Sir Arthur Sims

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27564, 22 January 1955, Page 6

Sir Arthur Sims

New Zealanders will welcome the news, printed this morning, that the Senate of the University of New Zealand has decided to confer on Sir Arthur Sims the honorary degree of doctor of laws. The University confers such honours very sparingly; and Sir Arthur Sims will be only the twenty-first in a very distinguished list of honorary graduates beginning in 1931 with Lord.. Rutherford of Nelson. Although his worldwide business interests have kept Sir Arthur Sims away from New Zealand for the greater part of his eventful life, he has remained one of the Dominion’s most useful citizens and one of its most generous benefactors. His £30,000 gift of a cobalt

telecurie unit to the Christchurch Hospital last year was the latest of ma3y generous gifts that have greatly helped education, science, and medicine in this

country. His benefactions have permitted New Zealand students to widen their horizons and experience in England; education, medicine, and science in the Dominion have benefited greatly from the exchange of teachers, doctors, and scientists under the numerous scholarships and endowments he has established.

Perhaps Sir Arthur Sims’s greatest contribution to New Zealand life

lies in this widening of its cultural horizons..,. Christchurch-borh and

educated, and an honours graduate of Canterbury University College, Sir Arthur Sims found New Zealand too confining for one' of his great' business ability and enterprising spirit; and he has done much to provide for others the opportunities which he earned for himself. The honour to be conferred upon him by the University is, above all, a recognition that Sir Arthur Sims has helped, perhaps more than anyone else, to break down the cultural isolation of New Zealand.