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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times-Advocate, 1965-01-07, Page 21 MONEY TREE Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881 Amalgamated 1924 `fie ereferZitnes-Abucleafe SERVING CANADA'S BEST FARMLAND Member: C.W.N.A.., O.W.N.A., C.C.N.R. and ABC PUBLISHERS: J. M. Southcott, R. M. Southcott EDITOR: William Batten GOT A CHILLY ROOM? ADDING A ROOM? MAKE YOUR COMFORT COMPLETE WITH ELECTRIC HEAT VISIT YOUR ELECTRIC HEATING INFORMATION CENTRE ONTARIO HYDRO Main St. S., EXETER Phone 235-0930 EDITORIALS Let's alter the course GUEST OPINION. Bit sour for sugar VW' • The community of Exeter started off the new year on a tragic note with the traf- fic death of one of its esteemed ladies and the costly fire Which destroyed Exeter Prod- uce & Storage Co. Ltd. It will certainly be the hope of every citizen that the two tragedies will not set the tone of things to come in this year of 1965. Many persons will dismiss the two in- cidents as the workings of the hands of fate. Unfortunately, with this attitude, there is no assurance whatever that the events of the early days of 1965 will not be repeated often to the sorrow of many. Fires and motor accidents occur in such frequent numbers that we are often prone to taking them for granted, regardless of how disastrous they may be. They make headlines and are a major topic of conversa- tion for a brief period, but then they are for- gotten, except by those adversely affected. Too seldom do people take advantage of protecting themselves by considering the events which have led to another's downfall. People read stories of drivers who have be- come involved by failing to stop at stop signs. And yet, many of these same people will go out and do the same thing. They read of ac- cidents brought about by mechanical failures and yet fail to take steps to correct the same type of failures in their own cars. And the list goes on endlessly, in direct proportion to the list of traffic fatalities. Many persons also have the same ad- vantage of preventing fires, but again they continue to live under the false assumption that grief comes only to the other fellow. There are reasons for every tragedy, although to be sure there are a few that are above human prevention. But each person has an opportunity to eliminate many of those "reasons” from his driving practices and fire prevention standards. As we noted in an editorial last week, time waits for no man. It is too late to turn back the hands of time and erase the grief with which we met 1965. But each of us has ample time right now to set a course for the remainder of the year. Whether we take that time may be the answer as to whether or not the events of the .early days of 1965 will be repeated in our own lives, and in fact in our own deaths. Fate does walk among us, but if all other hazards are eliminated, it has very few opportunities in which to manouvre. (The following is a report on the sugar beet industry given at last week's Huron Federation of Agriculture meeting in Clin- ton with area members of the provincial and federal parlia- ments. It was given by Lloyd Lovell, Kippen area farmer, who is a director of the On- tario Sugar Beet Growers As- sociation.) Sugar to producers is aprob- lem, with the Canadian consum- er it is not. Canada's house- wives, in nine years out of ten enjoy the cheapest sugar in the world, and in fact have become so adjusted to low prices that when prices rise to approxi- mate those of other countries, everyone is alarmed. First of all because Canada produces only 15% of her re- quirements I would like to ex- plain how we procure the bal- ance of our sugar supply. Most consuming nations of the world have long term sugar agree- ments with supplying countries. These agreements cover 90% of the sugar produced in the world. The balance, 10 percent, then represents a very small per- centage of global production but is in a sense surplus pro- duction, or "homeless sugar". Sometimes it is expedient for holders of these surpluses to sell at a loss in preference to storing it for long periods. Frequently sales such as these are below the cost of produc- tion. As a result of these factors the "world price" is a depres- sed price, which at present, is considerably below the cost of production. The Canadian Government does NOT enter into any sugar agreements with suppliers of raw cane sugar, and Canadian refiners, therefore, buy their supply on this "world price" market. You are quite familiar with the high level price a year ago when statistical evidence indicated world supplies tem- porarily less than demand. Other countries with sugar legislation involving import quotas, tariff barriers, import embargoes, other protective legislation, are techniques es- tablished by governments and are not without cost, borne by tax payers and/or consumers, but they have the advantage of assured supplies at relatively stable prices. To illustrate fluctuation in Canadian refined prices we have an extreme example, the like of which we have not seen in 40 Her 'needle' appears stuck ONE MAN'S OPINION by John C. Boyne • t... • • •'•• • Extend season Dependable Buys for '65 04ti;1" IT t1 410 p,„ ' fit 11 ti~ 10;14 i,tir 11:1, 64 DODGE 6 automatic, 13,000 miles, 4-yr, warranty .... $2295 63 GALAXIE 6 cyl. automatic, radio, low mileage $2095 63 PLYMOUTH sedan, 6 cyl., radio, sharp $1995 61 FALCON sedan, clean $1095 61 VAUXHALL, only 25,000 miles $695 61 SARATOGA sedan, loaded with all the extras .. $1895 61 VALIANT slant six, king of the compacts $1175 59 DODGE V8 automatic as clean as new $ 795 Mrs. Mervyn Lobb, Clinton, chairman of the Huron Federation of Agriculture edu- cation committee, continued to bubble over with her foolish statements about school teachers at last week's meeting with the county parliamentarians. Mrs. Lobb probably has grounds for some of her statements about incompetent teachers, but to make them in such broad, general terms as she insists upon doing is ridiculous. No one will disagree with Mrs. Lobb that there are some poor teachers in our schools. In fact, no one would disagree that there are some poor doctors, lawyers, farm- ers, newspaper editors, etc., but to cast asper- sions on everyone in the teaching profession due to the poor standards of a few is as wrong as denouncing every doctor or lawyer when one of their members is found incom- petent. If Mrs. Lobb knows of a particular school teacher who is unable to spell or read and teaches glaring errors in regard to geog- raphy, she is probably quite within her right to approach the school board which employs this particular teacher to point out the in- competency and to ask that the proper action be taken. =mom, The board, after consultation with the inspector involved, would undoubtedly take the action warranted, even to the point of re- placing such an incompetent teacher. The Clinton area lady also made some denouncements of the present education sys- tem and again they were in such broad terms that they were of little use to anyone who may be interested in taking steps for im- provement. The Huron County Federation of Ag- riculture has every right — and possibly a duty — to be extremely interested in educa- tion and the fact they have such a committee is a healthy sign indeed. But destructive criticism alone is of little use and it should be explained that some members at the meeting appeared to be slightly indignant at the remarks made by Mrs. Lobb. Possibly they were of the opinion that she was entirely correct when she noted "we're beating our heads against the wall". Our education standards and advancements form a "wall" that should not be beaten down with unwarranted criticism of the type Mrs. Lobb insists on using. Dobbs Motors Ltd. I3ATT'N AROUND WITH THE EDITOR 216 Main St. Exeter 235.1250 At least one interested iiiil •••!: t!!i 1' ''''''''''' '' ''''''''''''''''' ''''''''' ' lloqiii.114111=10,1:41,114* of polio. One person helped solve the riddle of diabetes. At the moment too many "good Christians" simply lis- ten to prayers for the hungry. A few—a very few, judging by the cards we receive—may even go so far as to buy Unicef greeting cards. But thousands more Canadian families could afford to 'adopt' one child. One of the highlights of this past Christmas season, for me, was to receive letters from friends telling us that they have done just that in the past year. One young couple from Victoria says simply: "We think we have received more than we have given". There are at least two ex- ceptionally good plans which help to add the personal dimen- sion to any expression of con- cern. If your family can afford $10 a month to fight this prob- lem write to: Christian Chil- dren's Fund of Canada, 1407 Yonge Street, Toronto 7, On- tario. If you can afford $16 a month write to: Foster Parents plan Inc., Post Office Box 65, Station B, Montreal, Quebec. Even if you act, many will still be hungry—but one person at least will be helped. You will at least have done something. In my opinion there is a deeper awareness of the unique spirit of self-giving during the Christmas season. But like the poinsettia it doesn't last too long. One way to extend the effects of the "Christmas Gift" is to give in this way the year round. years. On October 31, 1962, the wholesale price of sugar in Canada was $7.65 per 100 lbs. A Year later it was $18.65. Present Montreal refined sugar is $7.35., During this entire period con- sumers in the U.K. were paying relatively stable prices between $9.70 and $11.50 per 100 lbs. because their government par- ticipates in a Commonwealth raw sugar agreement. It is obvious that $18.65 was a high price for Canadian con- sumers to pay for buying raw cane sugar on the world market, but, by the same token, current prices are on the low side, and affect producers of both Cana- dian-grown beets and cane grown in the tropics. It can, therefore, be conclud- ed that most of the time refined sugar prices in Canada are ex- ceedingly low because of sugar plans and subsidies in other countries. Beet sugar pro- ducers and manufacturers in Canada, in spite of improve- ments in efficiency over the years, encounter grave diffi- culties, because most of the time they must compete against refined cane, made from im- ported raws sold at below cost. The figures indicate how low prices have forced domestic production down, in other words, farmers cannot con- tinue to produce at prices be- low the cost of production. In 1958, farmers produced 343,160,000 pounds of sugar in Canada, or 20.5% of the Ca- nadian consumption. The per- centage dropped to 17.7% in 1960 and in 1962 it was down to 14.8% with only 269,492,000 pounds produced. Canadian consumers have benefited from this but not with- out some sacrifice. When any- thing happens to world supply, so-called world raw sugar prices go up and Canadian con- sumers' sugar costs react ac- cordingly — and how they com- plain. Just to give you some idea of our investment in producing this 15% of Canada's sugar: there are approximately 4,800 growers, and at the average of 6 persons per farm the wel- fare of 28,800 people is direct- ly related to the return from this crop. These farm families have an investment of $304,- 000,000. In 1962 from the production of sugar beets in the four pro- ducing provinces $37,300,000 worth of sugar was manufac- tured, and this is at the whole- sale price level. This is new money poured into the Canadian economy each year. We must also realize that industry has another $50,000,000 invested in plants and equipment necessary to process our beets into sugar. From the above we can see that this industry has ramifica- tions that cover a wide area of our economy, so its welfare and survival is of importance not only to the farm people who pro- duce the beets but to the Ca- nadian people as a whole. I hope that in the above I have been able to explain why Canadian sugar beet growers find themselves .in the position of having to rely on deficiency payments in order to provide some small sense of security to Canadian consumers. OLD 'TIMES' 10 YEARS AGO Mr. & Mrs. Herman Gill, Grand Bend, celebrated their golden wedding anniversary Tuesday. Mr. Gill was the first reeve of Grand Bend. Don Welsh represented James Street Sunday School at' the 34th Older Boys' Parliament in Whitby last week. Canadian Canners Ltd. may expand the Exeter Plant if the town can assure the firm of adequate water supply. Exeter Turnip Sales will re- build on the site of the one which burned last week in Cen- tralia, Readers may recall that some time ago an editorial appeared in this paper questioning the advisability of the var- ious welfare, service and charity groups in the area combining to make one annual campaign similar to the United Appeal canvasses made in cities. We had come to the conclusion that the suggestion did not meet with the approval of those concerned, but this week a representative of one of the groups who annually make a canvass in the community called to say he was definitely interested. Having been associated with such a project in another community, he said it was indeed worthy of consider- ation and asked us to issue another plea for interested persons to get to- gether to at least discuss the pos- sibilities. To establish lines of communica- tion for those interested, yours truly would be happy to hear from the executive members of any service club or welfare group wishing to dis- cuss the possibilities of a United Appeal. However, the gentleman presently interested noted that time was of the essence and therefore any action should be started as soon as postible. So, if your group is interested, let us now and if enough interest is shown a meeting will be organized for a discussion on the matter, Surely some of the groups should be interest- ed to that point at least. Came away from Exeter's disas- trous fire the other night with the thought that being a fireman was in- deed a risky job and also wondering if During the p r e-Christmas season there is a great deal of emphasis on giving—on provid- ing aid to the hungry and the needy. Major inner-city missions find that they receive more assistance and more portrayals of interest during that time of year. UNICEF developed an ear smashing, conscience disturb- ing adaptation of "Silent Night", to draw attention to the needs in its area of service. Care, the Unitarian Service Committee, Foster Parent s Plan and Christmas Children's Fund all stepped up their adver- tising in an attempt to get more people personally involved in meeting the basic fundamental need of the hungry—food! Four years ago the United Nations "Freedom From Hun- ger" campaign began. Since then more than $221 million has been collected by churches, groups, individuals and govern- ments around the world. About 75% of that figure came from various councils of churches— the National Council in the U.S. alone accounted for $131 mil- lion. Yet if you compare that figure with even a small nation's de- fense budget you begin to sus- pect our protestations of con- cern—or at least you begin to suspect that governments are not concerned. The Churches obviously are. Jean Paul Sartre, the famous French author and philosopher refused a Nobel Prize for liter- ature for a variety of reasons. In any case, he certainly can't be called a woolly thinking, unrealistic idealist. He has said point blank: "The alienation, the exploitation of man by man, and the spectacle of people without sufficient food—all these have pushed metaphysical evil, a luxury we can do without in comparison, into the back- ground. Hunger is an evil pure and simple. I have seen children dying." Many people look at the im- mensity of the problem and say, "It's too big. The little bit I can do will be of no effect". But great answers and great solutions always begin in a small way. The fact that the Christian faith has millions of followers is due to One Person. One person broke the scourge every precaution was being taken in regard to the safety of the local volunteers who do such a tremendous job. After having mulled the situation over for some time, we learned at Monday's council meeting that Coun- cillor Ted Wright, himself a member of the brigade, had similar thoughts and his suggestions are indeed worthy of special consideration by all con- cerned. Ted suggested that members of the brigade should visit the various industries, factories and mills in Exeter and the immediate area, and take a tour through them so they would have some idea of what to expect if they were called upon to fight a fire in that particular building. They could determine the nature of various commodities and materials in the buildings, and their construction, and would be able to learn from the various owners what materials may be explosiVe, highly inflammable or dangerous in any. other way. Escape routes, fire walls and other bene- ficial knowledge could also be at- tained. To point up the need for such know- ledge, we had only to listen to some of the comments made by onlookers at the weekend .fire. One man suggested the wax at the plant would soon become hot and ex- plode. Another noted the building would quickly be engulfed in flamet as soon as the fire reached the pro- pane gas :furnaces. These of Course were things of which we had no knowledge and as we watched the firemen climb up ladders to windows and race across the roof, we hoped our informants didn't know what they were talking about. For- tunately, none of the horrible things happened, and no lives were lost. But the question remained with us. Could these things have happened? Were the firemen unaware of the risks involved? Or for that matter, were there any more risks involved than at any other fire? It is this latter question of course that must always be in the minds of any men charged with the dangerous jobs of fighting fires. The quirks of fire are always to some extent unpre- dictable. But what may be unpre- dictable to firemen, may be pre- dictable by persons having a know- ledge of what is contained in a burn- ing building. It is this knowledge that we believe should be passed on to the local volunteers with the hope that they may never be called upon to use it, but also with the more comfortable feeling that if the situation does arise, such knowledge could save lives. The suggestion by Ted that various buildings be toured is commendable. And it may prove invaluable also in the fact the firemen may spot hazards they could point out to the owners that may even prevent fires. It is our understanding that the firemen can demand to inspect any building at any reasonable time. But it would certainly be a thoughtful gesture on the part of any plant owner to invite such an inspection of the entire brigade on one of their regular practice nights. The results could be beneficial to all concerned. Who's first? Keep looking for one if you wish but it's strictly fictitious — we think. A better way to make money grow is by the regular purchase of Guaranteed Investment Certificates from I.M.T, Available in units of $100 for 2, 3, 4 and 5 years at a very good 51/2 % interest. For one year, 5%, We're not a money tree but we have branches at Forest and Petrolia. Write or ask for our descriptive folder. 50 YEARS AGO The new town hall in Hensall was formally opened on Wed- nesday evening by an excellent concert given by local talent. Proceeds were $135. Mr. Fred A. May, who, for a number of years, has been vice-president of the Couch & Schneider Co. of Mitchell, has resigned his position and is coming to Exeter to take a partnership in the Jones & May general business here. A branch line of the Hyndrnan telephone system has been run up the London Road North for two and a half miles with seven new subscribers. Friday evening a number of young ladies met at the home of Mrs. Saxon Fitten and donated and made 18 hospital shirts for the Patriotic League. III MT "Look, Mabel! Buried treasure!" Published Each Thursday Morning at Exeter, Ont. THE INDUSTRIAL MORTGAGE AND TRUST COMPANY FOREST SARNIA ettROLIA 15 YEARS AGO Exeter leads the way with the first' 1950 baby born in Huron County. Daniel Ross i son of Mr. & Mrs, William Walters of Winchelsea was born at 3;45 Pm. Eight of the original charter members of the Exeter Lions Club were honored with seats at the head table at the supper meeting in the Central Hotel Friday. They are J. P. Bowey, .1. B. Creeth, Dr. H. H. Cowen, Dr. Dunlop, A. 0. Elliott, T. 0. Southcott and B, W„ Tuckey. W. E. Middleton was elected chairman of the Exeter 'Public School Board for 1950. The installation of the newly elected officers of the Ancient Mystic Order of Samaritans took place In Exeter in the Opera House honoring the newly elected Grand Monarch Ivan Stewart, Paid-in.Advance Circulation, September 30, 1964, 4,063 25 YEARS AGO . Peter William B awden, a nat- ive of Exeter, and graduate of the Ontario College of Phar- macy, died in RidgetoWn where he operated a drug store for 50 years. Mr. & Mrs. J: W. Ortwein of Hensall celebrated their golden wedding anniversary New Year's Day. Benson W. Tuckey was elect- ed reeve of Exeter over W. D. Sanders with a majority of 237 votes at the polls IVIonday4 Mr. E:. C: RodWay of the Exeter High School staff was married to Miss Dorothy Stringer Tuesday, December 26. They ate making their home in Exeter, John Burke, Exeter Phone 235-1863 Authorized as Second Class Mail, Post Office Dept, Ottawa, and for Payment of Postage in Cash 4111111111111111111011001111111111 lifithcar SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada $4.00 Po Year; USA $5.00 "I want to report an escaped . vs t,3U..4 VIIIMASIOUNISta husband!"