Shannon News FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1924.

Shannon News, 15 February 1924, Page 2

Shannon News FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1924.

Mr Cairns, of tlhe local Post Office staff, has been appointed deputyRegistrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages in, Shannon.

A fe.w days ago Mr J. Swindlehurst, Whilst engaged in flax cutting in the Miranui swamp, severely cut his leg, which will necessitate him laying up for some days. At the Feilding ram fair on Thursday last, Mr Gordon Mitchell, of East road, purchased one of the stud Southdown rams which secured first prize at the Feilding Show*

At a meeting .held in the Methodist Church on Tuesday evening/ it was decided to hold the Harvest Thanksgiving Services on Sunday, February 24. The Rev. Mr Boothroyd will conduct the morning service and Mr Roberts will take the evening service. Suitable hymns will be sung. Both services will be bright and interesting and all who care to come along will be made heartily welcome.

At a special meeting of the! Shannon School Committee last night, the following scheme was adopted' to place before Mr Powell, the Board’s Clerk of Works, who is tq visit Shannon any day now for the purpose of ascertaining what work the Committee will receive a subsidy on: Laying down a tennis court, concrete footpaths leading from the entrance gates to the main buildings, tile draining the boys’ football grounds, extension of asphalt between the main building and the infants’ school, a cricket pitch, laying out a garden, extending tlie woodshed. Also the following apparatus recommended for the children’s playground: Trapeze, ladder, merry-go-round and swings. The whole is estimated to cost £420. The committee after allowing £IOO for the school picnic (have £22o'in hand and if a subsidy can be obtained for the whole amount, there will he sufficient money to carry out the work laid down.

Attention is .drawn to the announcement in our advertising columns regarding the Harvest Thanksgiving Services and Sale of Work, Produce, etc., in aid of the Methodist Church funds. Having a little sewing left from last bazaar, the committee are offering all goods at greatly reduced prices. These goods are mostly for ladies’ and children’s wear and are all well worth buying. There will also be a sweet stall and bran tub for the children. Afternoon tea and supper will also be on hand for those desiring such refreshments. In the evening there will be a short musical programme, which will be made a,s bright and attractive as possible. Admission will be free in the afternoon. In the evening the small amount of sixpence will be charged.

In our advertising- columns, Mr Jay, of Mangaore, announces that he has now extended his delivery of vegetables and fruit, and is able to offer same at much lower prices. Orders can be lefts at Aldersey's.

Miss M. Easton, \vho. has been on the teaching stall at the local school for some time, has left, having secured a position in the Marlborough district.

Recently, there has been quite a number of head-on collisions between motor lorries and cars at Mangahuo, but litle damage has been done. Yesterday one of Mr C. C. Franks’ lorries returning from Arapeti, ’when running down the hill this side left the road and went over title bank about 60 l'eet and alter rolling over righted itself at the bottom. Marvellous to relate practically no damage was done, only the windscreen being broken .and the front steering rod being bent. The driver jumped clear and was uninjured. Gear was .taken out this morning to haul the lorry up on to the roadc

An old offender named Joseph Hourigan who was convicted and discharged at the local court on Monday, agjain made his appearance before Messrs Gunning and Spencer, j.’sP., on Tuesday morning on a similar charge, also (wtitfii vagrancy in that he had no visible means of support. On the first charge he was fined £l, in default 24 hours’ imprisonment and on the second he was convicted and ordered to come up for sentence when called upon, conditionally that he returned to work, which he stated he had to go to. The accused said he arrived on Friday aiternoon in possession of £25, and when arrested at two o’clock on Sunday morning, he had only 2/. In reply to the Bench he stated he had not spent it all in drink, but thought he must have lost it.

A pleasing little function took place at the local school at 9' a.m. yesterday when Miss Vera Aim was presented with the gold medal donated by the Shannon Chamber* of Commerce fur the dux qf the school. Among those present were His Worship the Mayor, and Messrs Gunning, Beard, Murphy and Thwaites, representing the Chamber of Commerce and Messrs Murray and Tippler, the School Committee. Mr Gunning, President oi the Chamber of Commerce, m making the presentation, pointed out that the idea in giving a medal to be competed for annually .was tq encourage the scholars to work hard and although only one could win it it would be the inleans of th|e outers gaining extra knowledge, which would be their reward in, the future. Mr Murray, chairman of the School Committee, thanked the Chamber of Commerce for the medal and congratulated Miss Aim on winning it. He said he felt sure the award of a medal each year would be an incentivie for the scholars to work hard. He referred to the ground improvements that were about to be carried out at the school, also stating they were fortunate in having a good staff and the children had every opportunity of getting on. Three heaTty cheers wore then given for Miss Aim. Wireless transmitting and receiving sets have been fitted to the lifeboats of about 40 ships. These sets have a range up to 50 miles. It is understood that there are between 300 and 400 names on the railway retirement list. There are in parks controlled by the London County Council, 694 tiennis courts, 68 cricket pitches, and 136 bowling greens.

Blouses sold by a manufacturer at 4s lid in England were afterwards seen in a retail shop priced at 35s each, a profit of 600 per cent.

It is probable that the Ashburton Brass Band —a.very fine organisation — will give an open-air entertainment at Otaki on Sunday afternoon.

A fishing club, recently formed at the Otaki beach, purchased a net, and this .morning landed over 300' cod —probably a record catch for the coast.

During the past few months more produce has been railed from Otaki to Wellington than for some considerable time past. On the whole market gardeners of the district have done well. The total amount that passed through the totalisator at the Woodville Jockey Club’s autumn mpeting which concluded on Saturday last, was £25,053, a decrease of £6,506 on last year’s figures. Of the two popular country meeting, the Foxton Racing Club’s figures for their recent meeting, £35,758, shows a good £IO,OOO above the Woodville fixture, although both clubs show a decline this year.

A bald-headed bowlpr came forward to receive his trophy as a member of the runner-up rink upon the conclusion of the final game in the Taranaki Bowling Centre’s tournament at New Plymouth (relates tlip “News”). “Judging by his head, this is the veteran of the rink,” commented the president of the centre (Mr. A. K. Smart). “Yes,” promptly replied the bowlpr pointing to his unthatched pate, “a burnt head.” The retort aroused much laughter. The Maori has created on many occasions, whether consciously or unconsciously, considerable amusement among his pakeha brothers by reason of his quaint apologies and explanations. An incident which is vouched for by a Palmerston North banker reaches novel heights. The Maori client, who had overdrawn his account, arrived to render an explanation, which he couch’ed in thp following illuminating terms: “I am very sorry, but I wrote the cheque out going homo in the car, and the road was so bumpy that I wrote it for too much and I’m sorry.”

Tlie “ assets’ ' of bankrupts arc not always what they sefcrn, or, at any rate, they do not always realise the amounts hoped for. The owner of an asset has always a telescopic view; so has the prospective purchaser — with his ,eyl3 to the large 'end of the 'scope. In a recent Auckland bankruptcy case, among the, “assets" were two motor-buses, which were said to have cost about £I2OO each. One was auctioned on Monday morning. It bore signs of hard usage, but though theife was no reserve, the price expected was £4OO. It was “knocked down" for £33.' An expert stated that the buyer had got a bargain, for the engine alon'e, second-hand, was worth at least £2OO.

No less a sum than £ll6 16s 8d has been collected in Otaki and district towards the radium fund. Some of the dairy factories in the South Island are reported to be storing their butter in anticipation of a shortage in the Dominion in the winter. ,

A horse drawing a milk cart at Greytown .recently took fright at an elephant belonging to Wirth’s circus and thpn bolted, but after traversing a short distance dropped dead.

“Bunny”'is becoming troublesome in the Woodvill'e district, and a Rabbit Association has been formed. The meeting resolved that a levy of lid per acre bp fixed for the current year, and that a .rabbiter be engaged at £l7O per annum.

It is said that the operations of the Ratana movement have been extended in another phasp by the creation of a form of .banking institutions. The funds are believed to already amount to a considerable amount of money, contributed by the natives holding allegiance to the movement.

The Dargavillp Times records the following incident; Mr. Jim Hunter, one of our well-known local “sports/’ had the surprise of his life at Turiwhiri one day recently. A few weeks ago he thought he would set a hen on some duck pggs, so he secured a broody hen, and put a dozen, duck eggs, as he thought, under her. ' When he went \o see how the ducklings were progressing, much to his dismay, he found half of them (six) were young pukekos. Tip work now being done by the Government School Dental Clinic is evidently attracting the atention of people in England, for a request has been received from an authority in the Midlands and also from other sources * for information as to tlife lines on which the New Zealand Dental Clinic is being run. It is believed that in New Zealand this work is far in advance of that of any other country in the world.

“The Daily Mail” states that the will to live was strikingly illustrated by a patient in the Charing Cross hospital, who six weeks ago was admitted suffering from a malignant growth. The specialists decided it was impossibly to operate and the patient learned his end was near, the doctors estimate being ten days. Nevertheless he cabled to his son who was living in Australia. He kept a map at his bedside and daily traced the progress of the steamer bringing his son. He died an hour after the son’s arrival. In the course of a lecturp delivered at Martinborough under the auspices of tlie Farmers ’ Union, Mr. E. B. Eagle said that the average of 1601bs of butter-fat per cow now being produced by the cows of the Dominion was far too low, and with judicious selection could be raised to over 3001bs. He had succeeded in raising the production of his own herd from 2001bs to 400 lbs per cow. He reminded those present that to get the best results stock must be propierly treated, cared for in winter, and never allowed to lie down on an empty stomach. Cows, he said, were often blamed for holding up their milk, but the truth was that the milker was to blame, bustling, or ill-treatmpnt upsetting the cow’s nerves and diverting the blood flow from the mammary gland to other parts of the body. Hence as nearly all the milk was formed during the passage of the blood through the mammary glands, while tlite proeessof milking was going on, diversion of the blood flow meant less milk. for which the milker and not the cow was responsible. October 9th, 1923, will be remembered as a red-letter .Jay in the history of Danish dairy farming, for on that day thp magnificent new State _ Experimental Dairy was opened with due ceremony and in the presence of some 150 guests from all parts of the country, including the Minister for Agriculture, members of both Houses of the Legislature, etc. There were some telling speeches elucidating the marvellous development of Danish dairy farming during the last few decades and emphasising Denmark’s ’determination to keep her place in the van of the industry. The first dairy of 1882 has grown. into some 1600, and about 10,000 tons of milk are every day conveyed to Danish dairies. The new elaborate State Experimental Dairy is situated close.to the town of Hillerod, where the Danish State owns a couple of largo estates, one of which supplies the milk to the dairy. This is built on a veiy large scale, and all appliances and installations are of the most approved type and evidence that at this establishment practical tests and scientific research are to work hand-in-hand.