Reporter’s Diary

Press, 4 January 1978, Page 2

Reporter’s Diary

Whalers 9 relics

GIL PERANO, the last of the New Zealand whalers, has given an interesting collection of whaling artefacts to the Whalers’ Lodge Hotel at Picton, on “permanent loan.” There are blubber spades, harpoons, sweeps (whalers’ oars), lances, and the brass binnacle from the Orca, the Peranos’ last 150-ton mother ship. These will add an authentic touch to the “Harpoon Harry” and “Moby Dick” bars of the hotel. One bar takes the form of half a whaleboat. An 82kg harpoon will be mounted in concrete outside the hotel. Just to make sure it is not souvenired, it will be held down with steel chain. The Peranos, whose whaling station was at Whekanur, in Tory Channel, will be the subject of a new book by the Christchurch writer, Don Grady, who is in the process of interviewing the last 80 whalers. Whaling ended at Tory Channel in 1964. An ill wind ELEVEN Tunisian soccer players have good reason to thank President Sadat, of Egypt, for taking the peace initiative in the Middle East. Colonel Gadaffi, of Libya, was so furious at Sadat’s move that he offered to buy each player a new Mercedes car if they beat the Egyptians in a World Cup game soon after. Before a

crowd of 60,000 in Tunis, including Libyan and Algerian contingents who booed every Egyptian move, the home side won, 4-1. As well as the Mercedes, the winning players received about $l5OO each from their own Government for “services to sport.” Informal THE latest edition of a German guide to England called “The Little Londoner” gives some advice which must be equally valuable for New Zealanders contemplating a pilgrimage to Britain. “Visitors to England need not trouble about taking a dress-suit with them,” it says, “if they intend spending only a short time there for the sole purpose of sightseeing or studying the spoken language. Also the top hat may be left at home.” Variable pitch? GLOSSY publicity material reaching Christchurch for the French-British A3OO Airbus, claimed to be the quietest of the wide-body jet airliners, illustrates its case with noise-pattern information for Wellington Airport. At Wellington, it says, noise abatement procedures dictate a change of heading after “unstick” so as to keep the climb path over the sea, affecting the densely inhabited shore line as little as possible. Whether the choice of

Wellington Airport as an example is purely fortuitous or a cunning local sales pitch remains to be seen. The brochure says the A3OO Airbus has the highest thrust-to-weight ratio of any airliner. Its climb path, after a rapid take-off, is steep enough to ensure that it passes over airport neighbourhoods high enough to minimise nuisance. Frozen out YALE UNIVERSITY has installed a freezer room in its Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library to deal with bookworms. It is bookworms of the insect variety that the university wants to discourage. Fumigation with deadly gases such as cyanide would also do the trick, but this is risky to human bookworms, and the library cannot be used while a room is being done. The deep-freeze technique was adopted on the advice of a Yale entomologist. The infested books are wrapped in plastic and held at 20 degrees below zero Fahrenheit for three days. The cold kills insects, eggs, and larvae and without injury to the book. All future acquisitions to the rare book library will be given the freeze treatment. Longest title? A NEW biography by David Sinclair of the American writer, Edgar Allan Poe, asserts that the title of Poe’s longest story is probably the longest title in all fiction. If you have time, this is how it goes: “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of

Nantucket. Comprising the Details of a Mutiny and Atrocious Butchery on Board of the American Brig Grampus, on her way to the South Seas, in the Month of June, 1827—with an Account of the Recapture of the Vessel by the Survivors; Their Shipwreck, and Subsequent Horrible Sufferings, from Famine; Their Deliverance by Means of the British Schooner Jane Guy; the Brief Cruise of this Latter Vessel in the Antarctic Ocean; Her Capture, and of the Massacre of Her Crew, among a Group of Islands in the 84th Parallel of the Southern Latitude, together with the Incredible Adventures and Dis* coveries still further South, to which that Distressing Calamity gave Rise.” Dog trap QUEENSTOWN will set up a dog trap in an attempt to control the local nuisances. The council has decided to buy a trap in the form of a baited cage. It will be a portable arrangement so that the council can deploy it where it is needed most. In other areas, the council was told, the trap has proved an excellent control measure—not so much because of the dogs it catches, but because of the deterrent effect it has on owners. It encourages dog owners to keep their animals at home. Restraint SIGN in the office of a tolerant non-smoker: “If you must smoke, please do not exhale.” — Garry Arthur