LOCAL AND GENERAL

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 59, Issue 4171, 11 August 1939, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

A reminder is given of the Centennial Memorial meeting next Monday evening.

Heavy rain has been experienced throughout Te Awamutu district during the past day or two, and rivers and streams are considerably swollen.

During the hearing yesterday of an action in the local Court defendant mentioned that he owned a motor truck that was sixteen years old- The statement prompted the query: “ Is there anything owing on it ? ” but defendant replied that it was sadly out of date, though it served his special purposes, and in any case he was financially unable to replace it.

When a debtor was being examined in the local Magistrate’s Court yesterday it was shown that he had a very small income, from which he had to maintain his family. Mention of the.finances prompted Mr W. H. Freeman, S.M., to remark that the man should have recourse to the Social Security provisions. Such men seemed, he added, to regard Social Security provisions as a charity instead of as a right.

Half-a-dozen members of the Waipa Referees’ Asociation attended the monthly meeting of the Waikato Association at Hamilton last evening, when consideration was given to several knotty points in interpretation of the rules. A social hour after business had been completed brought officials more into touch with each other. The attendance exceeded forty, and included contingents from Putaruru, Maitamata, Morrinsville, Cambridge, Waipa, Taupiri and Hamilton.

After the Court proceedings locally yesterday, when three young men were prosecuted for misdemeanours at a dance at Mangapiko, Sergeant Clist stated that such offences were exceedingly difficult to detect, and he suggested that the publicity given to the prosecution would have a decidedly beneficial effect. The three young men prosecuted were by no means the only offenders, and the others should take heed of the consequences, and profit accordingly.

The committee responsible for organising the annual ball of the l’e Awamutu Fire Brigade, which is to be held towards the end of the present month, has secured a novel attraction by engaging Lew Mah’s Tahitian Band, a combination of genuine island players which includes among its members two accomplished gil l hula dancers. This month’s ball also will celebrate the jubilee of the Fire Brigade, which began its useful career in 1914.

Two men, Cliff Sisley and Maxwell S. Ramsay, were charged at the local Magistrate’s Court yesterday With being found on licensed premises without lawful excuse. Sisley was found by Constable Shaw at the Alpha Hotel, Kihikihi, on 24th June. He could give no reasonable explanation for his presence there. The penalty was £1 and costs 10s. Ramsay was found in the Commercial Hotel, Te Awamutu, by Constable Carseldine. Defendant did not attend the Court, but wrote setting out his case, which letter was regarded as a< plea of not guilty. Constable Carseldine said he visited the hotel at 8.30 p.m. with Sergeant Clist. Ramsay was standing near the door of the house bar, and, answering questions, said he was a stranger and was looking for the men’s lavatory. The magistrate imposed a fine of £1 and costs 10s.

Records in the racing world are frequently bein" broken, but at Riccarton on Tuesday a,nd Thursday there were records fractured or created, as the case may be, that are rather remarkable. For the first time in the history of the C.J.C. one horse has won the Winter Cup for the third time. That was Catalogue, last year’s winner of the Melbourne Cup. On Tuesday, Padishah won the Grand National Steeplechase won the Grand 'laursday, emulating his feat of a year ago, he won the Grand National Hurdles, and thus established a performance that has been frequently attempted but never achieved, of winning both big jumping events in the one season. Yesterday also saw a triple dead-heat for first in a,n important flat race, Tidewater, Lowenberg and Settlement finishing in line in the Islington Handicap.

“ Frankly, I don’t believe your evidence,” said the magistrate, Mr W. H. Freeman, in the Magistrate’s Court yesterday, when a motorist, Theo. Langmuir, contradicted the statement of Traffic Inspector C. H. Treadgold to the effect that defendant had overtaken another car on a road bend when returning from a race meeting at Hamilton towards Te Awamutu. Defendant had sought to show that the inspector had mistaken the cars, three of them following in procession, at a point near the Lake Road inter-section. When he said he was doing only thirty miles an hour at most, the magistrate interjected that he <?ould not, and did not, believe the statement, and added that it was dangerous for any driver to pass other traffic on a bend, and particularly so when there was race traffic on the road. The practice was too risky. A fine of £5 and costs 10s was imposed.

It was stated at the local Magistrate’s Court, during the hearing of an application for variation of a maintenance order obtained some years ago by a wiße, who was since divorced, that she had, from such places as Auckland, Whangarei, Palmerston North, and Wellington, issued summonses against her husband for default in payment of maintenance, and when he went to Auckland to defend the case he found that the charge had been discontinued. That had occurred on several occasions. It seemed that the woman was actuated by spite. Furthermore, she had considerably more financial resources than her former husband. The magistrate was impressed with the evidence of the husband, and said that if the woman did not come to Te Awamutu to defend her case he must accept the husband’s statements. He added that he would like to know something more about the woman’s finances. The order for maintenance would be varied, as requested, by cancelling the arrears, and fixing the weekly payment at 10s. “ That may I induce her to come to the Court and I state her case,” added Mr Freeman, I