RIOTOUS WOMEN

Greymouth Evening Star, 28 March 1930, Page 9

RIOTOUS WOMEN

STORM MEETING ROOM. MELBOURNE, March 20. Hundreds of women stormed a room in Temple Court, where a meeting of the Housewives’ Association was to be held to-day. Hats were knocked awry, feet were trampled on, and there were protests and screams, which reached such a pitch that constables had to be called. The door of the meeting-room was locked, and the women crowded outside in the corridors, making it impossible for tenants of the' building to pass to and from their offices. The meeting, which was very rowdy ultimately broke up, and was continued in another part of the city, where it .was again broken up. Recently the council of the Housewives’ Association passed a resolution that the president (Mrs Russell) should be suspended from all control of the association, and that all books should be handed over to the acting-president (Mrs J. S. Watts). Mrs Russell has steadfastly refused to abandon the office, and a definite split in the ranks of members has occurred, one party being led by Mrs Russell, and the other by Mrs Glencross and by Mrs Watts. On Tuesday evening the Mrs Glencross faction forced the doors of the association’s room, where the executive councicl was holding a meeting, and it was some time before quiet was restored.

When Mrs Glencross and her followers reached Temple Court to-day they found Mrs Russell and her faction in possession of the room, and after what bore every semblance of a riot, Mrs Glencross and the new executive retired to Scots’ Church Hall, Russellstreet. Here, however, further disgraceful scenes occurred as the Russell faction followed and attempted to storm the hall, but were unable to break their way in. Police had to be sought to quell the disturbance. In the struggle to gain admittance to the hall women used their hands and nails to some effect, tearing clothes and hats and almost disrobing one another. Bitter words were flung at one another, but the doors were eventually locked, and the followers of the deposed president excluded.

Resolutions concerning the future control of the association were carried, and the meeting ,which was interrupted by an incessant banging on the doors by those outside, ended in disorder.