. Kempthorne, he formed the nucleus of the since-important firm of Kemptorne, Prosser and Co. Mr. Prosser afterwards retired from the firm and went to Sydney. He was the third Mayor of Hokitika, and held office 1868–1869. He was in business in Hokitika as a chemist and druggist, and subsequently became an original partner of the well known firm of Kempthorne, Prosser and Company, Limited. Mr. Prosser was a member of the first County Council of Westland, and subsequently held a seat on the Provincial Council. He eventually removed to Sydney, where he opened a branch of his firm. It is said that he afterwards made a fortune out of Broken Hill mining speculations. Mr Prosser operated the Western Drug Hall in Hokitika but sold it in 1870 when Kempthorne Prosser & Co got underway. Mr Evan Prosser committed suicide at the North Shore, Sydney, on the 20th 1896. The event is thus