AN IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 4011, 30 May 1884, Page 3

AN IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.

Invercakgill, This day. At the Waste Lands Board yesterday T. J. Thompson, of the Bluff, applied for 21 years' lease of a section there, over which he has had a year's protection while experimenting in making cement. Ho has succeeded in turning out a plaster cement of a useful kind. Mr J. T. Thompson, late Surveyor-General, waited on the Board and bore testimony to the good qualities of the cement for plaster. Mr T. J. Thompson states that Mr Jones gave samples to Mr J. T. Thompson and others. Mr T. d. Thompson says he has made an important discovery by accident, and can now tarn out an article resembling and equal to Portland cement. Hβ has spent £300 in experiments, and says it will take £3000 to put plant on the ground. The Board did not think the industry sufficiently developed, and only renewed the license for a year, after which, if the experiment prove successful, a 21 years' lease will be granted. Thompson has patented the cement. He says he can produce it at 12s a cask. The supply of the raw material is very large, and is said to be mainly decomposed granite rock and silt from the foreshore of the harbor.