People and Their Doings.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20329, 12 June 1934, Page 6

People and Their Doings .

How the Test Cricket Descriptions are Broadcast from Australian Stations : Dame Clara Butt’s Elder Son Contracted His Fatal Illness when Visiting Barrie.

KEXNERLEY RUMFORD, the son of Dame Clara Butt, hss died eleven years after the death of his only brother, Roy. Clara Butt had three children, Joy, Roy and Victor. Roy died from meningitis three weeks before Clara Butt and Kennerley Rumford left for their 1923 tour of Canada and America. Winifred Pender, in her biography of Clara Butt, recalls that he was to have sailed for Canada about a fortnight before his parents, to play in a specially picked cricket team, the Free Foresters, against a Canadian side, and was looking forward to meeting his parents and joining them on their tour. He was staying the night at Sir Jan.es Barrie's when he was taken suddenly ill. He was taken home to Brook Lodge, ar»<! thence to a nursing home in Park Lane, where he died alter a few days’ illness. He was buried in the little churchyard at North Stoke, near his parents’ riverside home. The King and Queen and Queen Alexandra sent gracious messages of sympathy 9 9 9 QAPTAIN TAPRELL DORLING, D.S.O , R.N., better known to many under his pen-name of “ Taffrail,” gives what may not be altogether a fair impression of New Zealand women in his book “ The Man From Scapa Flow.” His character, John, is like himself, a naval officer turned author, and the following passages occur: “ Women, let it be said, were not John’s strong point. . . . Indeed he had received one letter from a lady in New Zealand: ‘Dear Sir, I like your books very much and always make a point of buying them. 'But, why don’t you make your female characters more passionate?’ John, who made a point of answering every letter, even the abusive ones, replied: * Dear Madam, I am glad you like my books. But, perhaps, it is as well that you live in New Zealand.’ The lady, net the least abashed, answered promptly: ‘ I do not live permanently in New Zealand,’ she wrote; ‘ I shall be in England early next year. I am twenty-six years old, and am considered by my friends to be passably good looking, though slightly freckled, due to an open-air life. I pride myself on having a knowledge of the world and being sensible and sophisticated. I should like to meet a distinguished author like yourself.’ John did not reply to that. Ilis wife forbade it.”

JT was hard to realise that those vivid descriptions of the Test cricket which were broadcast from the Australian B stations were not direct from Trent Bridge itself. Actually, the broadcasts depend on cablegrams, but clever announcers, including cricketers such as Vic. Richardson, make them sound as if they came from men watching the game. The procedure has been described in Australia as follows: A regular cable service is arranged and brief “ flash ” messages are sent every minute or so. “ Chipperfield, Hammond, boundary ” comes through by cablegram and the announcer does the rest. “ Chipperfield is batting steadily,” he says. “ I think he is going to hit out this time. Yes, a beautiful drive. It has gone right past extra cover, end, oh! it’s a boundary.” Expert knowledge of cricket and an imaginative mind make these descriptions really worth while,* and no one can say they are not first-class. Brief comment and the midday scores are also broadcast from the Empire short-wave station at Daventry. THAT un-Aryan creature of our chilhood, the Gollywog, is banished from henceforth from all German nurseries, says the London ” Truth.” Along with Dr Einstein, Mickey Mouse and so much else that is lovable in the normal world, he certainly has no place in the arid and humourless world of the Third Reich. The Noah family presumably will be next reduced by the omission by Ham and Japheth, those forbears of non-Aryan stock, from the arks of the future. But perhaps that is being over-logical. The position of Gollywog is, alter all, peculiar. The reluctance of General Minister Goering to permit any rival guy to capture by the brilliance of his attire the imagination of German youth is probably at the bottom of this latest ban on gollywogs.

9 9 NAMES have been mentioned in London in connection with the approaching selection of a new general of the Salvation Army to succeed General E. J. Higgins, who is retiring The names are:—Henrv W. Mapp. chief of staff; Evangeline Booth

commander in chief. United States of America; David C. Lamb, head of the intelligence office, international headquarters (formerly commissioner in New Zealand); Samuel Hurren, principal. International Training College, London; Catherine-Bram-well Booth, officer commanding women's

social work in Great Britain; and Charles Rich, territorial commander, Sweden. The High Council will meet in London in August next to make the appointment. It has been pointed out that General Iliggins was chief of staff at the time of his appointment to the generalship, and that the present chief of staff, Henry W. Mapp, is among the six names being discussed.

I%TRS THADEN, one of the world's most x daring women flyers, will be a contestant in the Centenary Air Race, and the prospect of her presence in Australia makes one wonder when Australia will see a crosscountrv Air Derby for women. Mrs Thaden, at 29. won the Air Derby for women in the United States against a field of sixteen competitors. The race was mapped over a course of 2350 miles of mountainous country and desert. Some years ago she also set an altitude record for women in the States, rising to a height of 20,270 feet, and although this was later eclipsed, she still holds several aviation records. A.W.M. in a tribute to this airwoman in the “ Sydney Morning Herald ” recalls that Mrs Thaden was one of the first women flyers to win distinction in a long flight which was waged with the Federation Aeronautique Internationale for recognition of women in awarding aviation records. It was following this flight that women’s air records were given official standing, regardless of how they compared with the records set by men. This official recognition was a triumph, for, among other women flyers, Mrs Thaden', with a then speed record of 156 miles an hour. CIXTY YEARS AGO (from the " Star ' ° of Jane 12, 1874) : Heathcote Swing Bridge.—ln the Provincial Council last night Mr Fisher asked whether it was the intention of the Government to take charge of the Heathcote 5 ! swing bridge and remove the tolls. Mr Maude replied that the Government was willing, and considered it right that the bridge should be on the same footing as that at Kaiapoi. Hokitika, June 12. —The lease of the Brunner Coal Mine at the Grey has changed hands, the Greymouth Company having bought M'Hughes and M’Carthy’s full interest in the lease, with the plant and rolling stock, also their prospecting license over Mount Rochfort, in the Buller district.