FIRST BOTTLE STORE

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27874, 24 January 1956, Page 14

FIRST BOTTLE STORE

TRUST BEGINS AT LAWRENCE “The Press” Special Service DUNEDIN, January 23. For the first time in 48 years the people of Lawrende last week were able to buy alcoholic liquor in their town. It was obtainable from a licensing trust bottle store, the first to be opened since restoration was carried in the Clutha Licensing District in November of last year. About 80 persons gathered in the hot sunshine outside a former Lawrence bakery to hear Mr R, G. Cullen, chairman of the Clutha Licensing Trust, officially declare the bottle store epen. He told the gathering that the store was only a temporary measure. “The trust must walk before it can run, and it needs revenue,’’ he said. But he hoped that soon he would be back to open at least a three-star hotel. Mr Cullen said it would take at least £30,000 to build a three-star hotel with good drinking facilities and a small number of good-quality bedrooms. He said the trust would open its second bottle store, at Balclutha. in about a fortnight. The premises in which the bottle store was established were ■'used for many years as a bakery. More recently the shop was used bv a jeweller. A start was made recently with the renovating of the vacant building. The Lawrence Businessmen’s Assoelation on Monday scrubbed the shoo out.