GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 2001, 10 July 1919, Page 4

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Jeff Hanson, on liis twentieth birthday, which was also the first anniversary of his marriage, was sentenced to 00 years’ imprisonment for the cold-blooded murder of his 37-year-old bride at Galveston. He confessed that he shot Ids pretty young wife, who was the daughter of a -neighbouring farmer and the hollo of the district, just after she had finished a dance with her uncle. He said he had intended also to kill himself, because he could not bear to see other people dancing with his wife. When the dance was finished she and her uncle went to the puneh-bowl near the window where Hanson was standing. Hanson said he fired the shot through the window (hat killed his wife. Some interesting details are given of the late Mr Frank Woolworth,' the millionaire president of the great Woolworth shop combine in New York. He was 67 years old., Mr Woolworth began his career as a simp assistant at Waterton, New York State, arid it was there jjjjat he first conceived the idea of a shop where prices would range from 2£d to sd, but no higher. His capital at this lime was £l, but he soon began to make himself felt in his own world-of business, and a few. years before the war it was his boast that in the States he could set up a newly-married couple’s household, in everything except Heavy furniture, for £2 or £3. Mr Woolworth. employed over 25,000 assistants, while his shops in the States and Grea-: Britain numbered 1,175, The Woolworth-Buildings, in New York, is the tallest in the world. The ex-Crown Prince entertains the idea of returning to Germany on the conclusion of peace, according to a “well-informed quarter,” and intends to reside at Potsdam as a private person, or to settle in a cast! ■in North Germany. The cx.Crown Princess and her children arc still at Potsdam. They lead a very simple life. Prince Eitel Friedrich lives In his little castle at Potsdam. Prim s Adelherg remains at Iris villa in Kiel; and Prince August, whose palace has been occupied by the Government, lives at the house of an industrial magnate, with his family. Prince Joachim is-still in Potsdam, but no member of the former Royal Family has been seen in Berlin, where they are not at all popular. Figures showing how workers in poison, gases escaped inlluenza arc. cited in a report by Dr. Frank Slnutlobotham of (he Medical Research Committee. “The information Ims been collected from 20 sources in different parts of Ihe country. It all points in the same direction—that, with the exception of phosgene gas, workers in other poison gases have enjoyed a very high degree of immunity from influenza infection.” In a factory in Staffordshire employing 200 men and woman there were only two eases of influenza, and one of these gof’it on his way from Scotland. This was only one per mmt., while among the factory medical officer’s outside patients 24 per cent, had the disease. The German Foreign Office recently complained of a picture appearing in the Canadian war paintings exhibition depicting the erucitication of Canadian soldiers by Germans, and entitled “Canada’s Golgotha.” The German Foreign Office claimed that the Canadian Government had lent its sanction to “an invented outrage.” Although the Canadian Government has not yet signified its acceptance of this work for any national purpose, certain investigations have been made concerning the truth of the incident which the picture purports to illustrate, and a considerable amount of evidence has already been collected. There are sworn statements by soldiers of the best character serving in the Canadian and Imperial armies who were unknown to each other, and between whom there was no possibility of collusion, the effect of which is identical that on or about Apr'! 13th, 1915, in passing along a road near St. Julien, Belgium, they saw a soldier pinned to a barn door by bayonets through the hands and wrists, and that this soldier wore a uniform and identification badges, which led them to believe that he was a Canadian soldier.

The triumph of prohibition in America has been quickly followed by the development of a problem which threatens to occupy the attention of the reformers to an even greater degree than that of drunkenness. Since the price of whisky became almost prohibitive the authorities have discovered that large masses of .people are ha ving recourse to drugs, which are wrecking their health and nerves. The Health Commissioner for New York, Dr. Copeland, attributes the drug curse in a great Pleasure o the inability of those accustomed to stimulants to procure whisky. He declares there are today between 200,000 and 300,000 drug addicts in New York alone,and that the metropolis is facing the “gravest narcotic menace in its history/' The police have made amazing discoveries. In the course of the last six months no fewer than a million, and a-half prescriptions for narcotics have been given by thirty New' York doctors alone. One medical man arrested has been in , the habit of prescribing for over 1,000 patients daily.