LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 18 December 1926, Page 12

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Motorists who passed through Oakilra late last night report having seen a spectacular blaze in the fern and gorse on the slopes of the Kaitaki ranges below the bonhdary of the icesarvc. Fanned by a strong breeze< the. fire lit up the country fer some distance around.

Mr. T. M. Ball, district engineer, informed a Daily News reporter yesterday that the highway through the Tangarakau Gorge was now open for traffic and there was every prospect of the road being open and in good order throughout the summer. This morning at It) a.m., the Minister of PubUcl Works (Hon. C. K. Williams) will open the section of the Stratford-Main Trunk railway extending from Okahukura to Ohura and a number of local body representatives from Taranaki intend making the trip.

"They’ll never stay the course,” said a spectator at the WVstown School sports yesterday as three very email boys set off at a break-neck speed from the -limit mark in a cross-country run over Syj miles. But they did, and, more than that, they Came in- first, second and third. Yet their ages rhiiged no higher than six and seven years. Though the course was broken by many steep and long hills, high fences and thick hedges, the trio were back again within 16 minutes, far ahead of nnuli larger competitors. And they might have just, returned from a walk to the nearest coiner, so undisturbed were they.

No fewer than 198 boys, having completed their initial training at Flock House, have, says the annual report of the trustees of the Sheep-owners’ Fund, been sent to employment as follows:Auckland 4, East Coast and Poverty Bay 32, North Taranaki 7, Wanganui 11, Hawke’s Bay 61, Wairarapa 21, Mana-watu-Wellington 34, Marlborough and Nelson 15, Canterbury 13. Fifteen girls are in employment as follows: East Coast and Poverty Bay 8, Hawke’s Bay 3, Wellington-Manawatu 2, Wairarapa 2. In every ease where a girl has a brother, it has been found possible to place her in satisfactory employment cither on the same farm as her brother or on a nearby farm or station.

After a round of the Lyttelton hotels an overseas fireman felt like swimming the English Channel. As that stretch of water could not be removed for his convenience, he had to content himself with the confines of the harbour (says the Sun). "Let ’er go, Gallagher,” he bawled out as he bounded off No. 3 jetty into the water several feet below. )By a faulty “take-off” he somersaulted right on the broad of his back. In a half-dazed condition he floundered and shouted. When sufficiently recovered he scrambled up the steps and stripped off all hjs garments save his shirt. A second dive was no improvement on the first, and despite any amount of encouragement from a number of interested newspaper runners, he was soon compelled, through exhaustion, to abandon the idea of anything like the Channel swim. “Three children in every 106 people in the world to-day are crippled,” said Mr. R. J. Jackson (who has just returned from abroad) to the Wanganui Rotary Club. In America, said Mr. Jackson, there were 400,000 crippled children. The Rotary Club there was trying to instil in the minds of the people and Government officials their duty t.o these afflicted children, and wae doing much to make their lot happier. At the conclusion of Mr. Jackson’s ad l dress the president of the Wanganui Club, Mr. P. Higginbottom, suggested to the members that the season was now sufficiently advanced to afford crippled children in the. hospital a little pleasure by taking them for motor trips.

The annual box opening of the Fitzroy habitation took .place at the school on December 9, when the very gratifying sum of £29 4 s 2d was collected from the boxes, this being the highest amount yet sent away. The members are to be congratulated on taking such a practical interest in Dr. Barnardo’s Homes. The highest collectors were Sybil Jones £5 13s 6d, Hazel Sykes £1 6s 8 l , a d, Dorothy Barnitt £1 <Js, George Taylot £1 5e lO’/jd, Jean Sykes fl 5s 9%d, Olive Gilbertson 17» 3‘/»d. Dorothy Barnitt and Bruce Barnitt have qualified for silver knifes. .The following have qualified for silver badges.; Sydney Jell, Rima Hollis, Ruby Bint, Nancy Buttimore, Alma Jenkins, V ernon “V calc, George Taylor, Eric Wray, Joyce Barnitt, Phyllis Hancock, Elsie Burr, Nola Martin, Jean Sjkes. Norman Kilpatrick, Lilian. Heaven, Pat Die, Fed Florence, Alma Cunninghaiii, ivy Ward, Ada Harlow, Stanley Alsop.

. . The Pipe B%»d plajs at . lngtenoqd ,'ihis evening 'and- at Kswaroa td? rnorrow’afternoon.'