General News

Press, Volume C, Issue 29517, 19 May 1961, Page 10

General News

Similarity Professor T. W. Walker, professor of soil science at Canterbury Agricultural College, finds a strong similarity between a bikini and the mundane statistics and tables of the economist. He told the farmers’ conference at Lincoln yesterday that both were a little revealing and suggestive, but what was concealed was vital. No Morning Tea A junior member of a Wellington suburban building gang on has way to make the morning tea left the electric jug and teapot at the bottom of a flight of steps at the front of a house while he conversed with a resident at the back. On returning, he found that both jug and teapot had disappeared—the rubbish collector had taken them when he took the rubbish tin. Investigation showed that the jug and teapot had been thrown into the tip, and so the junior builder will have to send a full report to the City Council so that compensation can be considered. —(P.A.) Rental Factories When the previous Government announced its intention to develop a scheme to build Government cental factories. the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federation asked for further details. The federation has now been informed by the Department of Industries and Commerce that the present Government has received the original proposals but has decided not to proceed with the scheme. Cache Of Amulets A cache of amulets is the latest find in the Moa-bone Point cave at Redcliffs. They were found by Miss Kathleen Fletcher, an adult member of the Canterbury Museum Archaeological Society, which continues to have an average of eight adults and 10 juniors digging on" alternate Saturdays. Russian Students A delegation of three university students from the Soviet Union will visit New Zealand for three weeks in July. It is expected that they will visit most universities in this country. An invitation has also been sent for a delegation from the AllChina Students’ Federation to visit the Dominion soon. Full Strength “With the appointment of ;two linesmen during the last month, we are at full strength in our electricity department for the first time in my association with this council,” said the Heathcote County Council’s chairman (Mr R. A Young! at the council’s meeting last night. Road Tunnel Moas Excavations for the approaches to the Christ-church-Lyttelton road tunnel have already yielded moa bones in small numbers. Thev; were found embedded in I Pleistocene loess and sent by the Ministry of Works and; the contractors to the Can- 1 terbury Museum. The bones i have been tentatively identi-1 fied by Mr R. J. Scarlett asi belonging to the medium-size . moa, euryapteryx. Pharmacology Course More than 80 Christchurch pharmacists have been “back to school” this week in the Municipal Electricity Department’s demonstration hall, where a refresher course on pharmacology is being given by Dr. G. S. Cox, principal of the New Zealand School of Pharmacy in Petone. This is the first such course to be held in Christchurch, and has been arranged by the Canterbury branch of the New Zealand Pharmaceutical Society. The course, which will end tomorrow morning, comprises lectures by Dr. Cox and films on pharmacological topics. Mercy Flight The Royal New Zealand Air Force made a mercy flight yesterday to take a desperately ill woman, a doctor’s wife, from the Tokelau Islands to a hospital near the air base in Apia. The Sunderland arrived at the Tokelau Islands at 6.30 a.m. to embark the patient, and reached Apia at 9 a.m.~ (P.A.) “Care For All Ills” "If we seek a cure for all ills, what about putting tranquillisers in the public water supply. I don't think the science fiction writers . have thought of that one, but i wouldn’t it be a good idea . just before elections.”—Profesor H. Field, at a meeting of the Christchurch branch i of the National Council of , Women last evening. Not So Far Behind I Less scientific information I has come from the Russians : as a result of their work with ■ satellites than has come from ; the Americans. “My feeling is that this is because the > Russians haven’t got it to i give,” the dihector oftheCar- > ter Observatory (Mr I. L. . Thomsen) told the Wellington branch of the Royal Aero- • nautical Society last evening. ' He said the Russians appeared to be putting satellites 1 into space for the sake of it, ! whereas the Americans made each satellite they put up do a definite job. “They may not really be so far behind the Russians as they think they are,” he said.—<P.A.) No Further Action A stop-work meeting of carpenters employed by Cubitt Wells in Wellington decided to take no further action in their claim for 8s 6d an hour, the secretary of the Carpenters’ Union (Mr W F Molineux, said. The men bad decided “on the job” the previous day to make the demand for payment, which was rejected by the Master Builders’ Federation, hi said.—(PA.)