REMARKABLE MODEL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 January 1940, Page 8

REMARKABLE MODEL

CRIPPLED CHILDREN BENEFIT. The profits from one of the most unusual attractions in “Playland” at the Centennial Exhibition will go to the Crippled Children’s Society in New Zealand, according to a statement made by Mr H. C. Harcourt, Taumarunui, who created the model. By arrangement with the Toe H movement, who have ceated a special trust fund for the purpose, the proceeds from the exhibition of this amazing model will “be donated to the crippled children fund for the formation of crippled children's clubs in various parts of the Dominion. For this reason the support of this attraction is well merited, and the thousands of visitors who are seeing it during their stay at the Exhibition can feel that they are helping a worthy cause as well as enjoying themselves. Extensive publicity will be given the Little Theatre through the co-operation of various bodies, youth movements and church organisations. Visitors from all parts of the world have praised Mr Harcourt’s work enthusiastically. The theatre took him five years to build and is a completely faithful representation of an English theatre building from street front to back stage. The interior of the theatre is finished in intricate detail, even to the panelling of the vestibules and of the tiny electric lift, which has a sliding door and mirrors. Mr Harcourt, who did all of the work himself, has been anxious for some time for some charitable organisation to benefit from the exhibition, of the Little Theatre, and the arrangement he has reached with the Toe H movement is extremely gratifying to him, he said. He created the building because of his love of the stage and his remarkable skill has resulted in the creation of a unique model.