LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 8 June 1923, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

file Hon. J. Q. Coates was very interested in the Kaupokonui factory over which he was shown j'esterday by Mr. T. McPhillips (chairman of directors) and Mr. W. J. McDonald (manager). The Minister spent a few minutes watching the smooth-running marhmery, the water-driven dynamo and other engines claiming his attention. >Jr. Coates afterwards went through the other sections of the great factory, taking a keen interest in all that he was shown.

In conversation with a Star representative yesterday at- Kaupokonui, the Hon. J. G. Coates said, in answer to a question, that he did not think that the unemployed problem would be serious this winter.

A very interesting evening will bo held at the Foresters' Hall to-ni^ht when the Huia Lodge will have their grand euchre party and dance. Good prizes are offered for the euchre party The secretary notifies that ladies are expected to bring a basket.

The new Kaupokonui bridge had only just been declared open by the.Minister of Public Works yesterday afternoon when the Hawera-Opunake mail bus arrived at the bridge, TJie way was cleared, and thus very fittingly (as one of those present was heard to remark) the bus carrying two of the best servants of the people of South Taranaki—the mails and the Han-era btar—were the first to cross the bridge.

The new bridge across the Kaupokonm River on the Main South Road which was opened by the Minister of Public Works (Hon. J. G. Coates) yesterday, is a fine reinforced concrete structure, and makes another nail in the coffin of the wooden bridges in the county. The council's policy of replacing all wooden bridges by concrete ones is indeed a sound one. The Kaupokonui bridge is 18 feet wide and is U feet higher than the old wooden bridge.