PRESS CURIOSITIES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 96, 24 April 1931, Page 3 (Supplement)

PRESS CURIOSITIES.

* * JOTTINGS FROM U.S.A. PRESS.

(By IRA WOLFERT.) A boy who made good in a 'big city is the 27-year-old Tamiji Sato, of Japan, who has set up in business in Shanghai as a snake, mice and spider-eater. He will also eat other things even lees palatable. Sato learned his trade when she lived as a hermit for eight years on Moon Mountain, in North-east era Japan. Food was scarce and he took what he could get. The man's chief boast is that he has never been ill a day on his life. Another man who made good through unusual digestive abilities is James Ourran, of Hull, England. Arrested for taking bets on the street, Curran chewed and swallowed his record of wagers. As this was the only evidence, he was discharged in Court. When he walked out he remarked, 'Tim glad I was hungry." A duel to .the death with pistols was fought between two women in Dresden recently, and the surrounding scenery suffered most. Augusta Weber, an actress, objected 'to Elizabeth Koldred's criticism of her work in a play. Desiring satisfaction, 6he challenged Elizabeth to a duel and Elizabeth agreed. The two drove 25 miles into the country and each fired a shot at 20 paces. Elizabeth's shot ploughed into a fence some distance off and Augusta's nipped leaves off an innocent tree. The actress thereupon declared her honour satisfied, but Elizabeth, staunch to the last, taunted Augusta with, being as poor a shot a 8 she was an actress. Another duel was narrowly avoided. James Alaska, of Buffalo, was arraigned before Judge Lamson on a charge of being drunk. "It was cold," explained Alaska, "Just because my name sounds that way it' is no sign that I can stand the cold. I was trying to warm up." Alaska called ■upon William. Shakespeare to support his contention .that there is nothing in a name, and Judge Lamson bowed before such eminent testimony. Sentence was suspended. Celebrating their birthdays on the same date, Mrs. James Chamberlain, aged 102, and Mrs. Sarah Parker, 103, both of Weston, England, were taken for their first automobile ride. "Now for an airplane," .they both exclaimed as they climbed out of the machine. One of the world's strangest jobs is that of Charles N. Brier, who spends all his working hours thinking of new names for the streets in Oakland, California. In the last eight years he has named or renamed most of the city's 2000 streets. One turtle that could never win a race, no matter how long the hare slept, h;;s •been found on the William Stahlman ■farm near Mount Vernon, Pennsylvania. It took him more than 80 years to travel five miles. A rabbit can't live that long. On the back of the turtle was found the inscription: "A.D., 1848—M.F.5." The inscription was probably carved by one McOon.nell Shoop, who lived five miles away about that time. Having nothing better to do, Frank Vondrich, a prohibition agent, amused •himself by counting the stars in tiie United States flag hung over the Judge's Bench in a Federal Court in Albany. He was surprised to find only 45, instead of the required 48. The building custodian was summoned post-haste and a Court recess was ordered while a flag with the correct number of stars was substituted, thus averting a national scandal. "Hold 'em, Yale," applies to something else than bucking the gridiron line at New Haven. Yale students working their way through college are holding 'em all right— 'em being babies here. They are playing nursemaid to finance part of their education, and, going to another extreme, they "reach the grave," serving as pallbearers at so much a corpse. Even better, they give up their very life-blood for an education, for many youths submit to transfusion operations, giving life to others to improve their own lives. A chicken that would have to turn upside down to fly properly was exhibited in Fond. Du Lac, Wis., by Charles Broth eiton, Lamartine farmer, who discovered it in a flock of chickens he raised. Ibe peifectly normal wings of the chicken are reversed with the feather side underneath. The chicken is normal in every other respect.—Copyright JST.A.Is.A. and Auckland Star."