City Gives Freely for Poor and Needy

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 407, 16 July 1928, Page 8

City Gives Freely for Poor and Needy

CASH AND GOODS, £12,000

BEST DRIVE IN NEW ZEALAND

main charitable organisations in Auckland, and a number of smaller ones, will benefit from the clothing and funds collection made on Saturday by the Commercial Travellers' and Warehousemen’s Association. The campaign was the most successful held in New Zealand, for charity. Impressive figures supplied to-day show the extent of the drive. Over 20.000 parcels, at a value of about £IO,OOO, were collected within five miles of the Post Office, and from as far away as Papatoetoe. SOO TONS OF CLOTHING Weighing roughly 300 tons, there is a mountain of clothing at the chief city depot. To remove it, 150 motor trucks will have to be brought into action. About £ I.SOO was the sum from the actual money canvass. This means that the combined proceeds of the campaign will exceed £12.000, includ ing the maximum subsidy of £ 20" which is being allowed by the Government. Provided the organisations which will receive shares from the collection know the needy cases in the city, there is no reason for anyone wlj.j deserves assistance to go without clothes this winter. Clothes of every description, hais footwear, piano stools, blankets, rugs, mattresses, kerosene stoves, bedsteads, perambulators, buckets, vegetables and household supplies are among the surprising miscellany at the depot. Sorting and distribution began to-day and will go on for about a week, keeping dozens of people busy. Over 1,500 workers, 400 cars and 5 1 trucks were engaged in the actual canvass. There is enough material to clothe 5,000 people. APPRECIATIVE OFFICIALS Association officials are more than satisfied with the results. They an surprised and appreciative. Several told The Sun to-day that the proceedswere well beyond expectations and last year’s canvass is completely dwarfed in comparison. Sorters have a knotty problem iu ensuring judicious distribution. On this subject, charitable organisations’ representatives were met this morning. Mr. W. H. Prentis, association president, told them the approximate results of the drive and issued than to a sympathetic city. “Whenever we have approached the residents ol Auckland and suburbs to support such an undertaking, they have stood solidly behind us,” he said. “The public took charge on Saturday. Even now we cannot estimate fully the results, but the quantity and the value stated are on a conservative basis." Collectors say that the generosity of residents in the poorer areas was a feature. Gifts from these districts were sensible and useful, almost invariably. Some offerings were singularly inappropriate. From one suburb came a dozen dinner and evening suits. One man gave a silk top hat. Mr. Garton, manager of the Poverty Bay “court" at the Winter Exhibition, has been so impressed with the response that he has offered the association the surplus from his districts exhibit.