A FORGOTTEN MEMORIAL

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 45, 17 November 1925, Page 8

A FORGOTTEN MEMORIAL

TO SAMUEL DUNCAN PARNELL. Ever the adherents of local labour unions seem to have entirely forgotten a man they once delighted to honour— Samuel Duncan Parnell, the founder (in New Zealand) of the eight-honrs movement. At his death a memorial was raised, in 1893, in chq form of a drinking fountain, incorporated in the .facade of the Wellington Free Public Library, on the eastern side of the main entrance. This consists of an ornamental carved granite basin, surmounted by a marble slab, in which is inserted a’bronze impression, in high relief, of the face of the founder of the eight-hours movement. But. long ago this fountain cease ! to function. Someone in authority caused the water tap to be plugged off, and the basin to be filled with concrete.

Wellington is very short of public water fountains. All over Sydney and Melbourne, in the streets, parks, and reserves, there ere public fountains which are used freely by all classes of the community, simply because with this sort of fountain one’s lips do not coms into contact with anything save the water. It is suggested to the authorities that this ancient memorial might be cleaned up a little and converted into a modern bubble fountain.