MAN LOCKED IN

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 247, 16 July 1935, Page 8

MAN LOCKED IN

Telephone Cabinet Door Fails to Open

A recalcitrant door-ctfleh on one of the telephone cabinets outside the Wellington Dublie Library gave a man several anxious and undignified moments when he turned to come out yesterday. He gave the door the usual pull. It would not open. He jerked more sturdily. Still it resisted. He tugged. The door remained closed. Thoroughly disturbed. he rattled it, he swayed back and heaved on it, he growled at it, he did everything that a man incarcerated in a four by four telephone booth would do, but the door did not yield. Meanwhile, the strange sight of a man locked into a telephone cabinet had attracted the attention and the sympathies of several passers-by. The matter was brought to the attention of the post office authorities. A faultsman was dispatched forthwith and the door was attacked from the outside. The ballcatch whose failure to function properly was responsible for the incident suddenly yielded, being torn from its socket, and a much-relieved man was able to escape from his narrow prison and pursue his business.

From the subsequent examination of the offending catch, it appeared that the ball set into the door had stuck in the socket in the jamb. It was the first time such a mishap has occurred in Wellington.