HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times-Advocate, 1973-06-28, Page 55One of Exeter's Newest Businesses
From the left, Mary Thompson, Bob Crawford, Dal Robbins, Gary MacLean, Gerry MacLean, Alice MacLean.
BUT .. . Already One of the Busiest
Yes, Gerry MacLean has only been in
business in Exeter for the past four years
(and only one at his new location) but his
store has already attracted a great many
Exeter and area residents looking for quali-
ty merchandise for such things as
automotive, camping, sporting, snow-
mobiling, stereo, etc., etc.
You'll find Gerry and his staff well train-
ed and equipped to handle your needs in
all these areas and you're only a stranger
once with the friendly guys at Gerry
MacLean & Son Automotive Ltd.
Gerry MacLean & Son Automotive Ltd.
Section 3, Page 3 THE EXETER TIMES-ADVOCATE JUNE 28, 1973
GRAVEL BRIGADE — District farmers in the 1920's probably would have been glad to
let local councils or government take over the job of road maintenance. Each farmer
was reponsible for maintaining a certain portion of road according to his acreage, and
had to draw gravel for this purpose. This picture of the "gravel brigade" was taken at
Russell Skinner's gravel pit on the St. Mary's Road in June, 1927. Those included in the
zt.41..tr.
picture are: Bill Smith, Cecil Cornish, Jack Hicks, Bill Stephens, Ewart Cornish, Russell
Skinner, owner of pit, George Ferguson, Clarence Johns, Wes Johns, Ward Hern, Mr.
Lamle, Mr. Hern, Percy McFalls, Howard Hunter, Fred Ford, Harry Ford, E. Prout, Dick
Johns, Ed Westcott, Art Ford, Rollie Williams, Freeman Horne, Wellington Brock, Enos
Herdman, Garfield Brock, Hector Rowcliffe.
Pioneers made good, straight roads
JOTTINGS BY J.M.S.
July 9, 1953 •
The other day I was motoring
through Dashwood where
preparations were being made
for the new permanent, road that
is being laid from Exeter to the
Bluewater Highway. A huge
power shovel was digging deep
into the hard gravel roadbed and
the old material thus excavated
was carted away in'trucks while
other trucks with fresh gravel
dumped their loads into the
newly-made hole. A huge power-
propelled roller followed and
soon the road was again ready
with little delay in traffic.
What particularly attracted my
attention and started me
reminiscing about the pioneer
days was the digging up of a
number of well-preserved logs
about eight feet in length, the
forerunners in road-building
about a century ago.
There were .no power-driven
chain saws in those days, no
motor-driven dump-trucks or
high-powered machinery to
.0- relieve man of the back-breaking
hand labour jobs.
Oxen were at first the beasts of
burden to be followed by horses.
Jumpers preceded the wagon on
wheels. Jumpers were a con-
traption built on a couple of logs
and skidded across the ground.
Timber was plentiful for the
building of the roads for this whole
tract of land was once a huge
forest. We must take off our hats
to the surveyors who marked out
these roads.
Highway 83, which from Exeter
to Bluewater Highway was
known as the Lake Road, and
east from Exeter to Russeldale,
was known as the Thames Road,
is a stretch of road more than 20
miles in length without a single
jog in it. The same is true of
Highway 4 from Clandeboye to
It Clinton.
Road-building in those pioneer
days was one of the first jobs to
provide the early settlers with
some ready cash, A dollar a day
was good wages.
Felling trees and sawing them
produced brawn and muscle and
many a man boasted of his
prowess. He had to prove it, for
***
Exeter Markets - 1933
Wheat, 60 cents,
Oats, 28 c.
Barley, 36c.
Buckwheat, 36c,
Manitoba's Best, $2.40
• Model Flour, $2.30
Welcome Flour, $2.00
Low Grade Flour, $1.25
Shorts, $1.10
Bran, $1,00
Creamery Butter, 23, 24c.
Dairy Butter, 18, 21c, - •
Eggs, extras, 30c.
Eggs, firsts, 27c.
Eggs, seconds, 16c,
Hogs, $5.10
fights were common particularly
after having imbibed too freely of
barley-corn which was cheap and
plentiful.
Whisky-stills soon followed the
pioneers and boot-legging is by no
means a modern invention.
Wood-cutting bees like barn-
raisings combined hard labour
with pleasure and whisky was
plentiful at most of them. A good
fight afterwards was casual
entertainment. At times .they
were grudge fights but at other
times just to prove who was best
man. There were no high stakes
to see one man punch another,
While forests dotted the area
and corduroy roads provided the
means of transportation over
low-lying land it was a very rough
road to travel on and gravel
roads were soon built up. For-
tunately beneath the soil gravel
has been found in abundance.
Gravel like water is one of the
things nature alone has provided
us with and one of the things, for
which we are least grateful.
The old Lake Road will have
many pleasant memories for a
goodly number of our readers
because it will recall that at least
one day in every year was an
event to be looked forward to and
to be remembered for days after
and that was the annual Sunday
School picnic.
It took a good two to two and a
half hours to make the trip from
Exeter to Grand Bend, mostly in
band-wagons or carry-alls.
Usually the dust on the roads was
thick and the ruts were deep.
Ruts in the road were
dangerous to the motorist and
many an accident was caused
when motorists met and had to
turn out of the ruts. The car
would jump the rut and the driver
would lose control.
It was just such an accident in
which my aunt, the late Mrs, Alex
Dow, formerly Mrs. David
Miller, lost her life. She was
returning home to Exeter from
Grand Bend in an_auto when the
car jumped a rut and the driver
lost control and Mrs. Dow was
thrown through the windshield
and died suddenly from the ef-
fects.
But dust and ruts were not the
only menace. Pitchholes in
winter and the break-up of the
roads in the spring were among
the things that have added spice
to travelling. Many a' motorist
enroute to or from Grand Bend in
the spring of the year has been
mired in the mud as the road has
broken through with the frost
coming out of the ground. The
faithful old ,horse came to the
rescue of the more modern
contraption. Many a farmer has
been hauled out in the middle of
the night to give aid to a stalled
motorist, Before the motor car
and in the early pioneer days the
same thing has happened when
stage coaches and horse-drawn
vehicles were the only means of
transportation.