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Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21404, 21 February 1935, Page 6

A letter received yesterday by the Otago Education Board revealed that some remarkably high temperatures had recently been recorded in Central Otago. The headmaster of the Hawea Flat School, near Lake Hawea, wrote stating that parents in his district had greatly appreciated the action of the board in permitting the schools to be closed at noon. He reported that since the opening day of this year, the noonday temperature of the schoolroom had been only once lower than 84 degrees. On one day, at 3 p.m., it had been as high as 104 degrees Fahrenheit. The maximum temperature in the sun had reached 140 degrees at 2.30 p.m. on February 6, and on February 14 at 5 p.m. the temperature had been 90 degrees in the shade. The chairman of the board (Mr James Wallace) said that on the previous night, after the board had concluded its business, he had instructed \be secretary to inform headmasters that they were quite at liberty to let- the children go away an hour earlier in the afternoon if they thought fit. Tuesday, he said, had been a very hot day. The board approved the 'chairman's, action.—"The Press" Special Ser-