NEWS OF THE DAY

Manawatu Times, Volume 63, Issue 174, 26 July 1938, Page 6

NEWS OF THE DAY

Centennial Literary Competitions Entries are invited by the National Historical Committee, Department of Internal Affairs, for a series of literary competitions commemorating the Centennial. The competitions are for a novel, short story, full-length play, long essay, and poems. The rules and conditions are available. Minister Visits School. The Minister of Education, Hon. P. Fraser, who visited Palmerston North yesterday, broke his journey at Shannon, where he had morning tea and called at the primary school in fulfilment of a promise he had made some time previously. Ho met the chairman of the committee and the staff. Ckull on Beach. Found by a shepherd on the Makara Beach past Terawhiti last week, a portion of the cranium of a human skull has been handed over to the Wellington police. It is to be submitted to a pathologist for examination, but it is not believed likely that identfication will result, as there are no teeth or marks that might bo distinguished. Oil-boring Machinery. The final and largest of four shipments from tho United States of drilling machinery for tho New Zealand Petroleum Company’s work in the Poverty Bay field arrived at Auckland by the City of Bagdad from New York. Comprising several hundred tons, some of the cargo is carried on deck. It will be transhipped to Gisborne by the coastal motor-vessel Margaret W. Missing Indian. Although the exhaustive search by 26 police officers continues, no trace has yet been found of tho Indian store assistant, Dalu Desai, aged 42, who disappeared from the settlement of Taharoa on May 7. In addition to the combing of the sandhills and the dragging of the lake, a party has been detailed to search the country adjacent to tho only road access to Taharoa Lake. “Miles Behind Other Countries” “We speak of New Zealand as being a country of wide, open spaces, but we are miles behind other countries in playing areas,” said Mr J. W. Mawson, Town Planning Ofiicer to the Department of Internal Affairs, when speaking at a conference with the Ashburton County Council. He said that very few towns in New Zealand could measure up to the standard of other countries. This was deplorable but true. Adult Education. “You probably know more about it than I do,” said the Minister of Education, Hon. P. Fraser, when approached yesterday by a reporter for his opinion on the progress being made by the experiment in Feilding in adult education. As far as he knew, added Mr. Fraser, everything was proceeding satisfactorily, but tho results of what had been undertaken there would be taken into consideration before an extension of the scheme was contemplated. Milk AH Round. When the Minister of Health and Education, Hon. P., Fraser, arrived at the Dairy Research Institute factory yesterday morning after travelling from. Wellington before insjiecting the plant and discussing tho extension of the scheme with a deputation, all those present were each supplied with a bottle of pasteurised milk and a straw. “This tastes all right,” said Mr. Fraser, who drained his bottle before proceeding into tho factory, where he evinced a keen interest in the various processes. Mrs. Holman’s “Courage” Praised. “I congratulate Mrs. Holman on her courage in saying that, sho knows nothing about football. That is one of the main subjects in the curriculum of the New Zealand secondary schools,” observed Dr. AY. M. Smith at a public meeting at the Opera House last night addressed by Mrs. W. A. Holman, wife of an ex-Premier of New South Wales. The comment had reference to a statement by Mrs. Holman to a reporter in which she said that about the only thing in which she was not interested was football. In the course of a humorous reply, Mrs. Holman admitted the truth of the statement attributed to her, and said she didn’t know “which end of a ball went into the net first.” However, she felt it necessary to point out that her mission in New Zealand was not to criticise the national game. If she did not draw attention to this fact, her published statement might eventually get distorted to this end. (Laughter.) Giving Way to Traffice on Right “I think it is a very unfortunate rule,” said Mr J. K. Moloney in the Christchurch Magistrate’s Court, reterring to the regulation that traffic must give way to vehicles approaching from the right. “You would not think so if you drove as much as I do; it is the one thing that makes motoring bearable in New Zealand,” said the Magistrate (Mi E. C. Levvey). Mr Moloney contended that some allowance should be made for the speed of the vehicle approaching from the right and that the question arose as to the point at which a motorist should be considered to have broken the rule. A car might be on the intersection first when another car was approaching from tho right at a speed which made it impossible for it to be seen in time for the first driver to give way. The Magistrate said that he had been asked to consider the matter of split seconds before—whether a driver was justified in not giving way because he was on the intersection a fraction of a second before the other driver. “I want the rule about giving way to be made absolute,” he said. “I always stop. The defendant in this case has failed to give way, and he is liable for the penalty just as you or I would be, Mr Moloney.”