Tour without speech

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32838, 11 February 1972, Page 2

Tour without speech

To travel more than 5000 miles behind the Iron Curtain would be a difficult venture for any person with normal hearing and speech, but it is a considerable achievement for a former Christchurch man, Mr D. Honnor, who has been totally deaf since birth.

Mr Honnor was a pupil of the School for the Deaf at Sumner between 1951 and 1959. With an English deaf and dumb friend he recently completed a motor-cycle tour of France, Germainy and Austria before clocking up 5384 miles touring through Jugoslavia, Hungary, Albania, Rumania and Bulgaria. Mr Honnor’s mother, Mrs G. Austin, of Christchurch, said yesterday that the two young men’s passports showed thev were deaf and dumb, this was only of partial assistance when it came to dealing with others in sign language. “I really think it says a lot for them both that they were able to take on this trip without having a lot of assistance from others. It certainly is an example which the School for Deaf should be proud of,” said Mrs Austin.

School funds. Special S»nts amounting to $380,000 ve been approved to meet the additional costs of maintenance of school buildings incurred by education boards. The Minister of Education (Mr Pickering) said: “These grants will eliminate the cash deficits boards have accumulated in meeting their essential maintenance needs during the 1971 school year.”— (P-A.)