BUND SOLDIERS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 118, 21 May 1941, Page 11

BUND SOLDIERS

MESSAGE FROM CANADA

WORK FOR COMRADES

"I wonder if you would kindly pass on to my blinded soldier comrades in New Zealand cordial messages from blinded soldiers in Canada, as' well as appreciative thanks ior the messages I was , given to bring from New^ Zealand," says Sir Clutha Mackenzie,,writ. ing from New York on April 16, io the honorary secretary of the Commercial Travellers' and Warehousemen's Blind Soldiers and Sailors Fund. "On April 5 the Ontario men gave me a dinner at the Sir Arthur Pearson Club at Pearson Hall, Toronto. Mr. Harvey Lyons, the president, remembers well a number of our New Zealand fellows. The Canadians are a brisk and active lot, and most of them seem to be busy in administrative and business posts. Colonel Baker expressed regret that the outbreak of war put an end to his hopes of journeying to New Zealand last year' for the Centenary blinded soldiers' reunion, but he looks forward to,making the journey one of these days. Many of the Canadians made kind inquiries after New Zealanders they had known in St. Dunstan's days.

"Mr. E. A. Baker, in charge of both civilian and soldier work throughout Canada, is doing an extraordinarily fine job. He was totally blinded in France'in 1915, where he earned the M.C. and the Croix de Guerre. For his work in Cahada he has been given the C.B.E. and made an honorary doctor of law by his old university. The Canadian Government looks to.him for expert advice in all questions of rehabilitation and war pensions for disabled Canadian soldiers, sailors, and airmen, and he was not long ago promoted to the rank of lieutenant-colonel. In the U.S.A. he is held in high esteem, and is looked to, because of his unbiased and sound judgment, to iron out many conflicts in local blind affairs, The Americans have done him the honour of making him, a Canadian, president of the American Association of Workers for the Blind. "The limbless soldiers of Canada, at the annual banquet of the Amputations Society of-Canada- also asked that messages of good will should be conveyed frbm them to their disabled soldier 'buddies' down in New Zealand. . ; "Here in New York the small but vigorous group of Australians and New Zealanders is making extensive preparations for Anzac Day—a service, a dinner, and a world broadcast. One of the most active people here pn New Zealand's behalf is Miss Nola Luxford, Hastings. She is a tremendous worker, with seemingly inexhaustible energy. She gives most of her time to the British-American Ambulance Corps, which has furnished many splendid gift ambulances to 'the Anzac, forces, as well as to ■ Britain.' She is constantly active on radio programmes and organising war relief parties, and, wherever she, is or whatever she is doing, she lias always a keen eye for interesting people in New Zealand, helping 'New Zealand's war effort or keeping friendly social interest going among the New Zealanders in New York." ■ Dominion, Fertiliser Co., Ltd., has ad-, vised the Stock Exchange Association1 that a dividend of 4J per cent, for the 12 months ended March 31 is recommended .by ,the directors. ... ..„. > .