TRIBUTE TO DOMINION.

Waikato Times, Volume 119, Issue 19892, 22 May 1936, Page 9

TRIBUTE TO DOMINION.

THE BLEDISLOE HALL. RECOGNITION IN BRITAIN. The air mail from Britain yesterday brought to Hamilton a copy of the latest publication issued by the British Steelwork Association, of London, a booklet dealing with the consruction and unique features of the Bledisloe Hall of Agriculture, opened last year by the Waikato Winter Show Association. Attractively printed, and illustrated with an interesting series of photographs showing the hall in various Phases of construction, tlie booklet I gives a comprehensive description of the building and comments that to an Empire whose growth has depended

-so mu oh upon the use of steel, a structure such as the Bledisloe Hall is of outstanding interest. The foreword is supplied by Viscount Bledisloe, a former Governor-General of New Zealand.

“I am glad to commend this booklet to the notice of all who are interested in the construction of public buildings combining symmetry, beauty, stability, rapid construction and inexpensiveness,” says Viscount Bledisloe. “All these desirable characteristics appear to be combined in the spacious and imposing structure, courteously named after myself, recently erected for agricultural exhibitions at Hamilton, the capital of the Waikato, that extremely fertile and sun-kissed area in tlie South Auckland district in New Zealand, famous for its progressive dairy farmers and its renowned dairy nroduce.

"Tlie importance of providing against l ho risk of human injury and financial loss, resulting from earthquakes in a country where seismic disturbance is apt periodically to occur, appears to have enabled an ingenious New Zealand engineer and architect, profiting J»y research and experiments, to o\olve a type of building of great span, possessing that element of atomic continuity, produced by the welding of f, tcel ' »««»»* destined lo open Up liUherto uncontemplated possibilities m the structural utilisation of steel lor public buildings where the accommodation of large crowds, as well as safety and durability, are' important considerations,” lie continues “I sincerely hope that the Bledisloe Hail ot Agriculture in .New Zealand may point tlie way to entirely new ami satisfactory methods of building construction throughout the British Kni-