PROPOSED WORKING MEN’S CLUB AT OHINGAITI.

New Zealand Times, Volume LIV, Issue 9903, 17 May 1893, Page 3

PROPOSED WORKING MEN’S CLUB AT OHINGAITI.

TO THE EDITOR. ' Sir, —Some week or_ two ago a petition w&a taken round for signature, requesting the Hon the Colonial Secretary to grant a charter for a working man’s club at this place. So popular was the suggestion that over one hundred signatures were appended to said petition In a very short time. Now, sir, some interested parties are using their test endeavours to prevent no from enjoylog the privileges that a olnb grants. Anonymous letters have been written to various papers decrying the opening of a club in this district, I will now, so far aa toy ability will allow, point out the advantages of a club to aa working men. At the present time the majority of the residents of this district are men working under the oo operative ays-, tem, bushfallers, roadmen and small contractors, All of these men are paid monthly, and the majority of them are fond of their glass. Now, under existing olroumstanoee the drinking men usually knock down their ohequee, or the greater portion of them, at hotel bars. Now, sir, we have bad enough of this ; we are not snob fools as people imagine, and in our camp disousa this matter very freely, -Why should wo fatten up a clots of people who, after scouring our money, turn ue out without iu some in' stances a shilling for a meal ? Now, sir, had we a olnb here wo oonld have our glass or two, a comfortable room to sit in, papers and magazines to read, dominoes, ohesa, cards and draughts to p’ay with —in fact, all the amusements that an ordinary mortal requires. Tha present Government are eseea* tislly friends to the working men, and I can assure them that they would be furtherieg our interests by acceding to our prayer and granting a charter for a working men’s club in Ohlngaiti, Apologising for she length of this letter, —1 am, ko., John O’Donovan. Ohlngaiti, I3th May.