Town Talk

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 40, 17 February 1939, Page 6

Town Talk

Durie Hill Baths. Evidence that the D’irie Hill School baths are hilling a long-felt want is provided in the generous, use being made of them by school-children and residents. Next week the finals of the district championships will be held in the Durie Hill baths. Sports Club Enrolments. At last night’s meeting of the Physical Fitness Week committee, it was decided to ask all sports bodies in Wanganui to keep a record of the enrolments of new members during the week and to have the figures published from time to time. Shops and “Fitness Week.” Special shop window displays will be a feature of Physical Fitness Week in Wanganui. Drapers and hardware stores will devote their windows mainly to sports good’s, while booksellers and newsagents will exhibit volumes pertaining to culture of the mind and the body. New Wanganui Plane. The Wanganui Aero Club's new Tiger Moth aircraft, ZK-AGZ, will be flown to Wanganui from Auckland , by Mr. H. L. Tancred, flying instructor to the club, on February 23. The new machine will increase the club’s fleet to five, the others being a Miles Hawk, Gipsy Moth, Taylor Cub and another Tiger Moth. Lorry Load of Soft Drink. Soft drinks were very much in evidence when a military lorry went over a bank not far from Taihape on Wednesday night. There were 50 dozen bottles on the vehicle and were being taken to the camp at Waiouru. Most of them were smashed. “It is a jolly good job for us that they were soft drinks and not beer,” remarked an occupant of the lorry. 1 Farmers’ Rally. The secretary of the Makirikiri branch of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union, Mr. Frank H. Jones, stated yesterday that he had received advice that the largest of the provincial districts of the union, Auckland, intended to be represented at the big rally at Makirikiri on Tuesday. Two Auckk nd delegates had been appointed.

Sports Blazers. The question of blazers to be worn by those participating in the grand physical fitness procession in Wanganui on Thursday night was discussed at the committee meeting last night. It was decided that all members of local sports bodies, past and present, who hold New Zealand, provincial or Wanganui representative blazers, should wear them in preference to club blazers. "No Strap.” When “physical jerks” were being discussed at a meeting of the Taihape “Physical Fitness Week” committee on Tuesday evening, Mr. Loader remarked to Mr. Whibley (headmaster of the local school) that he hoped there would be no “strap” if some of the “old timers” could not do the necessary bends. Mr. D. Revell pointed out that the exercises would be quite simple and would present no difficulties to the older generation. Injured Sergeant. Sergeant Harold Gillespie, of Wanganui, who was injured when a military lorry which he was driving towards Taihape went over the bank near Mr. B. Collerton’s residence, at Opaea, is reported to be making satisfactory progress in the Taihape Hospital. Private W. T. Collerton, who was the only passenger in the lorry, escaped with a few scratches. The accident occurred within a few yards of his home Might Wander Off. “The disadvantage of an open-air church service revolves round the fact that it offers opportunities for people to wander off until there is nobody left,” remarked Mr. L. B. H. de Lautour, amidst laughter, at. the “Physical Fitness” meeting at Taihape on Tuesday evening. Another member observed that people did not. do that sort of thing in Taihape. The meeting decided upon a service in the Town Hall. Perhaps they thought

that there was something in His Worship’s observation after all. “No Either, Or’’ “You cannot say ‘either or’ about any accident on the road,” said Mr. A. D. Brodie, in the Supreme Court at Wanganui yesterday. “You must take into account all the circumstances round it.” Mr. Brodie said that it was not a trustworthy way to put a case that a motorist should have seen a pedestrian and to put that motorist on the horns of a dilemma that he was either not keeping a proper look out or was travelling too fast. If that “either or” entered into such cases, every motorist who knocked down a pedestrian would be to blame. The state of every motorist on the road was indeed a parlous one. Thirty-one Mile Walk, To decide a wager three Public Works staff employees on the Parapara Road will engage in a walking race from the 31-mile depot to the Durie Hill side of the Town Bridge. The racp is to take place on Saturday (to-morrow) morning. The three competitors intend leaving the depot at 5 a.m. and the estimate is that they will arrive at the bridge about 3 r.m. As one of them, some years ago, was a prominent Queensland amateur

long-distance walker, the contest may awaken a good deal of interest. It can be regarded as a fitting addition to the programme of Physical Fitness Week. Mates of the contestants are hoping that the two hotels the three will have to pass will not be too tempting Aerial Holiday. A member of the Auckland Aero Club, Mr. R. Diggle, recently visited Wanganui in the course of an aerial holiday which covered more than 2000 miles. Accompanied by his wife, Mr. Diggle loft Auckland in a Miles Magister low-wing sports model, on February 4. Their first stop was at Wanganui and the next at Blenheim. The last lap for the first day was to Christchurch, which was reached five hours after leaving Mangere. On subsequent days they made trips in the machine from Christchurch to Lake Tekapo and the Southern Alps, but adverse weather prevented them from carrying out their original intention of crossing the Alps and flying down the West Coast to the Franz Josef glacier They then returned to Mangere in the machine, stopping en route at Palmerston North.,