PATRIOTIC WANGANUI

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2929, 15 November 1916, Page 9

PATRIOTIC WANGANUI

HAS RAISED OVER £120,000 AND, STILL GOING STRONG Wanganui has done itself credit in the field of patriotic endeavour. It has hover yet been short of its quota, and thcro is no reason to believe that such a contingency will arise for some time to como. _ The Wanganui and Waitotara Patriotic Association is a particularly active body, with a real fivo executive, who are not only out to rake in all the money possible, but have ' the sanest ideas concerning its disbursement. It could hardly bo otherwise with such men as Messrs. T. B. Williams (president), Hope Gibbons, (J. E. Mackay (Mayor), and Alfred Burnett on the executive, and with Mr. Thomas Allison as honorary legal adviser and Mr. M. Hogan, juu.,' as secretary. At its first burst tho association secured somo £36,000 in cash and about £10,000 in kind. Then, in November-December last a big carnival and "Paddy's Market" took place (with Mr. Lints as organiser), -which produced £66,000. Sinco then about another £10,000 has been added, so that altogether Wanganui and tho Waitotara district may have been said to havo subscribed £122,000 to the Patriotio Association's funds. Of course that does not nearly represont the 'sum total, for, as m other places, their funds havo been raised for various goodly purposes, such as the Military Guild, Eed Cross branch, Victoria League, Lady Liverpool's Fund Committee of Ladies, St. Vincent do Paul's Society, Belgian Clothes Fund, and tho Swankers' Club.-

Of the Patriotic Association's Fund, £20,000 has been invested in war bonds, between. £5000 and £6000 has been invested in Borough Council debentures, and another £12,000 is about to bo similarly placed. The sum of £7000 is also out in mortgages.

Tho balanco of themoney is invested in the Post Office Savings Bank. The association has tho very widest

powers in the disbursement of moneys on behalf of sick and wounded soldiers and their dependants. Wanganui, perhaps more than any other centre, favours advancing money to put soldiers on the land, but it is done in a most rational way. It will not advance money to secure land,for a returned man at, say, £40 an acre. That might bo all right in some cases, but {he risk on tho average would be too great a responsibility; but, providing tho association considers the man fit and able to "mako a do" of _ moderate-priced land, it will help him not only to the land, and with sjbock, but with the best of advice, which, in farming, is as good yellow gold to tho beginner. 'Jhe association helps the Red Cross blanch when the need'arises, and' is a contributor to tho upkeep of tho Aotea Convalescent Homo at Cairo.

Tho combined area, which supports the association includes the counties of Wangauui, AVaitotara, and part of the Patea County, with a population of from 22,000 to 25,000 people.