Reporter’s Diary

Press, 15 September 1976, Page 2

Reporter’s Diary

“Smif/tv’s” trim

THE anniversary the other dav of Kingsford Smith’s landing at Wigram 48 years ago took Mr L. J. Scuffell’s mind hack to the occasion. He was working in a hairdressing saloon (as they used to be called) across the road from the United Service Hotel, and well recalls the ripple of excitement when the famous aviator stepped in for a short back and sides. “Strictly speaking.” he admits, “it was not my turn, but Kingsford Smith climbed into mv chair for a haircut. He was a smallish neat man who gave little indication that he had made the first air crossing of the Tasman. He appeared most interested when he learned that I. too, had had no sleep, having listened in to his flight all night on a home-made crystal set. using the clothes line for an aerial.” Kingsford Smith readily answered all of his young barber's questions, and Mr Scuffell confidently claims to be the only man who cut "Smithy’s” hair in New Zealand. He was not so impressed with his co-aviator Charles Ulm. “He was taciturn to a degree.” says Mr Scuffell. “and during the time I shaved him. he did not speak a single word.”

Resourceful

TACITURN he may have been, but while he was in Christchurch Charles Ulm demonstrated that he was a man of action in an emergency. A journalist remembers being with both pioneer fliers in a city hotel when an extremely shapely young woman with a very low-cut dress asked Ulm for his autograph. She had to confess that she had no autograph book, but Ulm was undeterred. He gently hefted one of her generous endowments with one hand and signed his name on it with one of those purple ink indelible pencils which is moistened with the tongue. The observer has often wondered since then how long the autograph remained legible to favoured viewers. Sun seekers THOUSANDS of New Zealanders get so sick of the winter weather that they flee the country, judging by the Government Statistician's migration figures. For the year to July 31, 1976. there was a net migration loss of 4990. But for four months. April to July inclusive, the net migration loss soared to 39.573. Although more people than usual left the country in

that winter period, the -winter exodus is a regular event. For the same four months last year, the loss was 27,824, and in 1974 it was 22,484.

‘Sirop meet' VINTAGE car enthusiasts are hoping to educate the public—and the secondhand dealers—at the weekend when the Vintage Car Club holds its first public “swap meet.” They hope that when people attend the event at McLean’s Island on Saturday and Sunday they will see the sort of ancient bits and pieces members are always hunting for. and perhaps come forward with similar relics from their own attics and garages. Parts are getting harder to find every year, especially for the veteran cars (up to 1918). Mr Graham Pluck, the club captain, is sure that lots of people could help if they knew what members were looking for. The “swap meet” is being combined with a Paddy’s Market where all sorts of old wares will be for sale and exchange. Matriarch A CHRISTCHURCH girl who married on Saturday had to compete with her mother for attention at the wedding As well as being mother of the young

bride, she was also grandmother of the matron-of-honour and great-grand-mother of the flowergirl. Two marriages made it all possible. Dilemma

LILY OF THE VALLEY can get out of hand if unconfined, so a Christchurch housewife decided to move her flourishing patch of it to more restricted quarters next to her herb garden. With the first days of spring, the plants have started to come through again, but they have invaded a bed in which she planted garlic bulbs as an experiment. Now she can hardly sleep worrying whether she will have a crop of garlic-scented lily of the valley or lily-of-the-valley scented garlic. Unkind? A CYNIC might suspect that the alleged attempt to censor Keith Sinclair's new book about Sir Walter Nash is nothing more than a publicity ploy to promote interest in a biography of the most boring Prime Minister this country has ever yawned at. Especially in view of yesterday's disclaimer by the Security Intelligence Service, which said it had approached neither the author nor the publisher. —Garry Arthur