General News

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25160, 16 April 1947, Page 6

General News

Pickpockets at Races Pickpockets on the Ellerslie racecourse took £4OO from unwary persons in the first two days of the Easter racing carnival, according to information revealed yesterday. This is the first time in 10 years that pickpockets have operated so successfully at Ellerslie. Wallets from hip pockets were the “dippers’ ” greatest source of revenue. The police view is that pickpockets were “slick operators” from overseas. One man lost £220 and others from £l6 to £6O. One wallet was taken from an inside coat pocket. —(P.A.) ' Boulder of Rare Stone

A boulder of a rare stone, conjectured to have been carried from the mountains round Lake Brunner by the pleistocene age glaciers, has been presented to the Canterbury Museum by Mr C. Evenden, of Kumara, where it was found in a sluicing claim. Rough grey in its natural state, the stone has, when polished, a Wedgwood blue colour, speckled rather like granite. Its scientific name is sodalite syenite. According to Dr. B. H. Mason, honorary mineralogist to the museum, boulders of the stone are occasionally found in the Kumara district, but the outcrop from which they come has not been located. If an accessible deposit were found, it would undoubtedly “rank highly and have a wide field of uses as ornamental stone.” The museum has had one side of the boulder polished, giving a blue surface about two feet long, and it will be on display in a few days. Auckland Doctors Resign

The senior assistant pathologist at Auckland Hospital, Dr. Lindsay F. Brown, has tendered his resignation. Fifteen days ago, the hospital’s director of pathology, Dr. Walter Gilmour, handed in his resignation. These matters have been considered by the Hospital Board’s finance committee, which met yesterday before submitting a final report to the board.—(P.A.)

Adjoining Premises Broken Into Thieves who broke and entered four adjoining premises in Victoria stregt over the week-end gained little for their trouble. The premises entered were those of Tibbs Bros., the Caxton Press, H. Flavel and Son, and A. E. Marriott and Company, and no serious losses are reported. The police are investigating. Corinthic’s Maiden Voyage The largest of the post-war oassenger ships yet built for the trade between Britain and Australia and New Zealand, the 15,000-ton Shaw Savill and Albion liner Corinthic, left Liverpool on Saturday for New Zealand, via South Africa and Australia, on , her maiden voyage. She is expected here early in June. Commanded by Captain D. Aitchison, the Corinthic is carrying 80 passengers.— (P.A.) British Food Relief More than £llOO was received at the Auckland Town Hall yesterday for the British flood relief fund, which was opened recently by the Mayor (Mr J. A. C. Allum). The total up to last night, including £2OOO which the Auckland Electric Power Board decided on Monday to give, was £9679 10s 6d.—(P.A.) Demand for Camp Cookers Because of the power shortage in the North Island, and restrictions on the use of electric stoves, a Christchurch manufacturer has received orders from merchants for thousands of methylated spirit cookers. These cookers, which were formerly made for use by campers-, and in caravans or seaside homes, are now being shipped to the North Island at the rate of 1000 a month. So great has been the demand that the firm has been unable to make enough fuel containers for the cookers, and therefore has issued an appeal to school children for empty brass, metal, or car polish tins, which can be adapted for the purpose.

Aircraft Damaged A Lodestar aircraft at the Milson aerodrome (Palmerston North) was picked up from its moorings by the gale on Monday night and deposited in a ditch at the edge of the field. It was considerably damaged. The aircraft was awaiting the installation of engines, and consequently had a buoyancy which made it an easy prey for the wind. Other aircraft on the tarmac rode out the gale.—(P.A.) Warship Due on Saturday H.M.N.Z.S. Bellona^now on her way from Australia to New Zealand, and expected to berth at Lyttelton on Saturday morning, is reported to be carrying as passengers a number of New Zealand soldiers. Inquiries made by “The Press” last evening failed to gain any information as to the identity of troops on board. The Southern Military District has no knowledge of them, and no more has the Adjutant-General of the New Zealand Military Forces, Brigadier K. L. Stewart. The Minister of Defence, the Hon. F. Jones, told “The Press” last night that he thought the soldiers would be men from Japan coming home on special or other leave. It might have happened, he suggested, that they had flown to Australia, and been put aboard the Bellona there. The Minister emphatically discounted any suggestion that the presence of troops on board the waYship could in any way be connected with the recent strike among ratings in the Royal New Zealand Navy. H.M.N.Z.S. Bellona has recently been engaged in manoeuvres with ships of the Royal Australian Navy. Somerfield Bus Service A complaint about the Somerfield bus service has been made by the Hillmorten branch of the Labour Party, which has carried the following resolution: “That the Hillmorten branch of the Labour Party views with alarm the continued disregard of the people’s right to an adequate bus service on the Somerfield route and, in view of the fact that as many as 15 passengers are left behind when the bus is carrying 10 overload, demands that the Tramway Board discontinue the unprofitable and absurd Creyke road service and that this bus be transferred to Somerfield immediately to prevent undue hardship to the residents of the area.” National Savings Last week, out of the 335 areas in the Dominion for which national savings quotas have been alloted, 311 were successful in obtaining the prescribed weekly amounts, this being the same number as in the preceding week. All the principal centres were successful, and in each of the 20 postal districts the full district quota was obtained. At most places the investments were well in excess of the stipulated amounts. The re-investment of “bomber bonds” has contributed considerably to this end. At four places the phenomenal achievement of having the investments exceed the full year’s quota has already been recorded. The successful areas are Ohai (Southland). Waikanae (Wellington), Ohura (Hamilton), and Kimbolton (Palmerston North). At Ohai and at Waikanae the accomplishment was recorded early on the first day of the new financial year.—(P.S.S.)

Anniversary of Gas Lighting Gas lighting was turned on in Auckland for the first time 82 years ago yesterday. The occasion was greeted with much excitement and jubilation, but as the citizens airily tossed their unwanted kerosene and oil lamps into attics and junk-rooms they little realised that such “oil abominations,” as they were described in a newspaper article of the day, would come into importance again in a lighting crisis in the city close on a century later.