EDUCATIVE AND RECREATIVE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 35, 11 January 1926, Page 6

EDUCATIVE AND RECREATIVE.

The visitor finds mxrch of interest and delight to occupy his time and attention. To critically examine the exhibits would occupy many days, and the time thus spent would have an educational value which is not easily over-esti-mated. The New Zealand Government Pavilion forms an exhibition in itself. Occupying the whole of the middle pavilion on the west side of the Grand Court, fifteen departments of State are represented by exhibits illustrating agriculture, census and statistics, defence, education, the arts crafts and prodrrets of the Pacific Islands, the forest service, health, industries and commerce, Maori arts and crafts, labour, lands and survey, mineral wealth, the mines and the navy, printing and stationery, prison labour, the grow T th of the Public Trust and railway exhibits, etc. A Post and Telegraph Office with telephones and the complete working equipment of a modern office is also installed in the building to the left of the main entrance, while on the right the Tourist Department, in addition to occupying a large space devoted to the scenic and sporting attractions of the Dominion, has an office at which visitors can book for tours to all parts of the Dominion and obtain reservations for train and boat journeys, etc. The Government exhibits cover a wonderful record of progress during the last fifty or sixty years of the Dominion’s existence. Yet the Government exhibits are, in a sense, less indicative of the commercial and industrial progress _ of the country than the exhibits which are to be found in the magnificent New Zealand Second Industries Court, where no less than 200 manufacturing and commercial firms find representation. The variety and extent of their exhibits is really an eye-opener, for practically every industry essential to the requirements of humanity and civilisation is to be found in this court, which is lodged in the largest of all the pavilions and covers a floor space of three acres, providing “an appropriate setting for what is, without doubt, the most extensive and impressive display of New Zealand made goods ever brought together under one roof.” The exhibits have been rightly described as “uniformly excellent,” comprising a remarkably wide range and high quality of goods, which present an admirable object lesson of the genius and capacity of New Zealanders to provide for the requirements of the country. We are apt to overlook and under-esti-mate the importance of nr secondary industries which gave employment, in 1924, to 77,661 persons, the wages and salaries paid amounting to £14,573,441, the value of the manufactured products being given as £76,996,397, while the capital employed, as represented by land, buildings and plant occupied, and in use, was no less than £45,498,397. The provincial courts again ai’e a credit to each province represented, and a delight to visitors —Otago, Southland, Canterbury, Marlborough, Wellington, and Auckland being all represented. Canadian, Australian and Eijian exhibits 'are also to be seen in the respective pavilions allotted to them; America is also represented, and last, but by no means least, are to be seen in the British court some of the finest o.f the Mother Country’s historical treasures, one of the entrances to the court being through a facsimile of the “Old Curiosity Shop” in Chancery Lane, immoilaliscd by that greatest of English novelists, Charles Dickens. But, to be thoroughly

appreciated, the exhibition should bo seen, and when one temporarily tires of wandering through the courts there are rest rooms and lounges, the magnificent Argyll and Sutherland Band, the Amusement Park, with the scenic railway, and all soils of diversions to contribute to the enjoyment of the visitor.