LOCAL AND GENERAL

Taranaki Daily News, 10 June 1932, Page 6

LOCAL AND GENERAL

It appears that good habits are to be guarded against just as carefully as bad habits. Preceded by the Court crier, the magistrate entered at New. Plymouth yesterday to preside over his first civil sitting since the conclusion of the recent session of the Supreme Court. Said the attendant official in a loud, firm voice: “Silence—for his Honour, the King’s judge!” “The best in the Dominion” is thfc phrase used by Miss Pattrick, director of Plunket services in New Zealand, to describe the measures taken in New Plymouth for the provision of relief. The work of the New Plymouth. Relief Association in particular, she said, and the co-operation of the various organisations engaged in relief work were excellent, and there was little or no chance of overlapping, or of any really deserving case being overlooked. Having locked his Airedale in the wash-house the night before the show, a New Plymouth competitor in the dog section of the winter show was perturbed to find at 8 o’clock next morning that the wash-house was empty. With the judging timed within an hour or so he began a hasty search. He traced the dog’s wanderings to his old lodgings, where it had left after receiving a bone; he heard of its wanderings down by the railway station, and he finally ran it to earth in the town. When he got the dog to the show at last he felt he had earned the two first prizes it won as much as the dog itself. The footbridge across the railway yards to the sea alongside the Terminus Hotel, New Plymouth, is being repaired and rendered safe for traffic. Rusted and corroded bolts and bars are being replaced, decayed decking removed and the bridge painted. .Some time ago the Railway Department suggested to the New Plymouth Borough Council that the bridge should be demolished, on the grounds that it led practically to nowhere and was not needed. After investigation, however, the council declined to grant the request. Hence the present repair work.

A Maori chief at the Manaia Jubilee luncheon yesterday made a very dignified and impressive speech, referring chiefly to the co-operation of Maori and white in the settlenient and development of the Waimate Plains. The interpreter then halted. He said the Maoris had a grievance. It was that the local bodies nowadays were imposing rates that were altogether too heavy. The Maoris did not mind a fair thing, but objected to rates that were too heavy. The observation brought down the house.

The work of the Blanket Society in North Taranaki was highly commended by Miss Pattrick, director of Blanket services, during a visit to New Plymouth this week. After paying a special tribute to the excellence of the organisation and the good work of the Plunket nurses Miss Pattrick said that Plunket werk, pre-natal, post-natal and during the pre-school age was fulfilling ideally the true aims of the society. A special point was arising in North Taranaki, as everywhere, at the present time, in the need to assure that no mother or baby went hungry or without adequate clothing, and in New Plymouth this danger was being met and overcome. It was the result of good team work between the nurses and the committee which was the key to success in such work.

The following names of candidates who sat at New Plymouth in the March examination for electrical wiremen’s registration are given in a recent issue of the New Zealand Gazette as having passed the written part of the examination: Amon, W. S., Buttimore, H., McInnes, L. G., Pettett, R. F„ Riordan, P. J., Taylor, A. R. The only successful candidate at New Plymouth for the practical portion of the examination was W. E. Jones. Fourteen candidates sat at New Plymouth for the written examination, of whom six passed, and eight sat for the practical examination, only one being successful. Prizes have been donated by the electrical supply authorities, with the council of the Fire and Accident Underwriters’ Association of New Zealand, for the candidate who gained the highest marks in the written part of the examination, and the New Zealand Electrical Federation, with the Electrical Workers’ Union, for the candidate who gained the highest marks in the practical part. As an additional prize, the proprietors of the New Zealand Electrical Journal are forwarding, free of cost to each of the prizewinners, a copy of the journal each month for the next 12 months. The prize for the written part was gained by R. W. Leicester, Taumarunui, who secured 84 marks of a possible 100. The prize for the practical part was gained by W. M. Anderson, Auckland, who secured 84 marks of a possible 100.

Painful injuries, resulting in the loss of an eye, were received by Mr. H. H. Tocker, dentist, Napier, on Sunday afternoon, when a screwdriver slipped off a screw and pentrated, his left eye. Mr. Tocker was attending to his motorear at the time and was bending over a screw. The screwdriver was pointed upwards, and while using pressure on the tool it slipped off the groove on the screw and w’as jerked upwards, penetrating the eye. Mr. Tocker was immediately admitted to a private hospital, where he underwent an operation, but the eye could not be saved. He is not now in serious danger, but will remain in hospital for about a week or days.

A new class of exhibits was introduced with success at the Bay of Plenty winter show, which, opened at Whakatane on Wednesday. This was for home brews, and the response fully realised expectations, a total of 30 entries being received.

A consignment of 1220 deerskins from Makarova was recently railed from Cromwell, and will ultimately be shipped to England, where a market for these exists. The skins represented the season’s work of the Government party, the largest tally for one day being nearly 200, the deer being herded by a drive the day previously. Christmas plum trees on Mr. C. Grant’s fam at Tutukaka, near Whangarei, are at present bearing their second crop of fruit. Instances of a second apple crop are also reported, but for Christmas plums to develop in midwinter is a rare occurrence. The fruit, of course, will not ripen. “Well, we’ve got a few pumpkins, and we have our own potatoes,” stated a Maori debtor at the Hastings Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday morning when asked what he and his family, consisting of his wife and seven children, his mother and sister and two children, lived on if he earned only £lB in two years. “It is true that one half of the world does not know what the other half is doing,” commented the magistrate. No order was made.

“This picture is of special interest to New Zealanders,” said the Rev H. K. Archdall at Auckland when a representation was thrown on the screen of the memorial tablet to the schoolboy at Rugby School who, by taking the football in his hand and running with it, originated the code that bears the school’s name. “It has struck me,” continued the lecturer, “that there are two gods in New Zealand—Rugby football and green grass. I said so to a New Zealand bishop once, and he replied, ‘Yes, and pretty good gods, too!” Although he has been Minister of Education for eight months, it was admitted by the Hon. R. Masters, when officially opening the Otahuhu Junior High School on Wednesday, that until that day he had not visited one school in his Ministerial capacity. “Since I took over the portfolio I have not had much opportunity to move about the country,” said Mr. Masters. “Indeed, with the exception of two schools I visited at Pukekohe this morning, this is the first school I have inspected during the eight months I have been in office, so I am either doing my job or not doing it. You can judge.”

As a result of a canvass of business firms in New Plymouth yesterday it is Understood a number of them contemplate taking advantage of the recent reduction of postal rates to one penny for letters and a half-penny for commercial papers and circulars. When the rates were raised some time ago there was a tendency for firms to reduce, where possible, the number of commercial papers and accounts, and to organise their delivery by other than postal channels. The chief postmaster, Mr. F. E. Beamish, told a reporter that it seemed likely a number of business people would revert to the postal method of distribution.

Present conditions in New South Wales are evidently not affecting the pockets of the people to the extent of depriving them of money for sport. A check on "the gates at the Sydney Cricket Ground showed that 42,644 people witnessed the first match played by sthe English Rugby League team, and that the takings amounted to £3520. There was another huge crowd last Saturday, and the figures soared to greater heights on Monday when the first Test was played. It is reported from Sydney that over 60,000 people gained admission to the ground, and it was estimated that many thousands were turned away. A loss on the year’s working of £2471 9s 4d was shown in the balance-sheet for the year ended March 31, presented at the annual meeting of the Wairoa Power Board, bringing the accumulated loss of the board up to £8837 0s lid, as against £6365 Ils 7d at March 31, 1931. The chairman, Mr. E. A. Glendining, in his annual review, said that the general depression had so seriously affected the primary producers that the board had decided that it was not possible again to rate the area in an effort to recover part of the annually increasing deficit, and instead very strenuous but so far unsuccessful efforts had been made to obtain a reduction in the price of power supplied from the Public Works Department.

“Personally, I remove advertising signs from trees with a tyre lever,’ said an agent ofthe Auckland Automobile Association in a letter received at a meeting of the council of the association. The agent deplored the fixing of metal advertising signs to trees along country roads. He said a number of advertisements were placed on corners in the Te Aroha district, and these tended to take drivers’ attention from the road. Another form of advertising which was becoming general was the affixing to country bridges of pamphlets. The council agreed to write to all county councils In the Auckland Province asking them to prohibit the erection of signs on county roads and bridges, and to take action against offenders.

The habit of Mr. S. Pascall, the head of the Rotary movement, of leaving a train of “trees of friendship” planted in the wake of his tour round the world, reminded old Aucklanders of memorial trees planted by distinguished visitors of the past, including the Duke of Edinburgh, who was the first Royalty to visit these shores. “Edinburgh” trees in the domain and elsewhere have been mentioned, but most people have forgotten, or are not aware that His Royal Highness planted two Norfolk Island pines in the grounds of the Auckland Girls’ Grammar School at the corner of Hopetoun and Howe Streets. Mr. W. W. Kidd, formerly secretary of the Grammar Schools Board, Captain Albert Duder, and Messrs. Chapman and E. McKinstry, are the only four survivors of those present on the occasion when the Duke planted the trees in the south-east corner of the school grounds on May 19, 1869.

When discussing the present conditions of farmers, a retired manager of the Bank of New Zealand said that there was a distinct difference between the circumstances of the South Island farmer and the North Island farmer, the former owing his comparatively happy condition to two facts. In the first place, the South Island farmer had bought his land more cheaply, whereas the Northern farmer had borrowed his moneys which he had raised on mortgage to obtain the farm. The second fact was that the southern farmer had smaller holdings and worked what he had more thoroughly, thus gaining the full benefit from his land. He said that the majority, or at least a large percentage, of the South Island farms were still in the hands of their original purchasers. Such could be said for very few farms in the North Island.

Mr. A. W. Martin, Rupture Specialist, frrom Dunedin, is now on his 27th annual visit to the centres of New Zealand. He will be at the Central Hotel, Hawera, from 2 p.m. on the 9th, to 5 p.m. on the 10th of June; Stratford Hotel, Stratford, Saturday, the 11th, to 4 p.m. on Monday, the 13th; Imperial Hotel, New Plymouth, 14th, 15th, and 16th, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Consultations free. Why suffer when you can get immediate relief from a treatment that has Qured hundreds in New Zealand without operation or loss of a day’s work,*