THE Hauraki Plains Gazette With which is incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. Motto Public Service. MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, & FRIDAY. MONDAY, MARCH 21, 1927. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5103, 21 March 1927, Page 2

THE Hauraki Plains Gazette With which is incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. Motto Public Service. MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, & FRIDAY. MONDAY, MARCH 21, 1927. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The chairman of the Hauraki Plains County Council (Cr. E, L. Walton) has learned through Mr A. M. Samuel, M.P., that the visit of the Hon. Ministers of Lands, and Public Works to the Hauraki Plains will be made in Apirl, after Easter.

It's an ill-wind that blows nobody, any good. The large crpjwd which reached Paeroa on Saturday morning only to find that the races were postponed were at rather a loose-end. As a consequence the local hotels did a roaring (or at least a shouting) trade throughout the day.

Fallowing recent large transactions made at Hamilton involving the change of ownership of several valuable farm properties, it is announced that another important deal has just been negotiated, Mr J. B. Westlake, of Pahiatua, having purchased the 691-acre farm of Messrs Matthew Bros. (Hamiltpn). The property, which is situated at Ngahinapouri, including the stock, changed hands at £23,000', which was paid in cash.—“ Times.”

A few weeks back the New York papers announced that plans had been filed with the municipal building department of that.city for an office building 110 storeys high, the topmost point of which would be 1208 ft above the street. America’s highest building is at present the Woolworth Building in New York, which has 58 storeys and soars to 792 ft. Detroit, however, is eclipse this, for the Booh Tower building under construction there is to reach 837 ft.

The steamer Port Caroline, which arrived at Auckland from London a few fiays ago, called at. St. Thomas, West Indies, to replenish her bunkers. The work was done by about 200 negro women, who carried the coal in small baskets on their heads. They walked along a plank on to the steamer in single file, and, after emptying their baskets into the bunker hatch, they returned .to the shore by another gangway for further supplies. It was a case of “many hands make light work,” for in this way the Port Caroline was supplied with 500 tons of coal in seven hours.

The sand used 'far top-dressing the bitumen in Belmont Road made conditions very unpleasant this morning. In addition to being whirled into the air by the fast-moving traffic, the strong nor’-westerly wind carried the sand over the people using the street, filling eyes, ears, and mouth in a most disagreeable way.

Nine houses at Mount Morgan, Queensland, no two being in the same street, ' were sold by the bailiff for £44. The houses, which were erected on miners’ homestead leases, were sbld for arrears, in rates, which totallecl £416. They were in a state of disrepair, windows, doors, and flooring boards being missing. One house, in which a couple were living, was sold Ur £B. Two brought £6 each, and three were released for £2 each.

“Giving away money is my hobby,” once declared Mr Bernhard Baron, head of Messrs Carreras Ltd., tobacco manufacturers. He has just given £!0 0 )t: to the rebuilding fund of the Rcval Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital. The total sum needed is £60,000. On the occasion of his 78th birthday, last December, Mr Baron gave £26,000 to be distributed among various hospitals, and other chanties, and cluing the whole ol last year he distributed about £200,000 to various charities. It is estimated that the total amount of his gifts is now in the neighbourhood of a million.

Two serious hitches just before the performance of the marriage ceremony were not sufficient to deter a M' rrinsviUe couple from entering into wedded bliss last week (says the Waikato Times). The first intervention came with the discovery some 30 minutes before the appointed hour that no marriage license had been

bta.ined, and the second delay occurred when it was found that the ministir who was t<> officiate had mistaken the day fixed for the ceremony. Alter the necessary adjustni'nits, the union was happily effected.