MORE FREAK WAGERS

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 24 August 1935, Page 6

MORE FREAK WAGERS

BARROW PUSHING AND SKIPPING PROPOSED DIVE FROM BRIDGE SYDNEY, August 15. Messrs. Parkinson and Elvans, the participants of the “barrow-pushing” wager contest frqm Beechworth to Mount Buffalo, Victoria, have much to answer for. During and since their, contest barrow pushers have been trying to win wagers of a freakish nature all over Australia. Scarcely a town has escaped the craze. No hospital carnival is complete without a “wheelbarrow Derby.” Thin men wheel fat men, young men wheel old, and old wheel young There have been variants of the barrow contests, but all have been inspired by the now world-renowned Beechworth contest. One man successfully j wagered that he would drive a rooster a mile along a busy road. Another pulled a comrade a considerable distance in a sulky. A wheat-stack lahourer carried two full bags of wheat i|p a steep hill. But getting back tp barrow. Councillor Darwin, of Colling, wood, Melbourne, undertook to wheel a friend from the Victorian capital to Sydney. He is now past the border between the two States, with nearly half of his journey covered. Most amazing of all these freak wager “stunts” is that of the man who has undertaken to skip from Melbourne to Sydney. He is Tom Morris, professional athlete, club swinger, skipper, freak swimmer, and high diver. All he is carrying is a skipping rope, but following him are three companions on bicycles, carrying a supply of spare skipping ropes, rubber shoes, and light refreshments. Morris hopes to skip the 580 miles between the two cities in 35 days, and he, too, is finding no difficulty in keeping to the schedule has has mapped out of skipping 18 miles a day.

Skipping is anything but child’s play to Tom Morris. It’s an art. Besjdes skipping records, he holds swimming and diving laurels. He has announced that when he reaches Sydney he will dive off the harbour bridge. Morris once divied off Westminster London, with hands and feet tied, and in the same awkward state he swam five and a-half miles in the Maribyrnong River, Victoria. Likewise, he leaped from Prince’s bridge, Melbourne, in bonds. He once swam eight miles breaststroke from Kangaroo Island to Cape Jervis, South Australia, in waters where sharks are common. He also once planned to swim the seven miles from Circular Quay (Sydney) to Manly, but the police stopped him, and they will probably stop his bridge dive “stunt” also. About 18 months ago they stopped an American sailor from the Monterey from attempting a similar feafc after he had made a five-dollar bet that he would d,o it.