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Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 212, 6 August 1940, Page 9

Mr and Mrs E. L. Barnes, of Elmira Avenue, arc to leavqTor Christchurch on Thursday to attend the Grand National race meeting'. Dr. and Mrs P. McMahon, of Marne Street, who have been visiting Mrs McMahon’s father, Mr Wright, of Day’s Bay, have returned home. Mrs D: J. Lovelock, who has been indisposed, wan welcomed back to the shop branch of the Women's Patriotic Committee at its meeting last night, the president (Mrs E. C. ißarnett) expressing the pleasure of members at her return.

Lady Wilford, widow of Sir Thomas Wilford, was in the south of France when the Franco-German armistice was signed. She was able to make her way to England. 'She has been staying with her daughter, Mrs Penrose-Fitz-gerald, and she is considering a return to New Zealand, states a London correspondent. The annual report of the Health Department for the year ended March 31, 1940, states that, in view of the fact that for the past three years New Zealand has experienced a shortage of registered nurses, with the outbreak of war it became necessary to control their recruitment to a much greater extent to ensure an adequate nursing service for New Zealand, tlio maintenance of tho present standard of training, and at the same time provide a carefully selected and competent personnel for the New Zealand Army Nursing Service. Mr and Airs' W. H. Skinner, of New Plymouth, who celebrated their diamond wedding yesterday, were both born in New Plymouth, their parents being founders of the settlement. Mr Skinner, well-known as the' historian of the province, an Anglican Church worker, a student of Polyesnian culture and a surveyor, was Commissioner of Crown Lands and Chief Surveyor of Marlborough, Hawke’s Bay and Canterbury between the years 1911 and 1919. Tn 1918 he was elected to the Boundaries Commission and in the following year he retired from the department and returned to New Plymouth to live after 47 years’ service. Mr Skinner was joint editor of the Polynesian journal and secretary of the Polynesian Society for a number of years. In research work on tho early history of Taranaki Mr Skinner occupies a pre-eminent position, for he has been a copious writer on colonial history and the Alaori wars, his works including the authoritative book “Taranaki 80 Years Ago.”