An Earthquake Story.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 360, 5 October 1889, Page 2

An Earthquake Story.

When the recent big earthquake occurred in Gisborne some of the sto rented were of such an extrvordin ry nature that they will ba handed down from generation to generation, through the unwritten history of the district, supplemented by the musty documents now in possession of the Secretary of tha Union Literary Society. But the W ira apa Observer tolls the following storv so nicely that we are inclined to the belief that Gisborne has been completely whopped : For the truth of the following amusing earthquake story we aan vouch. At a place near Wanganui called Okoia there is a Government school hoii«e, and early in the present decade the building was divided into two compartments communicating by two doors between which was a large double chimney. The partition, the chimney, and thp mantlepieoe absorbed a great deal of valuable spice, for the building was small. The schoolmaster was inconvenienced in having to superintend the school standing in the draught, in the doorway of the partition and the dance loving youth could find no adequate space in either room to trip th ■ light fantastic to their satisfaction. Th schoolmaster,who suffered from neuralgia,said the two rooms ahou'd be made one, and thftchimney removed to the north end of the building. Thn dancing people concurred, and thf’ I QOR I Committee assaulted the Board for a whnte year for a Riibsidv, The Board was obdurate and the idea of carrying out the Improvement Roerned hopelegg. The great earthquake of 1881 occurred and s everal chinr eys were dam med in Okoia The china nev of the teacher’s residence was seriously .shaken and the top had to be rebuilt. I i the grey dawn of the following morning a terpsichnrean eommittesman, armed with the key, stole over to the school budding and doub'e chimney, To hiR horror it whr sound. He Q f >uld not stand this, so he went over to his house end reappeared with a cold chisel aud hammer, and proceeded to track that chimney from top to bottom After the most approved manner nf earthquakes. On the Monday morning the Committee as a body inspected the cbjmnev and pronounced it unsafe. A deputation of the Board, including Mr Baker, of Fordell, examined it and were astonished at the damage the earthquake had done. To ba short the school was closed for three weeks, the two compartments were thrown into one, and the settlers celebrated the occasion with a ball. No nne to this day has ever dreamt that the double chimney was cracked by any other m< a'iß thap he earthquake, and this is the fl'*st apppßrance in print of he true version of the Committsmau’e cold chisel and hammer ’