Obituary SIR ALEXANDER ROBERTS

Press, Volume C, Issue 29468, 21 March 1961, Page 16

Obituary SIR ALEXANDER ROBERTS

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, March 19. A former Mayor of Lower Hutt, who took an active part in most branches of the community life, died in Calvary Hospital, Wellington, today. He was Sir Alexander Fowler Roberts. Bom in Dunedin in 1882 he became a knight of the British Empire in 1926. After joining the staff of Murray Roberts and Company. Ltd., in 1903 he became the managing director in 1929. Educated at Merehison Castle school Edinburgh, and Clare College, Cambridge, he was New Zealand commissioner to the British Empire exhibition at Wembley during 1924 and 1925. During the First World War he was staff embarkation officer at Wellington. He was awarded the C.B.E. in 1918.

During the Second World War, Sir Alexander Roberts was the New Zealand representative of the British Ministry of War Transport from 1941 to 1948 and embarkation staff officer from 1940 to 1945.

He was a member of the council of the New Zealand Golf Association for 30 years, including a number as chairman.

He is survives by his wife and three sons.

REV. H. H. O’DELL IHZPJI.-Heuier—Copyright) LONDON, March 17. The Rev. Henry Hames O’Dell aged 72, a former president of the New Zealand Methodist Conference, died suddenly at Hampstead, London, yesterday while on a holiday visit to England. Mr O Dell, who was born m Australia, entered the New Zealand ministry in 1915, and was president of the conference in 1949. Mr O’Dell who had been in England with Mrs O’Dell for only a week, suffered a heart attack.