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Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21811, 17 June 1936, Page 10

Business generally is on the up-grade in Wanganui. “There are few vacant shops in the city,” said a retailer, “and during the last three months quite a number of new businesses have been opened up. The indications are that Wanganui will soon be back to its former position as a business centre. Wanganui was one of the first centres in New Zealand to be hit by the depression, and I am confident that it will be one of the first to recover fully. Wanganui people are apt to condemn their own city when they visit other centres, when they should be proud of it. There is nothing wrong with Wanganui, and I am sure that it has a great future ahead of it if the people only co-operate in any move for its advancement.”

The successful migration of 30,000 children to Australia and Canada from Dr. Barnardo’s Homes was described by Mr W. W. Hide-Smith, who arrived in Auckland on a holiday visit to the Dominion. Mr Hide-Smith, who has been a member of the controlling council for 36 years, said that since the homes were founded 66 years ago 114,000 children had been admitted to them. Of the 30,000 that had gone overseas, less than 2 per cent, had failed to become useful citizens. In Australia the organisation conducted a farm school at Picton, New South Wales, for boys, and a school at Ashfield for girls. These activities would be developed considerably, he said, as soon as the migration increased. The organisation would have its hands too full with work in Canada and Australia, he said, to be able to extend its activities to New Zealand at present, as the building of a receiving home would involve heavy initial expense.