THE OPOTIKI NEWS Wednesday, January 18, 1939. LOCAL AND GENERAL

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 135, 18 January 1939, Page 2

THE OPOTIKI NEWS Wednesday, January 18, 1939. LOCAL AND GENERAL

Meeting of Ladies. A meeting for the purpose of forming a ladies’ .committee for the A. and P. Association will be held in the It. S.A. Club Hopm to-morrow. Dance at Waiotahi. A dance under the auspices of the Waiotahi Women’s Institute will be held in the Waiotahi Hall cm Thursday night. Temperatures. The weather was fine throughout the North Island' yesterday morning. Temperatures at 9' o’clock were: Auckland and Tauranga 61 degrees, Opotiki and East Cape 62, Gisborne 64, Napier 65, and Wellington 58. Commissioner of Police. On a tour of police stations in the East Cbast and Gisborne districts,, the Commissioner of Police, Mr. D. J. Cummings, was a visitor toi Opotiki on Saturday. He was accompanied by Inspector Edwards. The Commissioner travelled to Gisborne! via the new coastal route, visiting police stations oqi the way. Kereu River Bridge. It is understood that the lvereu liver bridge will be available for tli’e use of traffic on the new East Coast highway as from to-dav. Although the completion of the bridge lias been a. little longer than expected, the low level of the river since Christmas has caused no trouble to traffic using the temporary pontoon bridge.

Fast Travelling. Members of tlie Minister’s party at the Tauranga aerodrome opening, were afforded an example of the speed and convenience of air travel when they made the first stage of their southward journey from Tauranga to Gisborne direct. The airline distance between these fields is 122 miles. Flying over the AYaioeka saddle, the airliner Karoro completed the journey in 52 minutes, ground to ground. Feeding Out of Maize. Owing toi the dry conditions in Poverty Bay some farmers in that district have been compelled to cut portion of the maize crops to feed to dairy stock. Should the dry weather continue much longer the area which will be harvested will be considerably reduced owing to the inroads being made on the seed crops. There is likely to be a shortage of liay for the winter, many hay padd.ocks having to be given over to grazing.

Telegraphic Interruption. Considerable trouble lias been given to telegraphic communication in the Gisborne district as the result of the high winds. On Tuesday telegraphic communication was cut off for four hours with Napier. In addition, communication with Auckland was very “shaky”. There was trouble between Motu and Opo'-tiki, and: practically no traffic was possible with the north during the morning and until 2.45 p.m.

Meeting of Company Members. An extraordinary, general meeting of members of the Bay of Plenty Press Company, Ltd. will lie held at Whakatane to-night at 8 o’clock, to consider, and it thought fit, to pass the following resolution as an extraordinary resolution: “That the company cannot by reason of 1 its liabilities continue its business, and that it is advisable to wind up the same, and that ,accordingly. the company be wound up voluntarily.” A meeting of creditors of the 'above-named company will be held in the Whakatnn© County Chambers at 11 o’clock to-morrow morning. Exceptional Wind. The gale which swept the Gisborne district on Tuesday did much damage to orchards and commercial growers will lose heavily through the- dropping of fruit and! then damage done to trees. The present season has been excellent for tlie maturing stone fruits to date, and most orchards were carrying heavy crops. Plums have beei> viinusually prolific, and peaches and nectarines also were bearing extremely well. Tuesday's wind brought down a substantial proportion of the „erop throughout the district, however, according to information from various sources.

Big Sports Meeting. What should be one of the finest sports meeting ever held in the Bay of Plenty, and certainly the best ever held in Opotiki, will take place .on the Reserve on Saturday afternoon, when teams from Gisborne, Opotiki, Whakatane. Te Pulse, Tauranga, Rotorua, and Te Awamutu will take part. Competitors from the Whangarei and Paerpa Athletic Club’s have also announced their intention, of coming, A novelty will be an exhibition of hammer throwing by the well-known athlete Leelcie, of Whangarei.

A Puzzled Importer. From day to day strange anomalies in the working out of the import controil regulations are being experienced by importers. An Auckland man who lias been in the habit of importing heavy chemicals from Japan finds that these are no longer obtainable there. He therefore applied for a license to import a similar, quantity from England, at. the same time disclosing that last year he imported! so much from Japan. The baffling reply, of the department has been to refuse him a permit to import from England, but to grant him one tot import from Japan. • -