HOARDING DESTROYED

Southland Times, Issue 21191, 18 September 1930, Page 7

HOARDING DESTROYED

DUNEDIN CITIZENS’ BEAUTIFYING EFFORTS. SEQUEL IN COURT PROBABLE. (Special to the Times.) - Dunedin, September 17. As a protest against the despoiling of the countryside by large and unsightly advertising hoardings four prominent Dunedin ’citizens, armed with saws and axes, recently set out on a voyage of destruction. Their objeot was to clean up the Cromwell Gorge and they commenced operations on a hoarding a short distance from Clyde. The hoarding was a large one and was firmly fixed, but the combined efforts of those four stalwarts eventually saw it dumped into the Molyneux. Just at that time a motor. cyclist passed along and he reported what was happening in the gorge to the local constable who went out and the party’s beautifying efforts ceased. One of the leading participants explained to a Star reporter this morning that the action was taken as a protest against the inactivity of the Government in allowing hoardings to be placed on the roadside, thus making the country hideous. When 'a busy man went for a holiday into the country, he said, he liked to leave the town and all its associations well behind, but if such signs were to be broadcast all over the country the town was ever present in the traveller’s mind. The destruction of the hoarding has been reported to the police and Court proceedings may follow.