THE Hauraki Plains Gazette With which is incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. Motto: Public Service. MONDAY. WEDNESDAY. & FRIDAY. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 1926. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVII, Issue 4952, 17 March 1926, Page 2

THE Hauraki Plains Gazette With which is incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. Motto: Public Service. MONDAY. WEDNESDAY. & FRIDAY. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 1926. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The second day’s racing of the Ohinemuri Jockey Club is to be held to-day.. Weather conditions are exceptionally good, and conditions point to a successful meeting.

To-day, being St. Patrick’s, Day, is being observed as a holiday by the banks and law offices.

A petition to the Licensing Committee is now being largely signed in Kerepeehi asking fon the granting of a license for an hotel in the township.

The. sum of £3BOO lias been distributed by the Auckland'Rugby Union in charities, donations, and benefits during .the last five years.

• Butchers of Thames have lowered the price of all meat, except sausages, one penny per pound from Monday last.

At the Waihi Police Court on Thursday, before Mr J. Murray, J.P., Claude Haines, a youth of .17 years, was charged with the theft of a pocket wallet containing £9, the property of Cecil Haines, his brother. !It appears that' Cecil, on discovering his loss,, reported the matter to the police, who subsequently traced the mlssfing property. On the application of the police the cape was remanded, to "the 19th inst.

At Thursday’s! meeting of the Paeroa Borough Council a, circular letter was received from the N.Z. Sports Protection League pointing out the advantages, to every section eff the community of the .adoption of what is known as “daylight saving” and asking the council to express an opinion 7n the subject. On the motion of Cr. B. Edwards, secopded by Cr. J. Pinder, it was decided to support the proposal.

A remarkable feature in connection with the iioll in Waihi last week for .the election of a licensing committee was the fact that no' I'jss than 111 votes proved to be informal. This, (sayis the “Telegraph’ty is no doubt in a measure to be attributed to the failure of the electors concerned to carefully check the lengthy list after striking out the names of the candidates (22 in all) for whom they did not intend to vote in order to make Sure t,ha,t they had allowed more than five to remain on the ballot paper. In the majority of cases where the papers were informal six names had been left on.

Instead of going to school on Friday morning, a youngster of twelve; who lives with friends outside the borough boundary, decided on a walking trip to Taranaki (sttateg' the Wa,ikato Times). the pony which he usually rides to school in t ( h& adjoining paddock, he commenced to walk to Te kuiti, where he was picked up by a motorist, who conveyed him to the King Country centre. His benefactor had an idea, however, that something wa.s wrong, and upon arrival at Te Kuiti he communicated with Hamilton, as a result of which the youngster was apprehended and returned to Hamilton. A touch of. pathos wasi lent to the affair by the fact that the little ’fellow wanted to wplk to- Waitara. to see his, father, a widower, from whom he has been separated for gome time.

The Railway Department draws attention to particulars of holiday excursion and train services, advertised in this issue in connection with the Thames Trotting Club’s meeting at Para ; wai on the 20th inst.

A cable message from London states that a shocking disaster has occurred at the Thorne Colliery, Doncaster. Six men in a cage were concreting the face of a sha.ft when the rope broke, and the cage crashed 220 ’feet and plunged into the water. The men were pinned under the* wreckage and drowned like rats in a trap. Heroic rescuers, were powerless.

While dying in the Waikato Hospital Peter Rawiri made a statement to the police completely clearing up the •mpstery of the tragic explosion which occurred at Te Rapa on Tuesday. He admitted that, prompted by jealousy, he had deliberately blown up his wife and then cut his own throat. At the inquest held at Hamilton yesterday the Coroner returned a verdict that the woman died the result df injuries wilfully inflicted by her husband with the intent of causing her death by means of an explosion of gelignite while in a fit of jealousy.

Mr A. M. Samuel, M.P., who has been at Paeroa since Friday morning, leaves to-day for Auckland. To-mor-row Mr Samuel will meet the South Auckland members of Parliament, and with them will confer with the South Auckland Rural Counties’ Association. In .the afternoon he will meet the members of the Waikato D®* velop merit League on the Gordonton swamp area, and in the evening will attend a public banquet to be .tendered to the Hon. J. A. Young at Hamil ton. "

In reply to Mr D. Le.ach, ame jer of the deputation that waited on Mr A. M.-Sa.muek M.P., with regard to a public crushing plant at. Karangahake last night, the member agreed that gold to the value ofc half a million sterling was worth more to the country than a million sterling worth of dairy produce. ''

The seventeenth week of the Exhibition at Dunedin closed on Mon lay night wjth the. grand total) of th® attendance" at 2,10'4,740, equal to the wonderful daily average of 20,839.

During January 777 men were employed on railway construction ■vyork on the East Coast line between Waihi and Tauranga, Of these 125 were artisans/ajid 652 labourers;

The Piako County Council has decided to appeal to the ratepayers for a loan of £3500 to erect a new council Chambers.

A start has been made with the work of removing the old post office building from Ngatea to K'aihere. Settlers of Kaihere are undertaking the job. , . '

Territorial trainees of A and D companies,, first battalion, Hauraki Regiment, who were unable 1 to attend the annual camp at Ngaruawahia at the beginning of this month have been notified tha,t it will, be compulsory 'for .them to attend the. casual camp to be held at Hopuhopu Yroin May 1 to 8, inclusive.

The new railway station yard at Paeroa had ample accommodation for the .additional .traffic and rolling stock occasioned by the races on Saturday. The outward Auckland special. on Saturday evening comprised 20 vehicles, the Waikato special 14, Waihi special 6, Thames special 10, Frankton’ordinary train 6, .Waihi second train 4- It is estimated that the number of passengers carried on the railway from Paeroa was much lesjs than for the corresponding day last yea ; r. This may be accounted TOr by the fact that the motor traffic to the racecourse was heavier than on previous years. s

For some months occasional sales of farm properties have been quietly taking pla,ce in Matamata district. Mr W..Hope’©' farm of 286 acres has been sold to Mr L. Hastings, of Hamilton, the figure being in the vicinity of £3O per acre. Also, a part <Jf. the Quinlan estate,'2Bo acres, has-been disposed of to Mr N. H. Pryce, of Hikutaia. A Walton property of 117 acres has been sold to Mr Webster, late of the Home country, where he was nianager of a large estate, the purchase price being £43 per acre. —Morrinsville Star.

The Haura.ki Plains County’s employees are now engaged in completing the Gumtown bitumen road. The laying of the top course of' metal commenced 1 on Monday. When'this work is completed the gang will be shifted to the Turua-Netherton and the Kerepeehi-Wharepoa roads.

In anticipation .of getting an hotel license for Kerepeehi plans are now being made for the erection of a commodious building on the hill opposite the post office. It is reported that arrangements have been even for the cartage of the. timber for the buildinc. '

A public notice exhibited at Kerepeehi above the signature of two Wharepoa settlers exhorts ratepayers to be progressive and not to sit back and allow the Wharepoa; ferry to be closed. A meeting is to be held at Wharepoa to decide what .action shall be taken..

.The work of asphalting the platform in front of the loceQl. railway station buildings has been completed, and is now being extended' along the platform towards Hill, Street. When this portion is finished a start is to be made with tarring and sanding the platform on the other side of the buildings towards the Paeroa-Pokeno loop line. The porters appreciate the asphalt, as they have had rather an arduous time pushing heavily laden barrows' through the loose sand during the process of the earth work consolidating.

“It is remarkable how tamely people will submit to operations,” said Dr. Unwin in addressing the Hospital Board’s Conference at Dunedin on “Hospital Staffing.” “They simply take it as a matter of course when a surgeon tells them that they have to be cut open, and in .the vast majority of cases they never think it advisable, to have .a conslulta.tion with another doctor.” He considered that there were far too many operations, and he blamed, this largely to what he described as “the enthusiasm of young hospital surgeons.”