CURRENT TOPICS

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXXIII, Issue 68, 15 September 1924, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS

CIVILISATION'S ENERGIES. "It would bo interesting, but quite inconclusive," says Mr Arthur D. Little in the latest issue of the Atlantic Monthly, "to allow one's self to speculate upon the progress which our civilisation is ultimately to make owing to the marvels that are resulting from the discovery of the Herzian waves. The sales of radio equipment in America reached a total of £30,000,000 last year, and are expected to double in 1924. The earth has become a whispering gallery, and the ocean has lost its solitude. The farm is no longer isolated, and the newspapers, the theatres, and the pulpit have a new competitor." It is possible now by Marconi's new marvel, the beam system, to direct an electric wave to any given area on the earth's surface; to enable the human voice to be heard in any part of the globe. Marconi, in this great discovery, has given a new power to mankind, the •effect of which is only beginning to

he realised. "Man," adds the Atlantic contributor, "is no longer bound to earth. He has achieved a three-dimensional existence. Since 1920 the transcontinental mail service has covered nearly two million miles a year. \ It has handled in all nearly a million ton-miles of mail. In England, during the past two and a-half years, there was only one accident involving serious injury to a passenger for 5,000,000 miles flown. In a single month 2600 passengers have been carried by the London-Paris route. It is now possible to fly from Vienna to Paris in ten hours and from Strasburg to Constantinople in thirty hours." And so we may, as Mr Augustine Birrell writes in "More Obiter Dicta." "shove ourselves forward in fancy another hundred years. Bear in mind what must be the huge output of civilisation's energies, think of the libraries it will compose, the pictures it will paint; consider its new buildings, its new inventions, its hurrying industries, and crowded paths. What production of the Victorian Age is so finished, so beautiful, and so strong as to be able succe»sfully to meet and beat down the huge and swamping epring-tide of the days that are to come."

I RUGRT CHAMPIONSHIPS. , The Stratford Football Club is to be heartily complimented on the sucI cess which has attended its teams i during the season, on which the curtain was rung down o n Saturday afternoon, when the First Juniors beat .the Hawei'a representatives on Victoria Park in the final. Coming on top of the Thirds' defeat of Eltham for the championship of that grade. Saturday's result is worthy of more than passing notice. They hud a strenuous season, and to come out as the winners Of a competition in which twenty-five junior teams were competing is decidedly praiseworthy. I

With roference to the deeds of the Stratford Juniors, a well-known footballer informed a representative; of the "Stratford Evening Post" that with the exception of one of the sea* sons during the Great War—all lean years, (hey were -it is nineteen years since they occupied the same honorable position in the competition. It was in the year 1905—a year made memorable as a milestone in the history of Rugby hi New Zealand by reason of the fact that tin famous All Blacks carried everything before them in their trip to Britain—that Stratford Juniors beat Clifton for the championship, the match being played at Waitara. Mr T. Wilson, who. incidentally, was the coach and selector of the - present team of Juniors, was the captain in 1905, and he has in his possession an interesting memento of the occasion in a photograph taken prior to the match. The changes that have taken place due to the whirligig of time are varied. Some of the boys, alas, in playing the game of War, went West, and their names are for ever inscribed upon the Roll of Honor alongside many of their fellow footballers. Otheri are living in our midst to-day, robust in stature, rubicund in countenance —in fact, are real old who now never stir from Uie fj^J^ l side at nights as was their < wont when the need for training called them out in their youthful days. Others, again, have drifted along Life's devious channels, and are lost in the hurly burly of the presentday world. It is interesting to ,note that one of the 1905 Juniors who played at Waitara ("Jimmy" Collins) had two sons (Arthur and "Ginner") playing i n the successful, 1924 team. So in the passing of Time.. we may expect the members of the Stratford Juniors of 1924 to take their places in the seniors in the future, and., help to carry the banner of success. Maybe, among these lads there are some destined to wear the Amber and Black jersey—who knows? At any rate, there would be no one prouder than their coach and selector, who has taken the greatest possible interest in the team during the season, and was th-e recipient of many congratulations oh their success on Saturday. The morale of the, team is high compared to some lifteens that could be mentioned in other districts, and for this reason also their success is the more gratifying. It is understood that a Club social gathering will be held next week in Stratford, when both the successful Stratford Junior teams will be entertained and their trophies presented. Tariki won the First Junior Shield last year.