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There was still a quaint custom in New Zealand of sending a long telegram to mayors advising them of visits of Cabinet ministers, the Mayor of Christchurch (Mr A. R. Guthrey) said at ; the opening of the New Zea- ! land Industries Fair last i evening by the Minister of Industries and Commerce | (Mr Marshall). I “Soon after I became Mayor, I received a 55-word telegram saying that a minister was coming to Christchurch soon,” Mr Guthrey said “I said to the Town Clerk, ‘What do I do—rush out to the airport and wait for him?’ “‘Just file it where we
put all the others—in the waste-paper basket,* was the reply,” Mr Guthrey said. Since then he had received many other telegrams, one of them containing 75 words “and it was no wonder to me after that that the Post Office was ‘making a profit." However, said Mr Guthrey, he had mentioned this to Mr Marshall only a few days ago. “This time,” said Mr Guthrey, “there was no telegram. Instead I got a scrap of paper telling me Mr Marshall would be in town today for two functions, and it eame in an unstamped envelope.”
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Bibliographic details
Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32073, 22 August 1969, Page 12
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198QUICK TO LEARN Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32073, 22 August 1969, Page 12
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