Birthday For Ng Women's Club

(See article Page 40)

The New Guinea Women’s Club of Sydney was 10 years old in April. Members and their friends celebrated at a party—some of those who attended can be seen in top photograph. Centre photo graph shows Mrs. H. H. Page, patroness of the Club; Mrs. N. Foxcroft, president; and committee members: Mrs. L. Northen, Mrs. P. Forsyth, Mrs. J. Whiteman, Mrs. J. Edwards, Mrs. H. Carr, Mrs.

A. Hornby. (Missing, Mrs. E. Harvey.) Bottom; Mrs. Page; Mr. F. Salisbury, a Sydney business man, who has been a very good friend to the Club; Mr. N. H. Foxcroft and Mrs. Foxcroft.

New Guinea Women’S Club

Is To Years Old

(See photographs elsewhere this issue ) A PARTICULARLY happy gathering of over 80 members and their friends 'met at the Feminist Club, King Street, Sydney, on April 24, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the formation of the New Guinea Women’s Club of Sydney.

The club was founded bv its present patroness. Mrs. H. H. Page, in the dark days of 1941, perhaps with a premonition that even darker days were to come. She says that it was felt that there would sooner or later be a general evacuation of women from New Guinea and that, even in early 1941, it was difficult for a woman to get permission to return to the Territory once she went South. The object of the club, in those earlv days, was to work to provide comforts for the New Guinea men" who had enlisted in the forces, but within eight or nine months it was assisting the bewildered women and children who, in the face of Jap in vasion, were evacuated from Papua and New Guinea. In the years that followed, the club, under the guidance of Mrs. Page and her loyal and hard-working com mittee, was an oasis of friendliness in a desert of bewilderment and uncertainty.

It was not until the war was over that many of the members, 'including Mrs.

Page and other members of the executive, learned that their husbands had been lost in mid-1942 on a ship that was carrying them from Rabaul to Japan.

After the war the function of the club changed to a certain extent but under the capable leadershin of Mrs. N. Fox croft, who succeeded Mrs. Page as president, it has retained its warm corner in the hearts of New Guinea folk.

Many of the war-time members have now returned to the Territory but the club goes on. At the weekly and monthly gatherings of the club, Territorians down on leave find it the one spot in Sydney where they can be sure of a cheery wel come.

The 10th Birthday Party brought out Sydney Territorians in force. Mr. F.

Salisbury, a Sydney business man who has been a good friend to the club since its earlier years, presented an excellent programme of movies, many of them taken by himself on recent trips to Papua- New Guinea and the United States.

Later, presentations were made to Mrs.

Page and to Mrs. Foxcroft in appreciation of the work they had done in guiding the destinies of the club in its first 10 years of life. Members and their guests after wards were entertained at supper and each received a piece of a very special birthday cake.