THE CENTENNIAL

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26214, 26 July 1946, Page 6

THE CENTENNIAL

MEMORIAL PROPOSALS HARBOUR BOARD’S VIEWS The Otago. Harbour Board, at its meeting last night, decided to defer for three months the question of stating its preference for any of the proposals lor a centennial memorial submitted by the Otago Centennial Association. The question arose when correspondence was received from the Centennial Association forwarding for consideration a precis of the three schemes selected by the Executive as suitable projects with which to commemorate the Centenary of Otago, and asking to be advised of the amount the Board would be prepared to contribute to the favoured scheme. “I think we should have confidence in the Committee which has been set up to go into the scheme and go no further.” said the chairman CMr H. S. Watson).

Mr F. E. Tyson said he was against the Sports Centre proposal, which v/ould serve only the youth of Dunedin and would not be a suitable memorial for Otago as a whole. “ I am against them all.” said Mr W. Begg. “ None of them are big enough. The Otago Early Settlers' Association is rapidly approaching the exclusive stage bv restricting its membership to decendants of persons who arrived by 1868. The stadium proposal would give us displays of this buffooning that goes on all over New Zealand, is this wrestling, which is a relic of the early Romans, who fiddled while Rome burned.” It was hardly fair to throw' the whole of the responsibility for the decision on the Centennial Committee, said Mr R. S. Thompson, and it was wise to seek, the assistance of local bodies. The object of the centennial memorial was to commemorate the arrival of the pioneers of Otago in 1848, and the only way to do that properly was to adopt some scheme such as the Early Settlers’ Association proposal, which could be made as big as required. The suggestion to build a suitable hall for the Association’s unique museum, combined with a community centre, was an excellent one. and would be very heartily supported throughout Otago. With Mr Begg, he believed the present restriction on membership was too rigid and he considered that the time would come when anyone who arrived here in the first 100 years wmuld be regarded as a pioneer. He moved that the Board should support the Early Settlers’ Association proposal. Mr Tyson moved, as an amendment, that the Board’s decision should be deferred for three months. Tiie amendment was carried.