IMPORTANT ADVANCE MARKED BY USE OF THE TELE PRINTER.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 366, 7 March 1932, Page 6

IMPORTANT ADVANCE MARKED BY USE OF THE TELE PRINTER.

A London Letter

Last of a Dying Race of Craftsmen: Death of a Veteran English Soldier.

(Special to the “ Star.”) LONDON, January 9. The tele-printer, an invention by which the written word can be transmitted over a telephone line, was demonstrated for the first time at the General Post Office recently. This remarkable piece of mechanism, calculated to prove an important advance in means of communication, is not yet in general public use, but may be introduced within the next few months.

ITS AID, any telephone subscriber with the necessary equipment may, after establishing a telephone connection, transmit a written message over local or trunk lines to any subscriber equipped for the purpose, and receive a written reply by the same means. Expert knowledge is not required. Transmission is from a keyboard resembling that of a typewriter, and any typist may, after grasping a few simple technical details, operate the tele-printer. The new invention opens up big possibilities. It enables a record to be made and preserved, at each end, of a “ conversation ” on the tele-printer, and a small additional appliance enables a caller to leave a written message at the other end of a line, even if no one is in attendance there. The widest opportunity for its use seems to exist in the business and commercial world. A head office may transmit written instructions, orders, or correspondence to factories, branches or departments elsewhere, or may conduct urgent correspondence with other firms equipped for the purpose. The possibility of transmitting police messages to patrol boxes, whether occupied Or not at the time of transmission, is also likely to engage consideration. The Yorkshire Conservative Newspaper Company was the first newspaper concern in the country to lease a telephone line for the transmission of Press messages by the tele-printer. This was done at the Rugby League Cup final at Wembley last April, when an installation connected with a telephone line on the ground transmitted an account to the Leeds Post Office, where it was dispatched to the offices of the paper by underground pneumatic tube. The Last, of the Bodgers. Deep among the beech woods, where the last spur of the Chiltons runs out into the Oxfordshire plain, lives the last of the old English “ bodgers.” With only the most primitive tools, the bodgers made chairlegs of wonderful perfection from the beeches in their native woods, but now only one man works regularly at this ancient craft—Mark West, the grey-bearded landlord of the “ Pheasant ” at Chinnor

Hill, and he has just entered his seventieth year. • , . , .

Mark works to-day just as his ancestors worked centuries ago, and just as hundreds of men worked out in the woods two generations since. He uses the same simple lathe, made entirely of wood, the same quaint treadle, consisting only of a length of cord, a foot-piece, and a long beech-wood bar to act as a spring.

Long years of patient endeavour were needed to achieve the finish which he gives to his work, for Mark began to learn the art when he only six years old. Britain’s Oldest Soldier.

Troop Sergeant-Major John Stratford, Britain’s oldest soldier, who died this week at his home at Wolverhampton, attained the age of 102 on July 23 last, when he received a congratulatory message from the King, as he did two years previously when he reached his century.

The Sergeant-Major ' was born in St George's, London, and took the Queens shilling on April 21. 1846, when he enlisted in the 14th Light Dragoons, afterwards the 14-20th King’s Hussars. His first period of active service was in the Punjab, and he was the only known survivor of the battle of Ramnuggar, fought on November 22, 1848. From this historic engagement the Hussars came to be known as the “ Ramnuggar Boys,” and for many years the sergeant attended the annual Ramnuggar Ball at Aldershot. He was afterwards at Gujerat. and at the battle of ChillianwaJJah. He went through the Persian campaign in 1857, and served through the Indian Mutiny with the Central India Field Force, being' present at the taking of Saugor, the battles of Mudinporo and Bettwa, the storm of Jhansi, and the Storming of Gwalior. He retired from the service after twentythree years, and then became instructor to the Staffordshire Yeomanry from 1871 to 1887, when he retired after forty-one years with the colours. His last service was with the National Reserve, from 1911 to 1914. His five medals included the long service and good conduct, and the 1900 meritorious service awards.