LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 58, Issue 305, 6 October 1938, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The talk at the weekly luncheon meeting of the Ashburton Rotary Club to-day was given by Mr L. G. K. Stevens, of Christchurch, whose subject was “Getting Together/’

Appreciation of the advice given by the Curator of the Ashburton Domain (M<r D. H. Leigh) in regard to the gardens and grounds of the Borough School was expressed by members of the School Commitee last evening, when it was agreed to send to Mr Leigh a letter to this effect.

“Cannot something be done to stop the drift of farmers’ sons to public works?” asked Mr H. F. Frederick (Raetihi) at a meeting of the Wanganui provincial executive of the Farmers’ Union. He said that in his district the position with regard to labour on farms was acute and _ sons of farmers were walking off farms to earn £5 a week on the public works.

Street sales of health stamps will be made in Ashburton to-morrow, and it is expected that large numbers wall be disposed of. The extra penny cost of the stamps will go to promoting health camps for children, and as the Ashburton Health Camp Executive this year aims at constructing permanent camp premises at Staveley the appeal should meet a more than usually ready response.

Whilst worms are usually considered the most insignificant of creatures, one recently found in a. garden at Puhipuhi certainly qualified for greater respect, says the “Northern Advocate.” It was a brown worm, as thick through the body as a man’s finger, and measured, exactly two feet from tip to tip. Extracted from the ground with care, the worm has been preserved in spirits, and is to he sent- to a Dominion authority.

Frequent visits by salesmen, and canvassers having caused embarrassment to members of school staffs, the education authorities have decided to stop the visits of such men to schools and notices warning canvassers against calling at schools have been prepared. The Ashburton Borough School Committee last evening decided to have two of these notices posted at the school. ‘

Tests taken last week showed that the temperature of the Ashburton streets is not yet high enough for the placing of the paving material, and the start of the Borough Council’s £IO,OOO scheme will be held up for a week or two. A certain temperature is required before the mixture is placed on the roads. Below that temperature the material will not penetrate the road surface. Once the work is started it will not take long to complete it.

‘ The monthly meeting of the Ashburton Fire Brigade was held last evening, the Superintendent (Mr H. Hefford) presiding. During the summer practices will be held weekly instead of fortnightly. Arrangements were made for testing and grading all the •'fire hose. The steam fire engine will bo tested next Wednesday. A donation of £2 2s and a letter of thanks and congratulations was received from Mr J. Thompson, whose house recently caught fire. The secretary reported that the games funds were in a good position. Fireman Bax reported that the competition team was making good progress.

A souvenir of the New Zealand returned soldiers’ visit to Sydney for the Anzac Day commemoration this year has been found on the wiest coast of the North Island, about 10 miles north of the Kaipara Heads. A bottle picked up on the shore contained three sheets of newspaper from the liner Monowai, dated April 30, and signed by a large number of the men. The bottle was presumably thrown overboard in mid-Tasman, as on April 30 the Mo.nowai was en route from Sydney to Wellington. The finder expressed the opinion that the bottle, which he picked up on September 20, has just come ashore, as it was not buried in the sand.

In fixing the general election for Saturday, October 15, the Government has broken a _ precedent of many year’s standing in favour of Wednes-' day or Thursday. The election day will also-he the earliest on record for 51 years. Parliament was formally dissolved on September 20, *and it is necessary to go back to the year 1887 to find a dissolution date earlier than October. In that year Parliament was dissolved on July 15. Since the 1911 election the earliest polling day has been November 4, in 1925. Saturday has been election day for both Houses of the Australian Federal Parliament on the last seven occasions, and probably many more. In New Zealand, however,‘five of the last seven parliamentary elections have .been held on Wednesday. The remaining two-, in 1914 and, 1922, were on Thursday.

City planning by a private company for the building up of a model suburb was mentioned by Professor W. H. Ilrittain, dean of the School of Agriculture at McGill University, Toronto, Canada, in the Course of an interview with a “Mauawatu Standard,” reporter. At Vancouver, he said, a Wellknown English company had bought land near the city and connected it with the latter by means of a tremendous suspension bridge. The land could not he bought in sections of less than one acre for building, but roads for future streets had been laid out and reticulation for water, sewerage and light provided with the giant bush still standing. A peculiar fact which had impressed him was that, with the aim of adding to the aesthetic air of the new suburb, clothes lines were absolutely forbidden.

Visitors from overseas are, often chided because of their lack of knowledge of New Zealand, but the, following are a list of facts about the Dominion which even a New Zealandei —never noted for an all-round knowledge of his country —might not be expected to know. New Zealand, according to figures supplied to the Tourist Department by the Government statistician, has an average amount of sunshine, of 2107 hours a year (six hours a day), comparable with southern Italy. The death rate is 8.48 in every 1000, the lowest in the world, the infantile mortality of only 32.26 a 1000 also being the world’s lowest figure. The Arthur’s Pass, tunnel of five and ■a-third miles is the longest railway tunnel in the British Empire, and besides being Britain’s best per capita customer, the Dominion last year bought more manufactures from Britain* than did any foreign country except the United States.

A public telephone booth will shortly be installed at Allenton, for authority has been given for its construction, according to advice received yesterday by Mr H. E. Herring from the Postmaster-General (the Hon. F. Jones). Representations for the installation of the telephone were tt made recently by Mr Herring. The booth will most likely be erected at the corner of Cross and Cox streets.

That the extensive campaign for tun use of the name “Northland” for the provincial district north of Auckland is definitely bringing results was proved at a business conference representative of the whole of the Dominion at Auckland a. few days ago. Not once was the province referred to as “North Auckland,” delegates from Wellington and even as far south as Otago and Southland consistently employing the name “Northland.”

At a meeting of the committee m the Eiffelton branch of the Farmers’ Union, it was decided to hold an excursion to the irrigation works at Klondyke next Thursday, and to invite all residents of the district to take pgrt. It was also decided to ask the four schools in the district to give their pupils an opportunity to visit the works, as such a visit had definite educational value.

“I think it is true to say that some people teach singing—and music” said Mrs H. C. Ross in a talk to the Hamilton Music Students’ Association last week. Mrs Ross was referring to the disinclination of some: students with good voices to go in for solid study, so that theijr art would, have the very necessary foundation of sound musical knowledge. “Haven’t we all played for tli|e singers who take terrible liberties with the time and then glare at the accompanist for not recognising their ‘artistic interpretation,’ as they call it,” concluded Mrs Ross, amidst laughter.

Shoe fashions and the condition of the trade overseas were discussed by Mr J. Goldberg, of Sydney, who was a through passenger 'by the Mariposa recently, aftfcr a five months’ tour of England, America and, the Continent. He said women could expect to find something of a change In shoe styles within a short period, in accordance with the trend of fashions in other countries. Thene was nothing new in men’s shoes, however, as _ orthodox styles continued in favour. Mr Goldberg added that the shoe trade in England* had suffered a severe setback through an invasion of imports from Budapest, where the industry was subsidised.

Mr S. H. Mayne, F.SIM.C., F. 1.0. (London), of Messrs J. R. Procter, Ltd. Christchurch, is at present in Ashburton, and may be consulted on all defects of eyesight at the Somerset Hotel to-morrow. — (Advt).