Another “Garden

of Eden”

Young American Couple in the Galapagos

Prom Our Own Correspondent.

Honolulu, Apr. 26.

Captain G. Allan Hancock, The

California millionaire sportsman who backed the trans-Pacific flight of the Australian aviators, Kingsford- Smith and Ulm, in the “Southern Cross”, has discovered new “Garden of Eden” activities in the famous Gala pagos Isles during his current scientific expedition in the Eastern Pacific, accord ing to radio messages from his yacht.

On the island of Floreana, an Ameri can mining engineer and his young wife were found hacking a clearing on the jungle-clad slopes of the volcanic island. The story has been played up by the American press because it is packed with romantic angles that prove setting up housekeeping in a South Seas paradise is not as easy as it is cracked up to be.

The “Robinson Crusoe” couple are Ainsley Conway and his wife, Frances, an ex-high school teacher. Vowing to work out an existence for themselves in

a wild jungle land that lies just below the equator, the Conways laugh at danger and hardships and revel in the hard work and adventure.

The Conways’ nearest neighbour is Heinz Wittmer, a German who came to the islands more than five years ago.

He has a wife and three children, and the most productive acres in Galapagos.

In April, 1937, Frau Margaret Witt mer gave birth to a little girl, Ingeborg Floreana. Her five-years-old son, Rolfe Hans, was the first white child born in the Galapagos. Another boy, Harry Wittmer, now 19, never was a very healthy child, but is growing stronger in the free and open life on Floreana, where hard work means existence.

Sailing to Guayaquil, the principal seaport of Ecuador, from San Francisco in March last year, the Conways took the old government schooner “San Cristobel” to the Galapagos. Reaching James Island in May, they set them selves up by a little spring to begin farming.

After five months of back-breaking work Conway was informed by Com mandant Carlos A. Puente, Governor of the Galapagos, that there was not sufficient water on James Island and added that he could not afford them military protection. They were picked up and moved bag and baggage 100 miles to Floreana.

Captain Hancock supplied a large variety of staples from civilization, in cluding everything from needles to heavy hardware and candy to canned goods, to the Conways and Wittmers.

Conway followed mining engineering, after serving two years in France dur ing the World War, until dust affected his health. He returned to Chico, Cali fornia, where he was born, and became a newspaper reporter. From that he turned to freelance writing in San Francisco.

Mr. J. Helg has been elected presi dent of the Marist Old Boys’ Union, Samoa, for 1938. Mr. R. Reid was appointed vice-president, and for the fourth year in succession Mr. C. Dean was made secretary. This year is the 50th anniversary of the foundation of the Marist Brothers’ School in the terri tory—it was opened in September, 1888.

Rev. William G. Wiedemann, of the Melanesian Mission, Sag Sag, New Britain, married Miss Ethel Gwendolyn James, at Newcastle, N.S.W., at the end of April. They will leave Sydney for Rabaul by the June mailboat.