THE PASSING SHOW.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 18566, 23 August 1922, Page 5

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By “Omar.”)

“Sunshine and Business!” That is the motto, or slogan, of Napier’s shopping and industries week, for which the citizens of Hawke’s Bay’s capital have been making strenuous preparation for weeks past, It is an excellent idea. The Big Week commences on Monday next, and already the manifold attractions which are to be crammed into it arc being “starred’’ throughout the countryside. The main purpose of rhe effort is, of course, to boom trade, and to that end’ the Napicrites are providing a wealth of entertainment and amusement for those with whom they desire to do business. It is a case of Attractions! Attractions’ and still more Attractions!—a veritable piling of pleasure on pleasure, with the most profitable pleasure of all the bargains—staring at everyone from the windows of the gaily decorated shops and tempting cveiyone to “come in and buy!" Capital! There is to be I a ladies’ hockey championship, in which ten teams of dashing damsels will strive I to win the laurels for their respective | towns and provinces. Poverty Bay, Wellington. W airarapa. Manawatu. ; Taranaki. Marlborough. Eastern Southj land, and. of course, Hawke’s Bay. will ! I each take a hand in this strenuous con-1 | test, and in between the matches the! jfair competitors will doubtless find time , Ito “do a hit of shopping.’’ A couple of representative Rugby matches will add i substantially to the ranks of prospective purchasers of masculine commodities, to I say nothing of the trinkets and trifles which the visiting stalwarts will feel in duty bound to a< quire, for ‘‘the girls they left behind them.” A Returned Soldiers’ Ball (with floor space for over 1000 couples’) will bring in the Diggers and their Donahs from the remotest outskirts. and he would lio a sorry sort of Digger who didn’t buy hi.s "little bit o’ skirt” (vide “The Sentimental Bloke”) i a new.skirt and a. blouse or two to take home with her. Crowds will “come in” for the Fancy Dress and Hard-up social and dance, and likewise crowds will “ turn out” for the community sings and the Grand Masquerade Street. Carnivals and Confetti Battles. Both those who “come in” and those who “turn” out I will “ do their bit” in the shops, and so all will work together for the common good—of Napier! Again, Capital! Which, being interpreted in terms appropriate to the occasion, means L.s.d. * ♦ ♦ To stimulate public ini crest in the coming event the men behind t he guns, or rather the counters, are running all sorts of competitions. The jewellers are giving a fifteen-guinea gold watch for a “time-guessing” -*ompetition. the body builders (car bodies of course!) offer a “tenner” to the person who tells them accurately “where’s where”; the chemists prefer "who’s who” to "where’s where,” and promise six guineas to whoever can identify and name the largest number of persons w ho appear iu sundry group photographs exhibited in the windows of the "dope ’ shops; the motor traders provide the prize for a "missing part stunt,” and the Automobile Association “carries on” with a speed guessing competition (quite appropriate!). Not to be outdone, the sellers of soli goods guarantee to pay the railway tares of those' who come out top in a. "things io wear” competition, the Iwioksellers offer a reward for the discovery of a “lost, sentence,” ajid the grocers sweeten up

the whole box of tricks, so to speak, with a "Sugar" competition. Apparently their admirable intention is to give sugar for "sugar,” which in the vulgar vernacular is a sweet nickname for filthy lucre. Then there is a “spotting" competition (nothing to do with the licensed victuallers), a “Napiergram” competition (a regular wit-tickler), and limerick competitions lor boys and girls respectively. Stunning? Rather! And even now I haven't got to the end of the big bill of fare, haven’t said a word about the part the Maoris are playing in Napier’s ‘big boost,” not a word about the mysterious “ escapeologist" who is to be handcuffed in mid-air (presumably after he’s done his shopping), nothing about the “free gift souvenir scheme,” nothing—

But there! If Napier, why not. Wanganui? That’s really what I’m driving at. As a community we’ve set some rather questionable examples of late years; but there’s no earthly reason why we shouldn’t follow a good one now and again. So what about a Wanganui shopping week (or shopping fortnight for that matter) close up to the coming Xmas? In other words, a real big, booming, bonser Xmas Carnival! Good idea, eh? What say you? Yes, I knowall about the beastly nuisance oi the election: wretched thing, sent to try us, gets us «ill more or less nervy, plays tlie very devil with business—and ail that sort of thing. Well, what I say is. just don't let it; that’s all. Just don’t let it. There isn't any reason why it should. Hie incudes and the steam plant and the codlin moth and other dotestable things have got to come; but as our evening luminary ways, why worry? Let Is get on with the Xmas Carnival business, do our voting when we have to. and then get on with the’ Xmas Carnival business again. There's money in it. And that. 1 take it. is what mcHt of you tvant. Asa matter of fact I could do with a little myself.

There was given in London recently a private view of a film that is likely ti arouse the keenest interest. It is a stringing together of historic incidents, actually portrayed by the kinema, from the lives of four generations of our Royal Family. It covers the period from the crude beginnings of this industry in 1895 until the accomplishment of the present day, and it includes the great pageants of the last quarter of a century. When we consider how wonderful a study history would be if only the kinema bad existed in former years, we may well envy our descendants their good fortune. Historic films are nowstored away in the British Museum, and we can imagine with what eager excitement the people of a hundred years hence will witness the coronation ceremonies of King Edward and King George. What still has tc he completely .solved is a method of preserving films, hut we can hardly suppose that this difficulty will prove insurmountable. Meanwhile it can truly be said that the invention of the kinema has made the past almost as living as the present.

The Borough Council seems determined to perpetuate the folly it perpetrated when it decided to instal a steam plant. One would have thought the Council would eagerly embrace the opportunity to get rid of the plant. But. no, the Power Board’s offer was turned down. The arguments used by the power plant devotees in support of retaining the too silly for serious consideration. The ostrich which hid its head in the sand

has very good disciples in some members of the Borough Council. It is not to he expected, perhaps, that home members of tile Council should see things in a coniniercial light, they having had no training in that direction hut it. is re*

, grettabfe that, those mon should set ' themselves against cthet councillors ' whose careers have proved them to be t real business men. , There a v e some outstanding facto I about the steam plant that should not , be forgotten. In the first place, it . should never have ordered (that has been acknowledge! by everybody, • oven some of the present advocates/. J| Secondly, it should never have Ixon ! erected (it should have been sold even at . a loss). Thirdly, when an offer was made for the white <lephant the creature should have been sold. • • •

“Look before, you Leap!” An excellent, a most excellent adage. only some of our City Fathers wouia take that precautionary Look before they did their Leaping! What a lot of trouble it would save to be sure. Take our good friend Councillor Sharpe, for example. Quite a chap, you know Very decent, and

all that. Wouldn’t knowingly do acrooked thing for all the gold in Christendom. But —he doesn’t Look: lie Leaps! And his last, leap—a regular blind-fold-hoad-first-here-j goes- sort of a leap—has landed him in a pretty pickle. At least that’s Imy humble opinion. The Editor and j I have been doing a little rummaging, rummaging amongst the records of the Children’s Peace Day Demonstration, and piecing together the interesting story of its origin, consummation, and—-aftermath. ’Pon my word ’twas great sport; but as the saying is, “not for Joseph.” or rather, not for Charles. You see, we had io rummage over the printed pages because the official records were lost, went up in smoke, so to speak, and there was nothing for it but to fall back on the tell-tale columns of the newspapers. And what did they tell us? Well, I’m neither a lawyer nor the son of a lawyer; but if they didn’t tell us that our good friend Cr. Sharpe has unwittingly jumped bald-headed into the very jaws of a breach of trust I’ll eat my hat. : : : : f: : Here is the skeleton, the bare bones, as it were, of the complete and convincing, not to say convicting, story revealed by those remorseless printed records: The idea that the children should be given a special day originated when the official Peace Day celebrations were in contemplation.

Children's Day was originally fixed for July, 1919, but circumstances made necessary its postponement until November of that year—Armistice Day. Accordingly. On October 20, 1919, “there was

an exceptionally well-attended meeting of teachers and school committee members at the Technical College to make arrangements for the Children’s Peace Day Demonstration on November 11th. On October 21st Mr Jas. Aitken, then headmaster of the Avenue

School, wrote a letter to the papers, appealing for contributions. “The Committee,” he said, “have something like £270 in sight,” but “we want £400.” The Wanganui County Council contributed £l5 16/11; the Waitotara County Council contributed a similar amount, so likewise did the Castlecliff Town Board, and the Gonville Town Board “caane to light” with £46 8/-.

The fund was pooled and controlled by the Borough Council, which body received those contributions, also the Government subsidy of £2B7—and paid the bills. These bills included—Catering £255, motor hire £ll 7/6, medals £9 16/-, wages £22 12/5. witn other items bringing the total expenditure OCT OF FUNDS DERIVED FROM RATES AND TAXES up to £322 5/4 On November 18th the Committee of School Committeemen and teachers held a “washing-up” meeting, at which it was decided to forward the accounts for expenses to the Borough Council in ACCORDANCE WITH THE COUNCIL'S GRANT OF £3OO, and that “any credit, balance be carried forward as a nucleus of a fund which shall BE USED FOR FUTURE ARMISTICE DAY CELEBRATIONS." Messrs Sharpe and Spriggens were elected trustees for the credit balance, which “IS TO BE HELD IN TRUST.” The School Committees Association had nothing to do with organising or financing Children’s Day. As a matter of fact the Association was then as dead as the proverbial door nail. It was only resuscitated a little more than THREE MONTHS AGO, after having held nu meetings for UPWARDS OF THREE YEARS!

Rather an eloquent sort of a skeleton, is it not? A speaking skeleton, in fact. And it says as plain as a pike staff “The School Committee’s Association has no legal authority to dispose of that £l4O. It is held 'in trust’ by Messrs C. J. fSharpe and Geo. Spriggens for a specific purpose. The trustees cannot legally divert the money to ajiy other purpose." Trustee Spriggens said: “Let’s look before we leap. Let's see what the lawyers say about it.” But Trustee Sharpe was never so timirous as that. He wanted to play Father Bountiful to his friends of the. Central Committee, so he trotted off to the Association’s meeting and leaped right into the “breach.” I don’t kuow what, the lawyers will say about it, but I can guess. And isn’t Cr. Sharpe chairman of our civic Finance Committe? And isn't the gentleman who holds that responsible position supposed to do at least a little “looking” before he leaps 7 And even if the Association had the legal right to say how “the children’s mite” should be. disposed of it would have been futile to vote it to the Central Memorial Committee because, don’t you see, the Borough .Council is “down” well over a couple of hundred over the Children’s Day business, without the Borough’s con- ' tribution there would have been no balance for Messrs Sharpe and Spriggens to hold in trust, and the balance. now existing by reason of the Council’s grant consequently represents A LEVY OUT OF RATES, which the Central Committee could not conscientiously accept! Why didn’t he look? Quite a nice chap, too.