SUDDEN AFFLUENCE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 July 1939, Page 6

SUDDEN AFFLUENCE

TWO ART UNION WINNERS IN CHRISTCHURCH. ONE AT PRESENT OUT OF WORK. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. Possessors of £2,000, but “broke” — this was the singular position this morning of E. V. Reynolds, aged 21, and T. J. Stewart, aged 20, winners of the first prize of £2,000 in the Art Union. They did not have a penny between them in a tiny room above a second-hand shop in Colombo Street. Reynolds listened intently to the spluttering of his radio when the draw was being broadcast from Wellington last night. His radio was not working well, but he managed to pick up the last three numbers of the winning ticket and the non-de-plume "Two Drunkards.”.

Reynolds handed over the precious winning ticket to a hotel proprietor to be placed in a safe and then he "shouted.” While excitement ran high and beer flowed at a city hotel, Stewart, the other winner, worked on (on night duty) in ignorance of his good luck. He arrived home at his boarding house in Colombo Street at about 1.30 this morning and turned in. still not knowing that he was the winner of £l,OOO for Is 3d.

This morning the two young men told how, one Friday night about a month ago, they were walking up the city when they decided to share in an Art Union ticket. They could not think of a suitable non-dc-plume so. "just for devilment,” the used "Two Drunkards.” They joked among themselves this morning. Reynolds, who is a tire worker. is at present out of work. Both the young men are athletes. Stewart is an amateur middleweight boxer, who last year fought in the Canterbury championships. Reynolds is an Addington League senior reserve forward.