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HomeMy WebLinkAboutClinton News-Record, 1973-07-05, Page 4NEWS-1=0111P, THURSDAY, JULY 0, 1973 Editorial comment OFY benefits Huron In the first two years of its existence, there has been much criticism of the' federal government's Opportunities for Youth Program, which is designed to employ young people in public service in community projects which they design themselves. A look at O.F.Y. in Huron County, however, shows that many benefits to the community at large, flow from the project and that charges of ex- travagance, uselessness and govern- ment rip-offs have little foundation here. In Seaforth, five young students have an O.F.Y, grant to help Senior Citizens maintain their homes and surroundings, pick up prescriptions and provide other services to the elderly. Another O.F.Y. project, in Brussels, will support Canadian culture through a rural centre offering NFB films, crafts and live theatre. In Morris Township, an O.F.Y. grant will allow three young people to work at constructing snowmobile trails through unused land. A recreation program for all ages, in- volving six young workers who will provide a supervised playground and a coffee house with live entertainment is operating in BlVth, thanks to Oppor- A holiday helper Thanks to countless blood donors and modern science, blood helps a million Canadians back to life and health each year. Blood carries out numerous functions in the body. For example it carries the necessities of life--oxygen, water and food to all the cells. It distributes heat produced by the working muscles and because of its water content and Tobilityc , .-it , serves .as a 'temperature regulator for the body. By the action of its white cells, antibodies, and certain complex 'chemical substances blood ser- ves as a constant bodyguard against in- fection and other diseases. Some people will be in need of this magic fluid this tunities for Youth. In Clinton, six young people have developed a home help service for the elderly ,and p#11 Arsgppe questionnaire Indicating the needs of Senior Citizens there. Last summer, II Hay Township students put this federal money to good use and produced a 48 page industrial and historical survey of their township which includes maps, old photos and statistics on such diverse things as gross farm income and cottagers' shop- ping habits' All these projects are worthwhile and 'give citizens in small Huron County communities access to services and resources which as well, could not possibly be provided by municipal budgets. The Opportunities for Youth program employs a fair number of imaginative and resourceful young people who perhaps otherwise would be unable to find summer employment of any kind. A program which gives these people jobs and enables them to help their com- munities while they work can't be all bad. Looking at the evidence of the projects, past and present, as they are developed in Huron, Opportunities for Youth, seems to be doing very well. (from the Huron Expositor) summer. By giving a blood donation you may help to save a life. The goal of .the Canadian Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service is to meet the blood needs of all Canadians. They can't do it alone. They need volunteer blood donors to continue to meet the need. Blood is important. Won't you spare a half hour of your time and give a donation? It could mean the difference between life and death. You can take a well-earned holiday during the summer, but accidenta and illness remain with us. Your blood is needed as much as ever so give a donation before going on holidays and ensure that blood will be on hand, ready to help. Doctors should not be scapegoats Otataide "Sorry only accept silver!" THE CLINTON NEW ERA Amalgamated THE HURON NEWS-RECORD Established 1865 1924 Established 1881 Clinton NewsRecord A member of the Canadian Weekly Newspaper Association, Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association and the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) second class mail registration number — 0817 'SUBSCRIPTION RATES: (in advance) 'Canada, $8.00 per year; U.S.A., $9.50 JAMES E. FITZGERALD—Editor J, HOWARD AITKEN — General Manager Published every Thursday at the heart of Huron County . Clinton, Ontario Population 3,475 THE HOME OF RADAR IN CANADA Have you ever noticed that when politicians get themselves into a bind, they look around for a patsy, or scapegoat? They did this with education in this country. When the big space race began, the politicians rode the wave of public demand for more schools, more schooling, and practically whipped the system of education into spending more and more money on bigger and better schools with more and more expensive gadgets and facilities. , Then the taxpayers, reasonably enough, began to howl about the sky-rocketing cost of education. I don't blame them. ' So what happened? The politicians made a 180-degree about-face and stated sternly that they were going to hold the line on education costs. • They should have held the line a little more firmly in the first place, instead of feeding a fish until it was big and strong and then letting it tear all over hell with the spoon in its mouth. Natural patsy for this political manoeuvre was the teaching profession. Teachers were presented, with the aid of some of the politicians' tame journalists, as greedy, grasping people whose chief interest in life was wresting higher salaries from the down-trodden taxpayer. This was patently untrue. The average teacher would be reasonably happy if he got an annual increase sufficient to keep oven with ,inflation, and a reasonable raise to reognize his increasing skill and experience. Exactly what happens in most businesses and professions. But teachers are born pat- sies. In the first plate, they aren't very militant. They are more interested in teaching than in going on strike. In the second place, for generations in this country, they have occupied an am- biguous position in our society. They are accorded a certain respect, but at the same time have been looked on with a certain scorn, as rather shabby professionals who need to be 'kept, in their place by the people who pay their salaries. Business men could whore and drink and practise shady dealings, but teachers were to be an example to the com- munity. They mustn't gamble, drink, smoke or stay out .late. They could own a car, but it should be second-hand and a certain vintage. They could go to church and sing in the choir, but they couldn't go to the tavern and sing in the bar. That's all changing, of course, and teachers are ac- tually being regarded as people, with feelings and faults. But the old, straitlaced hangover of our pioneer society is still there. "Teachers are a timid lot," the politicians say to one another. "Let's make them the goats." And so they do. But perhaps the politicians are not going to be able to walk so easily over their latest pat- sies,--the doctors. After creating a medical health plan that is iniquitously expensive, the politicians, as usual, respond to the cries of outrage by looking around for a goat. They have chosen the medical profession. Now, everyone who isn't blind and deaf knows that a doctor today, unless he's a bumbling idiot, enjoys a fat in- come. What's wrong with that?Just because you and I didn't have enough brains and guts to slug away at medical school is .no reason to envy those who do. A doctor spends about six years drudging at pre-meds and medicine,'a gruelling course. It costs him roughly $12,000. Then he has a year or two of in- ternship in which he is paid about as much as a lifeguard. After eight years, he has a few books, some skills, and is probably heading for the age of thirty. And he must start at the bottom again, to establish him- self. He will work about 60 hours a week, snatch the odd holiday, neglect his family and often destroy his own health. By the age of fifty he's an exhausted man, unless he has learned to pace himself. Sure, he's well off, by most standards. Big car, house, ex- pensive holidays. But he hasn't time to enjoy much of this. And he's also paying big taxes on that income. Let's take a look at a friend of the doctor. They were in school- together. The other fellow dropped out in Grade 10. He's now making $11,000 a year. But in the intervening ten or eleven years, the doe's friend has made $60,000. So, plus the $12,000 it cost for the medical education, friend is $72,000 ahead and has his family half- raised and has his mortgage in hand. It takes the doe a long time to catch up, and when he does, he's earned it, A few doctors might cheat, but most of them are honest, dedicated, and mighty hard working, The politicians' attempt to regulate doctors' incomes is a shoddy piece of work. Mostly for show A Toronto producer of CBC television dramas, visiting our town this week, has been telling me about his secret vice. He hates actors. It is a curious kind of loathing. Since his own success, and that of the writers and directors of his scripts, relies, in the final analysis, on the gifts of the performers, he must never show his true feelings. But, to him, they are the D.P.'s of the creative arts, the initials standing for Displaced Per- sonalities. > ary "No other profession," he ob- served at one low point, "can claim such a concentration of engaging neurotics, charming egomaniacs, talented emotional misfits and precocious children. To work with them for any length of time, as I have, is the perfect qualification for en- trance into a mental in- stitution, either as inmate or supervisor." My own contribution to the subject takes the form of the memories of the year I spent sharing an abode with a weird variety of show people, in- cluding a number of thespians, at least two of whom have gone 10 YEARS AGO July 4, 1963 To aid the new plant of Harriston Fertilizers which is to be built in Tuckersmith Township in the near future, the township 'council decided on Tuesday to see if taxes on the $150,000 plant could be postponed for at least a year. Reeve Elgin Thompson told council he felt some type of assistance would be warranted and had been told by County Clerk, John Berry, that it was possible' to postpone assessing the plant for a year after it started operation. Council decided to speak to their assessor, Ivan Forsyth, to see if taxes could be postponed for a year. While area public school students usually head for the city to see the sights, the op- posite was true last week when a group of Children from Lon- don's University Heights Public School visited Clinton and toured the Sherlock-Manning Piano factory and C.H. Epps Manufacturing Ltd. 25 YEARS AGO July 8, 1948 A name long associated with the butcher business in Clinton returns to that field of mer- chandising with the purchase of the C.D. Connell business by Norman L. Fitzsimons. Norman's grandfather, Robert Fitzsimons, started in the butcher business hero about 60 .years ago, and there has been a Fitzsimons in the business here ever since except for the past few months. Holmesville school is un- dergoing a series of im- provements during the summer on to great success. Looking back now on those days I think of them as My Silent Period. Following an ac- tor, conversationally, is like following a spectacular seal act or, as W. Shakespeare put it, As in a theatre, the eyes of men, after a well-graced actor leaves the stage, are idly bent on him that enters next, thinking his prattle to be tedious." I learned then that actors, unlike, say, plumbers, do not 'liking up their coats and go to viihrk. They are always at work. The actor, by the very nature of his talent, is easily and naturally given to self- dramatization • and often acts not merely his assigned roles, but his entire life. It is easy to put this down to an over-inflated ego. H.L. Men- cken, for example, cruelly defined the actor as a silly youngster grown ' older, but otherwise unchanged, and opined that "the most modest of them matches the conceit of the solitary pretty girl on a slow ship." Maybe so. But often this conceit ex- presses itself in an admirable vacation. New seats are being installed, several alterations made and the building is being re-decorated throughout. The "Glorious Twelfth" of July will be celebrated in Clin- ton on Monday next, July 12, when thousands are expected, when the 259th Anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne will be marked,. with Loyal Orange Lodges from the Counties of South and North Perth and South and North Huron. 40 YEARS AGO July 6, 1933 Mr. and Mrs. C.H. Epps, who had their inn, Kury Inn, near Bowmanville, destroyed by fire last year have rebuilt and are now doing a nice business. Mrs. Epps will be remembered bet- ter as Miss Mary Argent of Clinton. Mr. and Mrs. Manson and Donald of Dundas visited at the home of Mr. and Mrs. C. Haugh and other friends recen- 'tly (at Brucefield) " The Pletsch Hatchery, which has been located in Charlesworth's feed store, has just completed the season's work, and is under the management of Russell Jervis and owing to increased business, is now moving to the large building on Rattenbury street which was formerly used by the Jackson Clothing Co. This should be an ideal location for this business, 55 YEARS AGO July 4, 1918 The Girls' Auxiliary had a garden party on the lawn of Mr, C.F. Libby, Rattenbury street, on Thursday evening last, which proved to be unite a poise, an ability to be vastly en- tertaining company and even. by a sense of drama, to give a new dimension of zest to the commonplace. In my year of what we used to call the Bohemian Life I of- ten detested actors for their in- sufferable vanity. But I bolstered their vanity willingly for the joy of the performance and always with that secret envy of those of us who only sit and watch!'" As with 'tiny fora of•ViaitYVI Observed, the actor's' &idea' is a cruel master. Nothing is quite as sad as the aging idol struggling to keep on top. Yet that, itself, may 'be a valiant performance. The real trouble with all but the truly great actors, as it is with all extroverts, is that the facade is everything and what goes on inside is secondary. I have known actors whose conversation, whose philosophical outlook, seemed mature until they played a return engagement and I discovered that what had seemed intelligence was merely a well-rehearsed repertoire of miming. success. The Kiltie Band, headed by the Kazoo Band, organized for the 'occasion, marched through town and up to the grounds about eight-thirty. The "Kazoos", were all right too, and caused much fun. The Organization of Resour- ces Committee, having received permission from the Registration Board, are having the male cards gone over and a new card, giving necessary data, is being made for every man brought up on a farm or who expressed a willingness to work on a farm. This is not for farmers of course, but only for those men residing in urban centres who have had farm experience. The information so gathered will be used to direct suitable help where it is most needed on the farms. 75 YEARS AGO July 1, 1898 Miss Wretha Snell, daughter of E.H. Snell of the gravel road, It stands to reason that a man who plays upon an audience's emotions is not liable to indulge in too much soul searching. It is the effect, not the substance, that con- cerns him. He is rarely more than the imitator, very seldom the creator, and so you must expect the high shine with few base metals underneath. This explains why so much acting, particularly in the im- mediacy of the television sbre.erf,I fs, ineffedive., Reailisriiiis lost because the actor is merely giving his shallow conception of what life ought to be and har- dly ever is. A wise critic once wrote: "The average actor holds the mirror up to nature and sees in it only the reflec- tion of himself." Yet every once in a while, as my Toronto friend concedes, there comes along an under- standing actor who has the magic touch of interpretation, the gift of projecting the writer's imaginings in perfect harmony with his own concept of the role. When that happens you have the complete fulfillment of the creative process. who is now a candidate at the Public School leaving examination, has attended school in No. 2 Hullett, for four consecutive years without being absent a single school day. It is very doubtful whether a similar record could be found in the county. Such attendance is deservedly praiseworthy and merits a tangible acknowledgement from the sec- tion. Last week a young man from Wingham hired a wheel from Geo. Baldwin, Seaforth and forgot to return it. Mr. Baldwin got wind of his game, however, and after a hot chase of about 50 miles, got the wheel, while the thief took to the woods. Through some misunderstan- ding, the meeting of Municipal clerks called for the 29th and 30th resulted in failure. A few of the clerks fumed up in the morning and, finding so few here, went home, and then those who turned up in the af- ternoon did likewise. , .we get letters . Dear Editor The school year 1972.73 is now part of history. Yet during the year, you have made our children, our teachers, our parents, and the public fully aware of what is going on in the educational progress of every day life. Thanks for your fine coverage be it events in touch football, floor hockey, swim- ming, skating, basketball, volleyball, tumbling, soccer, softball, folk and square dance, and track and field day events, Your acceptance of articles on teachers' meetings, workshops, and professional development days has been very gratifying. It has been a pleasure to have worked with you. J.B. McCarroll, Physical Education Consultant. H—P Separate Board Disagrees "Gordon Hill, President of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, does not speak for all farmers in Ontario when he insists that farmers must be compensated for their loss of development rights when the Provincial 'Government locks their land into agriculture," says Martin Verkuyl, President of the Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario: Mr. Verkuyl, a Woodstock area corn grower and pork producer, was reacting to news reports alleging that the On- tario Federation of Agriculture will oppose new provincial legislation designed to zone some rural lands for agriculture unless the ,acts are amended to include compen- sation for those farmers who lose development rights' on their property. "The government is right in refusing to compensate land- owners for overnight drops in speculative property value when land uses are changed," says Mr. Verkuyl. "Develop- ment ights w n 9,4 #§4PartAimsPtCRIgt..0/a§ ,tarP,t1AOKIle Et§,AYISS M,Y9g4 by full-time speculators adver- sely affected by the legislation? To be consistent we would have to." Asked for his reaction to the news reports, Elbert van Donkersgoed, secretary- manager of the Christian Far- mers Federation of Ontario says, "It will be most unfor- tunate for agriculture if the OFA joins the speculator lob- bies in opposing this legislation and trying to keep these initial steps in land use planning as small as possible." "The members of the Christian Farmers Federation are pleased with the new steps in planning even though the Parkway Belt Act and the Niagara Escarpment Planning and Development Act are but a baby-step of what needs to be done all across the province. Agriculture needs to be protec- ted from the influence of speculators everywhere. Now that they cannot operate near Toronto they will just find another area in which to play their game. We need a com- prehensive program of land use planning for all prime agricultural lands in the province." Opine ions n order that News—Record readers might express their opinions on any topic of public interest, Letters To The Editor are always welcome for publication. But the writers of such letters, as well as all readers, are reminded that the opinions expressed in letters published are not necessarily the opinions held by TM News—Record.