MAD MERRIMENT

Taranaki Daily News, 22 December 1934, Page 7

MAD MERRIMENT

REVELLERS AT THE FAIR. GREAT BUILDINGS STRIPPED. Hallowe’en drew thousands of revellers to the closing ceremonies of the Chicago World Fair on the night of November 1> and when the police surveyed the scene next morning little remained untouched except the American flag floating bravely at its masthead. Souvenir-hunters, drunk with merriment, spent the night stripping the £11,000,000 buildings of their treasures. The streets, 83 miles long, were filled with hilarious crowds, who fore down the electric lights, drank all the liquor they could lay their hands on, and tossed angry policemen into the lagoons. One fat man, with a red tablecloth round him, sat on a £6OO motor-cafc-one of the prize exhibits—and defied the police’to get him, while the crowd roared approval. Rare plants, many valued at many pounds apiece, were taken as souvenirs. Above the din rose the screaming of the sirens of ambulances carrying injured revellers to an emergency hospital.