Ngati Poneke Honours Service Club Leader by Margaret Kelly Miss Gwendoline Ryan, the retiring president of the Altrusa Club of Wellington, received an unexpected honour at a hangi dinner held by the club on Saturday 15 June, when the Rev. Canon Hohepa Taepa bestowed on her a traditional kaitaka in recognition of the support given to the Ngati Poneke Building Fund Appeal by the Altrusa Club. Two years ago the club undertook to raise $3,500 for the building fund. $2,000 was presented to Mt Duff Daysh, Chairman of the Appeal Executive Committee, in December 1972 and the balance of $1,500 was presented to Canon Taepa at the hangi dinner. Miss Ryan, who is Senior Mistress at Mana College, Porirua, became President of the Altrusa Club of Wellington in June 1972. Among the various projects programmed by the club for the period covering her term of office, was support for the Ngati Poneke Building Fund, a project which Miss Ryan was particularly anxious to promote as a form of service to this important section of the Wellington community. The Altrusa Club of Wellington is one of thirteen such clubs in New Zealand, which are all part of Altrusa International, a service organisation for executive women which was founded in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.A. in 1917. There are now Altrusa Clubs in thirteen countries of the world and members of these clubs are women holding executive positions in professions or in the business community. Invitations to membership are governed by classifications available and the various clubs operate by drawing on the leadership abilities of its members in seeking out and attempting to meet the needs of the community. In the Wellington Club there are 35 members and because Wellington is the centre of Government, a number of these are in executive positions in the Civil Service. The Altrusa Club of Wellington has achieved a great deal since it was established in 1966. As well as supporting a number of smaller projects the club has made major grants from time to time. In 1969 it made a grant of $3,500 towards the building of the Waitangirua Kindergarten in Porirua East, and in 1971 the club raised $1,300 for cancer research. Then came the undertaking to raise $3,500 for the proposed new marae for Ngati Poneke. Over the past two years, as well as honouring its promise to Ngati Poneke, other worthwhile projects have been completed. One of these was the bringing to New Zealand of a Solomon Island Nursing Sister—Sister Veronica—who had suffered the amputation of a leg. She was in need of a properly fitted light-weight leg which would enable her to give to her own people the service for which she had been trained. With the co-operation of the Melanesian Mission, the Altrusa Club of Wellington brought Sister Veronica to New Zealand for eight weeks. Here she was fitted with the new limb and visited hospitals and institutions for further nursing experience. Another project was the purchasing of a movie projector for the League for the Hard of Hearing, to assist with the teaching of lip reading. The club also provided a tea and coffee dispenser for the Intensive Care Unit of the Wellington Public Hospital. Other work in the community has included assistance to Youthline, Birthright, Medical Aid Abroad and the Crippled Children's Society. The raising of funds for its various projects is done by holding special functions and by