NEWS AND NOTES.

Hutt News, Volume 1, Issue 21, 20 January 1928, Page 3

NEWS AND NOTES.

According to an advertisement which appeared in the "Petone Chronicle" of Saturday last, an extraordinary vacancy has occurred on the Lower Hutt Borough Council, owingto the resignation of Councillor E. W. Hunt (through ill-health). The 27th of January has been set down as the last day for receiving nominations, and the election will take place on Wednesday, the Bth of February, 1928. We suggest that this will be a grand opportunity for the Lower Hutt Business Men's Association to put a strong man in the field to contest this seat both in their own interests and those of the Borough.

Messrs. R. Y. Shearer Ltd. have an advertisement in this issue calling attention to their summer and clearance sale which starts on Thursday of next week. Thrifty buyers are asked to keep this in mind and be on hand when the sale starts to participate in the bargains always obtainable at the firm's well-known season end sales.

The Hutt Valley Swimming Club draws attention by advertisement to their grand carnival to be held in the Riddiford Baths on January 30th, commencing at 8 p.m. Champions returning from the Dunedin championships will be present, and the programme will consist of handicaps, fancy diving, novelty items, etc. The public are asked to give generous support to this club, which is doing so much in this district to teach the young folk the art of swimming.

A Lower Hutt Domain.—By recent Gazette notice the Lower Hutt Borough Council has been appointed to control the Mataiawa Domain, situated in the Normandale Settlement, Lower Hutt.

It is with great regret that we learn of the l-esignation of Councillor E. W. Hunt from his position as councillor on the Lower Hutt Borough Council owing to ill-health. During Mr. Hunt's term on the Council he has proved himself a valuable member, and several of the progressive measures adopted and successfully carried put was due to his keen business ability and foresight. He was chairman of the Estates Committee and the many successful property deals on behalf of the Council were mainly due to his outstanding experience and ability. His resignation will be sincerely regretted, -and the ratepayers will lose the services of a man who was both careful and thorough. Mr. Hunt will have the sympathy of the entire community in his illness and we trust that at no distant date he will be with us again in the fullness of health and vigour.

The engagement is announced of Lorna May, third daughter of Mr. and Mrs. G. A. Chapman, Lower Hutt, to John Francis, third son of Mr. and Mrs. C. F. Millward, Wanganui.

At the last meeting of the Hutt County Council Mr. Walter Dyer, of Epuni, Lower Hutt, was appointed a member of the newly-formed Wellington Suburban Water Board.

Mr. J. E. Cairns announces in our advertising columns that, owing to his removal to new premises (late Everybody's), the whole of his stock has been considerably reduced in price in order to save removal expenses. There are many bargains in every department.

The Lower Hutt Amateur Athletic and Cycling Club are arranging a big afternoon meeting for the 28th January at the Hutt Recreation Ground. The programme, now drawn up, provides for twenty-one events, and all branches of the sport are well catered for. Judging by the enthusiasm displayed at the previous evening meetings held this year, a record attendance is anticipated and a tiptop afternoon's sport is assured. Entries close at noon on Saturday, January 21st, 1928.

A local correspondent inquiries if there is any near future chance of

Melling swingbridge collapsing in the heart of an exceptionally severe gale, as during the past winter, under adverse weather conditions, its many hitherto taut wire strand :; shook like an aspen, and its creaking and swaying timbers made journeying across it, to and from Melling station, worse than a rough sea journey across Cook Strait. A quarter of a century since construction, we intend to inquire, and make due report.

N.I.P. (Petone). —Sorry the "Hutfc News" cannot assist you to the extent you desire. It would take far too much of our space to correct your verses so as to make them worth sending to your friends as a memento of an enjoyable holiday. Besides, ouv chief poet is away holiday-making-, and probably going through some of the same hectic experiences you seem to have had. Both in metre and rhyme you are very erratic, and first of all you must decide on a standard in both respects. This is how you begin:—

My memory recalls King Country days, When everyone seemed happy, For the piano played from morn till night, Songs were sung, some short, some snappy.

Looks as if other things than the songs got very short towards the end.

By advertisement in our columns, Mr. Frank Thomas announces his end-of-season sale, commencing January 31st next. Prices have been reduced regardless of cost, and there are baiv gains for all.

Charged with obtaining £50 from Bertram George Spooner at Lower Hutt by means of a false pretence, Andrew Alexander Clark, alias Hugh Grant, a labourer, aged 20, was remanded till a later date.

The engagement is announced of Mr. P. H. Latham, youngest son of Mr. R. Latham, of Lower Hutt, to Esther, youngest daughter of Mrs. and the late Mr. J. Eggers, of Upper Moutere, Nelson.

The local Eastern Hutt schoolgrounds, on Sunday evening last, presented an animated appearance in the vicinity of the asphalt tennis courts on which quite a number of youths, on cycles, held round-track events., whilst some venturesome youngster— an onlooker probably—tolled the school bell lightly, according to laps. The Riddiford play area denied them on Sundays, some youths would invade a cemetery for recreation, unless the caretaker caught them off-guard.

Local tennis tournament players were a little dismayed at the threatened showers of Saturday afternoon last, but save a sprinkle of rain now and then, and a slight breeze to contend with, all contests took place according to programme, although the top form of some of the club champions had evidently escaped them, as a result of holiday-making interfering with practice, accounting for the few "surprises" registered, and to be "wiped-out" later on. * * *

Local radio enthusiasts were delighted to get into touch with Sydney Stadium on Saturday night last (14th instant) and enjoy the splendid description given of the Sullivan-Puttini fight. In spite of the usual "howling" of the dingoes of the aerial night world groping for their various fardistant objective, and in the absence of undue "pading" of any kind throughout the entire contest, every one of the fourteen rounds came over the air with graphic clearness, and with added emphasis, when the announcer declared that Johnny Sullivan, of Ireland, had beaten Bruno Puttini, of Italy, in fair fight.

As a result of inserting a sixteenword scatter advertisement in the recent issue of the "Hutt News" a local fruiterer informs us that he got orders for the goods he named at a price, from many new customers even unknown to his rounds by motortruck. On the strength of this small advert, he is doubling his orders for similar fruits from Greytown this week,

Our township presented quite a busy appearance, as usual of late, on Friday evening last, "shopping night," despite the usual prediction of anything but good fortune happening to anyone on a Friday, the thirteenth.

The holidays over, for adults, only the youth of our schools are left to enjoy utter freedom from the workaday world and its cares—and, in every nook and corner, with and without leave, are finding new playgrounds for cricket pitches and such like summer pastimes.

Complaints have reached us of several small boys in the near vicinity of Gadsby's butchery at the Taita end of our township, who not only play, at the risk of their lives, on the bitumen, highway, but return the kindness of considerate motorists slowing-down past them, by throwing stones at and after their cars. An occasional sight of a policeman might improve matters' in this vicinity, failing a good oldfashioned hiding from chance observant pas and mas not wishing any harm to child or car.

Pedestrians walking the Hutt traffic bridge of a night are regularly "halted," at its western end, by an "odour" that reminds them of anything other than the old-time perfume "Jockey Club," or the more recent "Ashes of Roses" of this, our jazz age; but these need not fear surreptitious burial there, for it is only one of the local gas mains arguing out the nightly conundrum whether it, or the old traffic bridge, enjoys the greater strength. Leeks are pretty strong, but this particular "leak"— my stars!

Quite a furore of local excitement smote the peaceful citizens of Upper Hutt township on the evening of Saturday, 14th instant, when two speed maniacs, aboard their motor-cycle, came passing through their midst, with a terrific blast, doing anywhere in the vicinity of sixty miles an hour. Only the Hutt Road speed-cop, Morrison, on his new "Brough"—calculated to do 100 m.p.h.—>could have overtaken them that night; but, all the same, local sages predict, in the said township, that they met their "Waterloo" elsewhere.

The Wellington Courts collected some £250 of fine-money the other day, from motorists and others flagrantly (if, in some cases, quite innocently) failing to observe the existing motor regulations. These will be wise to give the proposed universal motor regulations, shortly to be enacted, a deal more study than the milder ones of to-day which, except from an undertaker's point of view, are too good to last.

In the absence of street lights on Saturday night (14th instant) pedestrians coming home from the pictures and elsewhere ran the gauntlet, at the various cross-roads, of the usual quota of cyclists (motor and pedal) without lights or bell who—despite fines and warnings of every kind— still continue to make a "Brooklands speedway" of every highway and byway that gets them home with a safe neck in doing their usual "measured mile." These persistent law-breakers are a perfect menace to our community which looks on aghast at the few appearance of such individuals at our local Court.