During the 1930s the Hawke's Bay region of New Zealand experienced four large earthquakes, Napier (MW 7.6) and Hawke Bay (MW 7.3) in 1931, Wairoa (MW 6.9) in 1932, and Pahiatua (MW 7.4) in 1934. We address the question of whether these comprise a triggered sequence of events. There are significant difficulties in dealing with earthquakes that were recorded 70 years ago as fault parameters are difficult to obtain. With the exception of the Pahiatua earthquake, no primary surface fault ruptures were identified, and locations for the other three events may be in error by tens of kilometers. However, geodetic data were collected before and after the Napier and Wairoa earthquakes, and regions of uplift and subsidence from the former have been mapped from low-order leveling data. This information helps to constrain the fault parameters for the first of these events through elastostatic modeling. Results from recent teleseismic body wave modeling have been used to determine fault parameters for the Hawke Bay event. Our analysis of the induced static stresses with the Coulomb failure criterion shows that the Napier earthquake triggered both the Hawke Bay and Wairoa earthquakes but that the Hawke Bay earthquake probably delayed the Wairoa earthquake. We also conclude that these three events did not trigger the Pahiatua earthquake. ¿ 2001 American Geophysical Union