You Don't See These Too Often

'J' HE item in Tolala’s column this month about New Guinea’s willow wielding Garretts has reminded us of another Garrett item that we’ve been meaning to write about for some time. lt concerns the Fanning Island pound notes that were issued during World War II when Mr. R. G. Garrett was manager of Fanning Island Plantations Ltd., a subsidiary of Burns Philp and Co. Ltd., of Sydney.

There was a shortage of currency on Fanning Island at the time; war conditions made it impossible for Burns Philp to replenish the island’s stocks from Sydney; so Mr. Garrett arranged for 1,000 Fanning Island pound notes to be printed in Honolulu — l,lso miles north of Fanning so that his Gilbertese plantation workers could be paid The numeration of the notes began at 1,000 or 1,001.

When Australian currency again became available at Fanning Island, the specially-printed notes were withdrawn and all but a few of them destroyed.

How many of the notes remain in existence today, we do not know —but there are only two that we know of. One is hanging in a frame in the Burns Philp board-room in Sydney; the other, which is reproduced above about five-sevenths of its actual size, is in PlM’s files.

Mr. R. G. Garrett, whose name is on the notes, is now based in Rabaul, from where he supervises Burns Philp plantations in New Britain and New Ireland. He is not related to Tolala’s willow-wielding Garretts