THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1936.
KING GEORGE V MEMORIAL INVENTOR OF MECCANO IS DEAD
FOR HONGKONG
OFFICIAL SCHEME.
His Excellency the Governor, has been informed from many quarters of a general desire that Hong Kong should possess a worthy Memorial to His late Majesty, King George V.
In the United Kingdom the National Memorial, with royal approval, will take the form of Playing Fields throughout the country with suitable commemorative entrance gates. Members of the fighting Services in this Colony are subscribing to this Home memorial, and any civilians who desire to contribute are reminded that remittances should be addressed to "The King George National Memorial Fund, The Mansion House. London. E.C.4."
At the present time of economic depression It is unlikely that sufficient money could be raised in this Colony for the purchase of large areas for playing fields. The Executive Council has therefore had under most careful consideration the preparation of a plan which, while identical in its main purpose and conception with the Home Scheme, will carry with it an assurance of immediate practical success and of popular acceptance: The scheme which has emerged is that Government should preserve for public parks with children's play- grounds two open spaces, one in Victoria and the other In Kowloon. Both the proposed areas adjoin congested districts, and any possible doubts as to their potential recreative and hygienic value will be speedily dispelled by an evening visit to the existing Southern Playing Ground at Wantsai.
The area selected for Victoria is the beautiful garden of the present Government Civil Hospital, which will no longer be required when the Queen Mary Hospital opens next year. The Maternity Black and Medical Officer's quarters can be demolished and there will then be room for three playgrounds and lif funds permit} for a paddling pool, without encroachment on the fine lawn that already exists. The many lovely trees, which luckily escaped mutilation by the recent typhoon, would of course bo preserved in any future layout.
In Kowloon there is a sufficiently large unalienated space at the Northern end of Canton Road just before it joins Jordan Road. It contains at present some rocky hummocks but, given funds, these can be easily levelled off or converted into terrace gardens. More would have to be done here than at the Civil Hospital, but there is no reason why an equally useful and pleasant result should not emerge. If, however, this area can be exchanged for one even more suitable the Government will consider such an exchange,
The Government's contribution to the scheme will be the preservation of these areas as open spaces, their preparation and equipment depending upon public subscription... The erection of commemorative arches or gates, as under the Home Scheme, would doubtless meet with general approval but although tentative sketch-plans are being got out) the local Scheme is not yet tied to any set design. All subscriptions will be handed over to the Urban Council, and with them will lie the responsibility of getting the fullest value for money in the lay-out, equipment and beautification of both areas.
It is considered that future maintenance would be a fair charge on urban revenues and voluntary subscriptions will therefore be utilised entirely on Initial development.
The Governor.carnestly invites subscriptions to this. Scheme, which should be paid into the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, the Chinese Chamber of Commerce or the Tung Wah Hospital. His Excellency is most grateful to these institutions for this service of collection. Cheques should be made payable to "King George V Memorial Fund" and crossed. In launching this appeal the Governor hopes that the Scheme will commend itself as strongly to the general public as it does to his, colleagues on the Executive Council and Finance Com-. mittee and to himself, and that it will meet with a truly generous response. The receipt of donations will be acknowledged in the newspapers, by kind permission of the Editors.
Mountain Lodge.
September 30th, 1936.
WEALTH FROM
A TOY
IDEA BORN WHILE WAITING NEAR
· GOODS YARD LITTLE strips of steel, neatly drilled with holes, and miniature nuts and bolts brought a fortune to Frank Hornby.
He was the inventor of Meccano, the building toy known to boys throughout the world.
He died in Liverpool last month, after a serious operation, at the age of 73.
One Christmas Eve, 36 years ago, Mr. Hornby was travelling to Birmingham to spend the holiday with a relative. He wondered how he could amuse the children.
BIRTH OF THE IDEA
As the train stopped opposite a goods yard he caught sight of a small crane,
The little strips of stert came to mind as ho contemplated building a miniature crane. Recalling the incident years later, Mr. Hornby
Bald:
"I sat there dreaming about it. I was drunk with delight when I got out of the train.
"Meccano started in my workshop. I decided on the name because people of every nationality could pronounce it."
Mr. Hornby made the first set of Meccano him- self with the little money he possessed. He de- velope: the iden with one assistant.
In spite of its growing popularity, however, Meccano more than once brought him to the edge of bankruptcy.
2,000 WORKERS NOW
To-day, Mr. Hornby's Meccano factory employs 2,000 men and girls, and occuples five acres.
Mr. Hornby, still absorbed in his invention, went
to his factory every day as he had done years before. He also visited his factories in France and America. He crossed the Atlantic 60 times.
He entered Parliament as member for Everlon
in 1931-but Meccano drew him back and he degided not to seek re-election.
THEY TELL WORLD
WORLD THE TIME
SEARCH FOR MISSING JUDGE
Lucky Blackiet, right, desert prospector, leading Los Angeles nuthorl- ties and 'a score of newspapermen on a search through the desert country near Banner, Cal., where he says he saw Joseph Forte Crater, long-masing justice of the New York Supreme Court. Left to right. Capt. Butch Alien, Dep. Sheriff August Grand and Bincklet.
Germany Off Clothes Standard
Berlin, Oct. 1.
READING SECRETS OF THE STARS
It's Just Routine
SQUAT buildings with grey metal domes make up the most part of the Royal Observatory, which sits on the hill in Green-- wich Park behind a tall fence with locked doors.
While you sleep these grey domes turn, slowly, in time with the turning of the earth, Black slits in the domes show where the telescopes are pointing at the sky.
Nobody on the ground aces the telescopes, just as nobody ever gives much thought to the work that goes on and has gone on here for 360 years.
It costs us £20,000 a year to run the Greenwich Observatory. A state of 30 men, from the Astronomer Royal (since 1033 Mr. Harold Spencer Jones), down to the mechanics and messengers at the gates, spend their days and nights on a timeless job.
They devote etimes to watching, photographing, computing.
Nothing about them sets them apart as men con- cerned with other worlds. They have wives and families; they go to the pictures.
They scoff at the idea that their job is awe-inspiring." It is. in fact, a rigid routine job.
"I've been here 25 years," one of them said, "and
made of synthetic materials.
Clothes bought by Germans after to-day must, in part, be I've only seen two unusual sights. One was an aurora,
A new decree, issued by the Ministry of Trade in accordance with Herr Hitler's plans for self-sufficiency-----
Prohibits the manufacture of clothes and other textiles from natural material alone and requires a mixture of synthetic wool or cotton to the extent of from 20 to 30 per cent,
Special inspectors are to be appointed to visit textile fac- tories, tailors shops and dressmakers establishments to see that the new law is observed,
}
and the other was Novo Herculis (the star that flamed and exploded)."
Only on a hundred nights in the year is work with the telescopes possible. So a man marked for duty peers up at the sky is larkness appronchen, wondering whether it will be worth going in or not,
If the night is time he will climb up into the dome, get to work briskly and unremantiently. On a cold night he wears a woollen knitted hat and an extra pallover.
The man on one telescope the 28. equatorial-is working on double stars. Lying on his back, on a prop.
he is ped-up mattress, is observing, one by one, the hund-
A general economic staff has been appointed to give effect to. the Chancellor's kienu. It is predicted that before the end of Jour reds of pairs of stars-meamtring their distances apart. years Germany will have achieved self-sufficiency in respect of her, their size; comparing his measurements with measure- rubber requirements.
iments taken by somebody who did the same job years In regard to textiles and metal the prospect of self-sufficiency, leaving the results he gets for someone who will be is held to be less rosy.
going the same job years from now.
ON HER
QUEEN VICTORIA'S LETTERS ON
"LONELY"
QUEEN
YOUTH
(FROM A CORRESPONDENT)
Berlin, Oct. 10.
VICTORIA Was throughout her reign in regular correspondence with members of the Prussian Royal family, and a great number of these letters have been pre served.
A volume containing the most important of them is shortly to
appear, it being announced that King Edward has given permis-
sion.
A selection of them is given this
morning in the Deutsche Allgemeine
Zeitung,
letter
dated
from Osborne September 14, 1945, thanks King Frederick William IV. of Prussin for the hospitality which he had shown her and the Prince Consort,
"Dear Germany and its inhabi-
"
Lants," wrote the Queen, "pleased me very much-I am afraid nimesi too much . I did not feel at all foreign." Queen Victoria's feelings towards her children аге described in another letter to the Princess (lates Empress) Augusta, who was almost In despair at parting with her daughter, who had just married the heir to the throne of Boden
ATTITUDE TO CHILDREN She says frankly that her own relations with her children are quite, different.
1-see-the children much less, and even here (Balmoral), where
Albert is often out for almost the I find no particular whole day. pleasure or substitute in the society of the elder children... It is only exceptional when I feel cunfluentiul Laik with thern pleasant and easy.
20
son
Is
On another telescope-the Thomp-
observer equatorial-an phalographing squares of sky to de- termine the distances of the nearer store.
He photographs them in the evening, then six months later he Carly them in the photographs
he plots the rate of morning; their movement along a baso line of 188,000,000 miles,
A thousand pictures u year are taken at Greenwich. Hundreds of
You will not understand this. It years work has been done. The is due to various causes. First of stara yield their secrets slowly and all, I am realty only mon and painfully.
quite happy when Albert ix
with me.
What sort of feeling is it, alone
Secondly, I am accustomed to go and quiet in this dome, nearer to on with my work of many sorts the stars than men before them have alone, and then I grew up quite ever got?
plonc and. always
accustomed At questions like this they look to-the-society of grown-up uncomfortable. Too difficult""to" ex-"
(Continued on Page 10.)
plain. They change the subject.
HONG KONG SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF CHILDREN.
t
The total Expenditure in 1930 on behalf of sick and destitute children is estimated $12,000, against which the Income to date is $20,000 only.
In order to continue ila work, the Society
$3,000
asks for the balance of
before the elose of the financial year on
31st October.
Hon. Treasurers:
Mr. A. McKELLAR, C.A..
c/o Mackinnon, Mackenzie & Co.,
P. & O, Building.
Mr. KWOK CHIAN,
c/o Banque de L'Indo Chine,
Hongkong.
September 18, 1936.
CANTON AGENTS
for
The
Hongkong Telegraph
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Tel. 13501.
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