“BACK TO DUNEDIN.”

Otago Witness, Issue 3698, 27 January 1925, Page 17

“BACK TO DUNEDIN.”

A MOVEMENT REVIVED. What does the old home town stand for? Fifty years ago Dunedin was the commercial centre of the country, and stood as the great nursery in which were cradled and fostered the big businesses whose names are household words to-day. And in the process of that building-up Dunedin was rearing and training those captains of industry and commerce who have gone foith and filled the waste places of the land. Later it stood as the educational and instructional centre, and still holds pre-eminence therein, and through the grey gateway of its Alma Mater have passed the eager students who in their turn became the guides and instructors of ambitious youth not only in our own country but in other lands. Still later, it has stood for a great industrial and manufacturing centre, first in many arts and crafts and the pioneer of that enterprising yet careful municipal trading activity which yearly brings to the coffers of the corporation the golden harvest ot toil. But, above all these things, to its sons and its citizens, Dunedin stands for a city wherein to dwell; a city blest by Nature with charming surroundings and a never too extreme climate, where the kindly fruits of the earth and its beautiful flowers burgeon and ripen in profusion, temperate alike in climate and condition, where the mosquito ceaseth from troubling and the house fly is not an undue pest. So however far they may be scattered, its sons and daughters think back longingly to the old home town, and it is to meet this longing that the proposal is being reviewed of a Back to Dunedin Week luring the progress of the Exhibition. Mr C. Russell Smith advocated such a proposal about two years ego, but it was decided to postpone the effort at that time. Now it seems as if the time is iipe for a forward move, and the suggestion has been made that this is a matter which might readily come within the scope of the activities of the Otago Expansion League. If the idea is to be carried to full fruition much organising work will be required, and it will be essential to make an early start. The league certainly seems the likeliest body to undertake the work, and, if cordially supported as it ought to be, should undoubtedly succeed.