LOCAL AND GENERAL

Taranaki Daily News, 18 July 1933, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

Good progress was being made With sewerage contract No. 5, reported the engineer (Mr. C. Clarke) to the New Plymouth Borough Council last night The connection ,to Dartmoor should be completed within two weeks, when connections could be made in that area.

Hundreds of New Plymouth people visited different beaches on Sunday and yesterday in search of drift-wood brought down by the flooded rivers. Fitzroy beach, where logs and branches from the upper reaches of the Waiwakaiho were fairly plentiful, was well patronised. “What do three cockies know about running a store?” asked a supplier at the Midhirst Dairy Company meeting yesterday with regard to a suggestion that a committee of three should be set up to run the store. “You might as well put my sister there,” he added amidst laughter. ••

Applications for subsidies under the new No. 10 building scheme of the Unemployment Beard continue to be made, the New Plymouth Labour Department reports. During last week applications for bungalows and small houses were received, the building costs ranging from £6OO to £750. The total value involved was about £2OOO, bringing the amount since the commencement of the scheme to about £12,000. \

A record of 20,956 lbs. of butter-fat (factory returns) is the performance of the herd of 60 cows owned by Mr. J. Kovaleski, Beaconsfield Road, a supplier of the Midhirst Dairy Company. That means the fine average of 349.26. Under group herd-testing that would probably mean at least 355 lbs. of fat per cow, as the factory returns do not take into account the milk used for the house or for feeding calves. Farmers sometimes wondered why some pinus insignis or macrocarpa posts lasted only two years while others lasted for many years, remarked Mr. V. C. Davies in the course of an address at Hurworth last night. The reason, he explained, was that in the former case the posts had been cut in the summer when the sap was up, and in the latter case they were cut in the winter when the sap was down, that being the proper time to cut them.

That the prospects for casein for the coming season appeared brighter than for some time was indicated at the annual meeting of the Midhirst Dairy Company yesterday. The chairman (Mr. W. I. Wellington) said they had been able to make a forward sale of casein at a price that would enable the company to pay 2d per pound of butterfat for August, September and October. Last season the company paid IJd per pound of butterfat on the milk left for casein making.

Making an attract've display, an exhibition of work by students of an Auckland school of architecture is arousing much interest at New Plymouth. The display, arranged in a Devon Street shop window, was sponsored by the New Zealand Institute of Architects, and gives an excellent indication of the high standard of work achieved and of the type of design now popular. The exihibition includes blue prints, colour washes and black and white drawings of widely varying classes of modern, commercial and ornamental architecture.

The Governor-General lias notified the Patea Borough Council that it will be impossible for him to unveil the Turi memorial as his programme has been mapped out for the next three months.

The recent rain in North Taranaki has been much warmer than is usual at this time of the year and an early spring seems to be indicated. Further evidence of this tendency ia the fact that kowhai trees in different portions of New Plymouth are now a blaze of yellow bloom.

Controversies frequently arise as to what timber has the greatest durability for fencing, and as a general rule matai has few supporters. Two large matai posts, however, which are at present supporting the road gate to Mr. H. Belcher’s farm, Rawhitiroa, have served this purpose for 38 years.

Sixteen cases of infectious disease, all diphtheria, were reported in the borough of New Plymouth during June, said Mr. R. Day, chief inspector, in a statement, dated July 7, presented to the borough council last night. “We have had rather a bad spell of diphtheria,” he commented, “but at the time of writing it seems to be abating.”

1 About a dozen of the 200 pairs of boots received by the New Plymouth office of the Labour Department from the Unemployment Board now remain, and of those five or six are to be called for by relief workers shortly. The remainder are outsizes or otherwise unsuitable. Another supply of boots is expected any day and this should fill the needs of all unemployed as yet requiring footwear.

A letter from the Taranaki employers’ Association expressing the concern of some members at the frequency of street collections at New Plymouth was referred to the borough council meeting last night by the works conunittee, upon the recommendation of which it was decided to appoint Crs. Brown, Smith and Stainton to confer with the holiday committee of the association.

Appearing in the New Plymouth Court yesterday, Henry Edward Thomas Wakelin was again remanded on a charge that on July 7 he stole 10 packets of cigarettes valued at 7s from A. E. Priest at Moturoa. He was also charged with the theft at Moturoa on June 24 of chocolate to the value of 8s Bd, the property of Margaret Williams. On the application of Senior-Sergeant Turner he was remanded' till Wednesday, bail being allowed on one surety of £25.

Several raids were made on motorists to check lights and licenses and several cases were to be taken before the court, reported Mr. R. Day, chief inspector, to the New Plymouth Borough Council last night. It was pleasing to note, he said, that up to the end of June 1980 driving licenses had been issued, as against 1875 for the same period in 1932, an increase of 105. Up to yesterday the licenses issued numbered 2018, compared with 2067 for the corresponding period last year.

At a meeting of the Hurworth branch of the Farmers’ Union last night arrangements were made for tire judging of the hay. and ensilage entries in the farmers’ field competitions. It was decided to hold the judging on August 7, and arrangements were made for a light luncheon. It was also decided to procure a cup for the stack ensilage competition, to donate £1 Is to the local branch of the Women’s Division and to hold a Farmers’ Union ball in August,

That Rotarians T. C. List and F. Milner, the New Zealanders at present in the United States of America, were taking the fullest advantage of their opportunites to see different parts of the country and hear different people, was the opinion expressed by Rotarian R. Quilliam, president of the New Plymouth Rotary Club, at the club’s weekly luncheon yesterday. He mentioned the fact that the delegation had had audience with President Roosevelt, and he anticipated many interesting talks by Rotarian List when he returned to New Plymouth.

Mr. Charles. R. Allen, son of Sir James Allen, had the end of the middle finger of his right hand lacerated and several other fingers injured as the result of an accident in Dunedin on Saturday. Mr. Allen, who is blind, stepped off a footpath to cross a street, but the boy who accompanied him apparently saw a a motor-lorry approaching at a slow pace and pulled Mr. Allen back, Mr. Allen evidently caught his heel on the kerbing at the edge of the footpath and put out his right hand in order to save himself from falling. As he grabbed a post the motor-lorry struck it, with the result that Mr. Allen s middle finger was severed at the first joint. Mr. Allen is a well-known contributor to newspapers, and he used his injured hand for typing.

The Government is to be urged by the New Plymouth Borough Council to legislate so that all rates levied on lands mortgaged to the Crown and any of its departments will be collectable in the same manner and with the same statutory powers as rates levied on lands mortgaged to private persons. The P 1 0" posal emanated from a conference of local bodies at Wairoa. -It was decided to send copies to Mr. S. G. Smith, M.P., and the Municipal Association. Mr. Smith will be requested to urge again on the Minister of Internal Affairs the desirability of making the amendments to the Rating Act 1925 recommended by the town clerk in his letter of April 12, 1932, the object of the amendments being to provide a more easy and less expensive way of making rates a charge upon land.

Although the rain had not quite ceased in North Taranaki yesterday, conditions as regards transport and communications had returned very much to normal. With the exception of the first cars each way, the AucklandNew Plymouth passenger service was run to schedule. The first cars were about twenty minutes late, the passengers having to be transferred in one place to another car on account of a slip on the road. At Boddy’s Hill, north of Mahoenui, the road was not cleared for traffic until about 3.30 p.m., about 60 or 70 cars having been held up in the meantime. At that time, however, a large stone that had been hindering advance was shifted sufficiently to allow the traffic to pass, although the labours of about 20 men were required to accomplish it. Another large mass of stone still blocked the road, but it was expected that the obstruction would be cleared some time last night.

The monotony of the dairy company annual meeting was varied yesterday at Midhirst by an election campaign, each of the nine candidates for the three vacancies in the directorate placing before suppliers his views on various dairying problems, together with his policy for the welfare of the company. Each had also ■to submit to questions. Some suppliers objected on the grounds that it was not fair to spring such a surprise on the candidates, who should have been given warning. Moreover, it did not follow that because a man was a good speaker he was a good business man. Advocates of the proposal, however, held that it was better not to give the candidates any warning. From the speeches and the voluminious notes Produced it was evident that some of the candidates were prepared. _ The call o time found them still going strongly. One candidate was very brief, remarking that he had neither policy nor anything else, but if elected would use his judgment to the best of his ability. He just “missed” by a few votes. The speeches took over an hour, and it was obvious that the last speakers were, at a disadvantage as their audience was visibly tiring.