These Events Made News

New Zealand Listener, Volume 37, Issue 952, 8 November 1957, Page 20

These Events Made News

STORIES THAT MADE THE HEADLINES is the title given to the next series in the popular This Is New Zealand programme heard from the ZBs at 7.30 p.m. on Wednesdays, Starting this week on November 6, Wellington journalist Nevile Webber will talk about the big news stories of this century. He will give the authentic newspaper flavour ‘to the broadcasts as he tells of the strivings behind the scenes by reporters and papers to be first with the news. In the course of his research for this programme, Mr Webber turned over scores of old files of New Zealand newspapers, now housed in the General Assembly Library in Wellington. The first of his talks is on the only tragedy among Tasman flights-the attempt by New Zealanders Hood and Moncrieff to be the first to fly over from Australia. Most of Wellington stayed up that night and ever since then people have argued as to what really happened to the flyers. Another sensational aviation story in the series is about the first solo crossing by Guy Menzies, the young Australian who startled the world by announcing that he was flying off to Perth and instead landed head first in a Westland swamp. There’s the classic newspaper hoax story about the finding of a moa in the Urewera Country that made headlines round the world (until papers realised they had been hoaxed), and the saga of the wreck of the Elingamite in 1902, which gave its name to a poker hand (one with three kings). There is

the story of the tremendous Rongotai Wool Store fire, with its surprising sequel, and of the mysteriously unheralded arrival in New Zealand of two officers who were to tell New Zealand -after they had told the world-of Captain Scott’s death on his journey back from the South Pole. One talk, which entailed much research, deals with four prisoner-of-war ascapes in New Zealand, including that of the German sea-raider Count von Luckner, who returned to the scene of his exploits between the wars. Another tells how the famous Rotorua guide Alfred Warbrick crossed the boiling lake of Waimangu Geyser in a rowing ‘boat, a feat scores among the hundreds: who had gathered to see could not bear to watch, Nevile Webber, who is 38, is with the Wellington Evening Post. For four years he was the London correspondent of the New Zealand Herald, the Evening Post, the Press, and the Otago Daily Times. A regular reviewer in the ZB book session on Sunday evenings, he is the New Zealand correspondent of the BBC, and also the joint-editor of the N.Z.R.S.A. Review. 3