THE Bolton Evening News continues to have a considerable "reach", I find.

The picture we carried in June showing the 17th Scouts (Christ Church) troop in 1932 has found its way to South Africa.

Mr WA Watson has written from Discovery in the Transvaal to say an old friend sent him a copy of the paper.

"I am on the photo and I remember a few of the boys on it too," he says.

They are Ron and Bill Townson, Eric Baron and Tom Ormrod.

He says he knew the scoutmaster, the Rev NF Tripp, who married him and his late wife Vera when he was on leave from the navy in February, 1941.

Mr Watson went to South Africa with his family 40 years ago and has enjoyed his life there -- he worked on newspapers as a compositor, reader and linotype operator.

"The scouts changed my life," he writes. "I took to cycling on Sunday, on my own, further and further, up to 150 miles a couple of times."

He then took up hiking around Bolton as a club member.