AMERICAN ITEMS.

Hokitika Guardian, 21 January 1924, Page 2

AMERICAN ITEMS.

tUSTKAI.IAN AND N.Z. CABLE ASSOCIATION. THE POLAR ELY. '.Received this day at 8 a.m.) WASHINGTON, Jan. IS. Mr Detiby, testifying before the House Naval Affairs Committee, (cabled on January loth) declared the vast unexplored area contiguous to Alaska constituted a constant challenge to the United States and justified tho' Polar flight. Another power will, within a year photograph a map of this region if we do not. The Arctic Circle area is certain to he of high strategic value commercially and militarily and is the property of the United States. The Z.ii.t. will cruise over a million square miles of unexplored territory. The flight will not he especially hazardous and the cost is estimated at 185,0110 dollars. Lieut.-Commander Bartlett, who aee< mpankd Peary, the discoverer of the North Pole, also testifying, recommended the flight and endorsed its practicability. Other naval experts affirmed the Z.E.l.’s experience in the gale (cabled on Kith January), which only demonstrated the vessel’s airworthiness regarding the polar expedition.

A SERIOUS ACCIDENT.

(.Received this dav at 8 a.m.5 NEW YORK, Jan. 19. A balcony railing at an indoor athletic meeting collapsed and 300 hoys were hurled to the floor. Seventy were injured, most of them seriously Six thousand hoys and their parents croudad the large Armory building at "Brooklyn to watch the inter-school track contest. Several hundred hoys filled the balcony anil during unexciting finish in the ,110yds run, Hie youngsters ehowded fnrivai'd on the balcony vailing. M,libers fainted, as amid shrieks and writhing, a mass ot hoys were prori pi la led mi to the centre ot 'he floor. - i ushell forward, a panic reoy, police re: tines end firemen being culled out. Ll*HiC' Ul" C'ISITAD AvTi tins day at 3 a.m.) AY ASHING! ON, Jan. 19. Representative Sherwood, 88 years old, made a stirring speech in Congress against the Volstead Act. lie declared that lie signed the temperance pledge when twelve years old and will never vote for a law which tolerates intoxicating liquors as a lieteiage. lie cited figures showing tho mounting consumption of British liquors in America and said that since the Volstead Act was passed drinking had increased among young men and girl. It has become a menace to orderly society. The anti-saloon league said' the act would reduce crime to a ' - minimum and largely reduces the divorce evil, hut after four years experience we find not a single promise had been kept. Crime has increased forty per cent, divorces in fifty cities have increased thirty-live per cent, and murders had increased forty per cent. The fearful record of our narcotic addicts is even worse now, numbering nearly a million victims as reported by the highest medical expert.