ALIENS’ CAMERAS

Press, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23094, 9 August 1940, Page 3

ALIENS’ CAMERAS

FORTY-ONE AT POLICE STATION ROAD MAPS ALSO GIVEN UP Forty-one cameras, most of them rare and very valuable, have already been handecTin to the police in Christchurch by aliens. Although elsewhere applications have been made to the police by New Zealanders to buy cameras surrendered by aliens the police in Christchurch are glad to findthat the same idea has not occurred to Christchurch photographers. . Most of the cameras collected m Christchurch are of the very best quality; in some cases the lenses are valued much more highly than the average good camera, and one alien said that in all probability the factory which made the lens of his camera would never operate again. Another man said that he thought his camera was the only one oi its kind in New Zealand. Instead of a roller to wind, it has a trigger to change the film automatically. Realising that the cameras are far too valuable to risk losing, the police are going to secure their safe deposit, but arrangements have not been made for this yet. All the cameras can be reclaimed at the end of the war and probably all of them will be. Road maps issued by, petrol companies have also been handed in by aliens because there is a regulation forbidding them to possess maps “drawn on a scale larger than four miles to the inch” (a definition the interpretation of which has troubled the police; it is presumably intended to refer to large maps of small areas). Among other possessions forbidden to aliens are explosives, motor-cars, boats, aeroplanes. nautical charts, and documents of military value. The regulation provides for permits and these have been issued In the case of tnotor-cars. A permit is also required before any alien can possess more than three gallons of inflammable liquid, including petrol. __________________