RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume C, Issue 29402, 3 January 1961, Page 16

RANDOM REMINDER

LOOKING BACKWARDS

It is appropriate at the start of a new mor.th and a new year to look backwards as well as forwards and there is no dourt that Januarys of the past had their notable occasions. Today, for instance is the 72nd anniversary of the invention of the first paper drinking strav and yesterday it was 82 years , since a Brooklyn mi fanan made history of a sort by delivering milk in glass bottles. On January 5. 1914. the Ford Motor Company raised thei daily minimum wage to five dollars and reduced the ..ours from nine to eight, .Busing the “Wall Street Journal” to comment “This applies Biblical and spiritual principles they do not belong.” -On January 10, it will be'l2l years since penny postage began and 11? years slice

Bishop Selwyn conducted the first Church of England service in Canterbury (at Taumutu). A sensation was caused on January 12, 1910, by Baroness Rosen, wife of. the Russian Ambassador to the United States, when, at a White House dinner she asked President Taft for a cigar. He had none, but borrowed or probably commandeered, one from a musician “and”, says a contemporary account, “lit it for the lady, astounding the assembly.” On January 13, 1869, the foundation sttae of the Christchurch Supreme Court (the present one, not the promised one) was laid and on January 16, 1887, horse trams began a service from Cathedral Square to New Brighton in spite of the attentions

of a certain Mrs Knight, who, disagreeing with the contractors about the compensation paid for the use of her land, often sat on the rails. The Bowker fountain began playing in Victoria Square on January 24, 1931, and Robert Burns (“I winna blaw about mysel’, As ill I likes my faults to tell”) was born on January 25, 1759. Mendelssohn’s Wedding March was played for the first time at the wedding of Queen Victoria’s daughter, the Princess Royal, to the Crown Prince of Prussia on January 26, 1858. On January 28, 1878, the first commercial telephone switchboard was put into action in New Haven, Connecticut. Users receiving calls at first answered with the word “Ahoy”. We have made some progress since then.