Port gets switched on

The progress of the fruit industry in the heart of the famous Teviot district is illustrated in...
The progress of the fruit industry in the heart of the famous Teviot district is illustrated in Mr John Bennetts' fine orchard at Roxburgh. - Otago Witness, 3.6.1914.
There is every probability that the streets of Port Chalmers will be lighted by electricity within a few days' time, as the Waipori power has now been carried through to the suburban town.

Needless to say this lighting will effect a great improvement to Port Chalmers, while about the end of the month the current will be available for the lighting of private houses.

It is understood that the residents of St Leonards have also made application to be supplied with power, and the request has been approved by the Electric Power and Lighting Committee of the City Council, with the results that steps will shortly be taken to have the necessary contribution raised by the local residents.

• Good progress is being made at the Canterbury Petroleum Prospecting Company's works near Chertsey (says the Christchurch Press).

The combined boilerhouse and blacksmith's shop is completed, and the plant installed. A large wooden power wheel has been built and placed in position.

This wheel is 10ft in diameter, and 1ft thick at the rim.

The material for the derrick is on the ground. It is all out to size and ready for erection.

The derrick will be 72ft high, and will be completed, weather permitting, in about 10 days. The plant is the largest and most complete made by the Oil Wells Supply Company of America.

It is practically new, as it has not done 500ft of drilling, and most of the tools have not been used.

The price at which the Canterbury Company obtained the plant is said to be £750.

• The Asiatic overflow into the islands of Sumatra and Java was referred to by Mr Robert J. Walker, the first member of the British Association to reach Australia.

''I was enormously struck,'' said Mr Walker, ''with the preponderance of Chinese and natives in Sumatra and Java. In Batavia and other towns the wealthiest citizens apparently are the Chinese, who own motor cars and houses, and live quite in the European style.''

Mr Walker added that when in Java he spoke to one of the Dutch generals, on the fact that Holland, which owned the country, was so small, and had a population fit for colonising work, and yet did practically no colonising.

How was it?

The general replied that the good business prospects in Holland prevented any system of general immigration.

The result was that Holland's colonising power was certainly not increasing.

''There is no doubt,'' said Mr Walker, ''that the Asiatic overflow south is a coming question.''

Mr Walker visited the tea plantations in Java, where black labour, being so cheap, the residents can compete with almost any tea-growing country in the world.

• Major-general Godley, Officer Commanding the Forces, stated on Saturday that two New Zealand officers were at present being trained in aviation at Home, and when one of them, Lieutenant Burn, returned to New Zealand towards the end of the year, it was probable that he would take the aeroplane Britannia out of the local Defence stores, where it is now deposited, and use it.

The commandant had nothing to say at present regarding the establishment of an aviation school in New Zealand. - ODT, 17.6.1914.

 


COPIES OF PICTURE AVAILABLE FROM ODT FRONT OFFICE, LOWER STUART ST, OR WWW.OTAGOIMAGES.CO.NZ

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