The Editors' Mailbag
p. 23 · Read in the full issue
e Knew Miss Dakota
Mr. Leslie Gill, of the Northern ylomons, is reminiscent: Your article and photographs (pp , 66, February PIM) concerning e Quonset suburb of Noumea, roke memories.
I resided in that area for a week February, 1943, in a Quonset med “Miss Dakota.” The huts in at section of the Quonset town ip were named after the various ates. It was a United States Navy t-up, and —I think my memory •ves me right—its official designa n was “CUB 15.” [ went to a movie there one night d saw a Bob Hope film. What uck me most about that show ,s the fact that a group of Gl’s ose a 1,000 lb bomb as a box-seat im which to view the show.
ant a Useful Old Book?
For many years, in the early ft of this century, the standard erence book on the South Pacific s Stewart’s Handbook of the cific, compiled and edited by rcy S. Allen. The last edition s in 1923, and that issue is par ilarly valuable, because it con ns a bibliography covering books ding with the Islands. Mr. C. chanan, of the Whitehorse Road, epdene, Victoria, informs us it he has a copy of the 1923 tion available, if anyone wants It. Allen, for a long time, was nember of the Sydney Morning raid staff. He now lives in re ;ment in Mosman, Sydney, and 1 is an authority on Pacific mds history.
iese Differing Points
View!
i valued reader in Melbourne, ding his sub. along, says; “It ild be a great relief if your tor would cease his tiresome, ious prattling on political tters.” .n ex-resident of Fiji, in a note m South Sydney, asks for a ticular issue, so that he may d again an article (dealing with Red Asian menace to the future he Pacific Territories) and adds: iese articles of yours always re id me of Lord Roberts before rid War I, storming the length I breadth of England, preaching ut the German menace; and y said his was a voice in the lerness, and ‘Poor old Bobs—he is his dotage.’ Australia to-day 3S something far worse than the •man menace of pre-1914.” nd a former Pacific Islands sionary, writing a couple of iths ago from the United States, a friend in New Zealand, com
mented on PIM and said: “Your Mr. Robson writes some fine articles, which remind me in some ways of that great old man of England, Winston Churchill.”
Which, while it is carrying praise to an absurdity, does show —as we remarked—how widely different are the points of view.
Error in Kilowatts
It was stated in the February FIM (p. 24) that the Port Moresby hydro-electric installation will have an initial output of 3,000 kilowatts, “which is just over the town’s pre sent maximum power consumption.”
The P-NG Department of Works points out that the biggest demand for power ever recorded in Moresby (February, 1953) was 1,295 KW, which is only 43 per cent, of the output expected from the Rouna Falls power station.
Bananas by the Foot
The claim that those post-hurri cane bananas now coming out of Fiji (PIM, Feb., pa. 21) are of record size suggests to me that the Fiji banana is de teriorating. When I lived in the Sigatoka district 45 years ago, the banana plantations of Messrs. Ty Sang and Sang on Ty were just being opened up, I have no auth entic records beyond a clear memory, but I remember that many bunches from the Yalva, Bila Levu, Qiri Qiri, and other plantations exceeded in size those you have described as the products of 1953 some of those bunches were fully 4i feet high. Being a banana planter myself at Naikurokuro, near Suva, I was much impressed, and took particular notice of them.
The soil of the Sigatoka Valley is immensely fertile, probably because of the big limestone cliffs at Qale mare, some 30 miles upstream.
When the CSR Co. opened up Kavonagasau sugar plantations— about 600 acres of alluvial flats— the first crop was 70 tons per acre averaging 17 POCS. —K. P. WRIGHT, Quirindi, NSW.
Did He Brief von Luckner?
Your reference to the destruction of the Carnegie Institute ship Carnegie, in Apia, reminds me of an interesting member of her staff (writes Mr. K. P. Wright, of Lomani, Quirindi, NSW, who was a planter in the Sigatoka area of Fiji over 40 years ago).
He was a German named Heim brod, a clever surveyor, who did a good deal of work in Fiji. I knew him well —he surveyed several blocks for me at Sigatoka. He was married to a charming Irish lady and they had a British family.
Heimbrod joined the staff of the scientific ship Carnegie, and spent some years with her, and so must have learned a great deal about the ports and anchorages of the South Pacific Islands. After Count von Luckner had made his famous incursion into the South Pacific it was remembered that Heimbrod had been visited in Fiji by von Luckner, and that they were friends, and it was thought that Heimbrod had imparted to him the special information about the South Seas which the Count clearly had. So Heimbrod was interned.
After World War I Heimbrod re turned to Fiji. He was met by a number of returned soldiers and warned to keep away. It was even said that some of his possessions were thrown overboard. He went away, and I never heard of him again.
Tragedy of Tonga’s Bananas
The newspapers here (Auckland) have been commenting upon bananas, small in size and bad in appearance, believed to have come from Tonga.
In 1907, when I represented the Union SS Co. in Tonga, we shipped every month from 10,000 to 20,000 cases and bunches of fine bananas to NZ. The growers got 1/6 per case, delivered on wharf. In 1952, the Government Banana Board was paying 8/- and 10/- per case, and carrying the fruit to the wharf.
A disease gravely reduced the banana output in 1911, and the Government of Tonga sought out side assistance. Three months later, there arrived a gentleman from an experimental farm in New Zea land, who assumed the title of Director of Agriculture. I do not think he had ever previously seen a banana outside a fruiterer's shop, and his efforts to restore the banana industry were not suc cessful. He induced the Govern ment to encourage the production of vegetables, which the Govern ment Storekeeper sold in this store.
The disease has never been eradicated, and the poor quality of the Tongan banana is the result of
It.—F. T. Goedicke.
G and E Finance in 1911
A recent reference in PIM to the assessment of the Gilbert Islanders’ taxes in terms of copra has re minded Mr. Neville Chatfield—who was buying copra for Burns Philp & Co. in the Gilbert and Ellice Colony 40 years ago—of some official reports in his possession, relating to conditions in the Colony in 1911. They show that in 1911 the natives had to pay £3,120 in taxes (which even then was ex tracted in the form of copra). In that year, the Colony produced 2,070 tons of copra, worth £20,700, and 142,163 tons of phosphate, worth £213,250.