LADY FREYBERG ATTENDS W.I. CONFERENCE

Chronicle (Levin), 12 April 1947, Page 6

LADY FREYBERG ATTENDS W.I. CONFERENCE

"I am a regular reader of Home and Country, 'and "that -very well planned and well-written -journal keeps the branehes of Hie institute in touch with 'oue another," said her Excellency, Ladv Freyberg, at the second annual conference of- the South Auckland Federation of Woniens' Institues held recently. "Rcading the notices of the activities of the various branehes,. T have been struck by tlie tliread of unselfishness whicli *runs tlirough the institute 's work. " Both in working for eharitable causos at home and in sending food parcels to Britai'n, the institute had showed itself a fine and- vital orgauisation, lver Excellency eontinued. This was the golden jubilee year of tlie women 's institutes of the world, | said her Excellency, the' first institute having been set up by Mrs. Hoodless in Stony Oreek, Canada, 50 years ago. . , r

Many fine things liad been acliieved by the movement in that time, aic.instance being Denham College, a college for women at Oxford, which had recently been established bjr the Women 's Institutes of England as a memorial to Lady Denham, the first president. of the institute movement in England. Lady Freyberg, who was- welcomed by the president of th.e South 'Auckland Federation of Women 's Institutes, Mrs. N. R. McElwain, said that altliough, thro'ugh being a soldier's wif e, she never lived long enough in one placd to hg^e much elose contact witli any particu It institute, she was definitely institutLminded. When forming a club for the wives and daughters of an English regiment she had run it as nearly as possible on institute lines.