WAR MENTALITY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 September 1939, Page 4

WAR MENTALITY

INTER-HOUSE ASSOCIATION VIEWS. REQUEST TO MAYOR & COUNTY CHAIRMAN. The restricted retail trading in the town consequent upon the outbreak of war, was discussed at the annual meeting of the Wairarapa Inter-House Association last night. As representatives of business houses, delegates were concerned with the need for maintaining business at a normal level and a motion was passed to approach the Mayor (Mr T. Jordan) and the chairman of the County Council (Mr R. Gordon Lee) with a view to making an appeal to the public towards that end.

The activities of certain organisations which were already', preparing for war conditions, many of which were hardly likely to occur in New Zealand, were also discussed. It was decided to ask the Mayor and the county chairman to try, if possible, to curtail these activities which were only upsetting the mental balance of people and to suggest that individual group efforts concerning war conditions should cease until a national scheme of voluntary aid could be organised under proper civic direction and in keeping with the realities of the war situation in the Dominion.

One of the major reasons for planning to continue the association’s activities on a full scale this year was to help'take people’s thoughts off the war. ' Sporting rivalry would be a real tonic, it was thought, and every effort would have to be made to keep the public in a normal state of mind, unhampered by < foolish talk of invasion and undeterred by the tragedy of war.