HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1972-08-30, Page 2grAllOPEn nm,
'MUSSELS
(*TARN)
WEPNESDAYf APGIrIST 3O 1.972
erYing Brussels and the surrounding community
published each Wednesday afternoon at Brussels, Ontario
by McLean Bros. Publishers, Limited.
Evelyn Kennedy Editor Tom Haley - Advertising
Member Canadian COmrnunitY Newspaper Association and.
Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association.
Subscriptions (in advance) Canada $4.00 a year, atherS
$5.00 a year, Single CoPies 10 cents each.
Second plass mail Registration No. 0562.
Telephone 887-6641.
it's up to us
While no firm decisions were
reached, the public meeting held
last week to discuss law enforce-
ment in Brussels was well worth
while.
If it accomplished nothing else
it emphasized once more that in the•
final analysis law enforcement in
our democracy depends on the co-op-
eration of the people. It is only
in a dictatorship that the police
have the final say and in effect
make the decision as to guilt or
innocence.
In democracies such as Canada
the police have well defined duties
but the.responsibilty of deciding
between guilt and innocence lies
with the courts. The decision rests
on the courts assessment of the
evidence brought before it.
This is where we as citizens
have a responsibility. If we don't
co-operate in providing evidence
of misdemeanors and fail to support
the police when a charge is laid,
we can only blame ourselves when
people that in our eyes are guilty
of something -'whether it be tire
squealing or malicious damage -
avoid the penalty of the law. Guilt
can only be determined on the basis
of evidence. No matter how effic-
ient the police are their hands are
tied in many situations without
support from the public.
If we are not prepared as citi-
zens to testify concerning incidents
of which we have knowledge there is
not much more the police or the
village council can do than what
already is being done.
To the Editor:
237 Geddes St.,
Elora, Ontario.
Sir:
Enclosed is my renewal
subscription. We surely do
appreciate The Post and are
especially • pleased with the
Centennial year issues.
I have one scrapbook com-
pleted and starting another.
So glad the Kennedys are
continuing to be associated
with the paper.
Lois and I thoroughly en-
joyed the Centennial weekend
and express our thanks to the
hard working Committee for
their kind invitation and splen-
did program.
Harris Bell
The Historical Branch of
the City of Edmonton Parks
and Recreation Department
has been researching infor-
mation about the Hudson's Bay
Company Fort Edmonton as
it was during the 1840's, in
preparation for an authentic —1,,
reconstruction of the post.
Much of our knowledge of this
fort in the 19th century is
derived from Fort Edmonton
Journals of Daily Occurrences
which are now' in the Hudson's
Bay Company Archive:
If any readers have infor-
mation concerning the
whereabouts of these missing
journals, we would sincerely
appreciate hearing from them
at:
The Historical Exhibits Bldg.,
10105 - 112 Avenue,
EDMONTON, Alberta,
T5J OK1
Sir:
May We make an appeal to
Yours truly,
your readers for some
missing documents?
D. Babcock,
Research Consultant,
With the best intentions in the world
to do so , I never quite get around to
answering all my Mail. There always
seems to be some domestic or other
crisis that interferes.
In almost every case, the letters. I
get are both friendly and interesting.
The exceptions are, business letters and
bill collectors. Form 'letters and pro-
motional letters I don't even read: just
tear them once across and toss into
the logical depository - the garbage pail.
Anyway, this column seems to get
around quite a bit, and the letters pile
up, and I keep making new resolutions
to answer them and the pile keeps grow-
ing. If my wife would leave me for a
Month, and I worked eight hours a day, I
could clean them all up and start a new
life, relieved of guilt and shame.
Just to give you an idea, here's a
cross-sampling. Just got a card from
The Bobsey Twins, Regina and Kath.
Postmark: Venice. They're two former
Students. When they were in Grade 13,
and I couldn't find a boy to clean up
the estate, they took it on, and did fr the
best job I've ever had done. Unlike boys,
who don't get into the corners, they
crawled into the bushes and dragged out
leaves with their bare hands. They gar-
nered forty plastic garbage bags of leaves
and twigs. I gave them their pay and
an illegal beer and we've been buddies
ever since. According to the card,
they've covered seven countries in three
weeks and are now heading for Spain.
Poor old Madrid.
Here's a letter from R. F. Stedman,
County Wicklow, Eire. An excerpt:ilYour
column holds for me 4'. note of sanity in
a mad world and ranks, in my mind with
dreg Clark." Double thanks, R. F.
Greg Clark is about six tiers above me,
but I appreciate the sentiment. Mr. Sted-
man went to High school with my older
brother and sister.
Just grabbed another one from the
heap. Holy smokes, it's dated Feb., 1971.
Thomas A. Smith, Rouleau, Sask. He
noticed a reference in the Column to
Calumet Island, in the. Ottawa River,
where my mother was born. He was
born there too and remembers Smileys
in Shawville, Que., where my dad once
ran a store. it's a long, interesting
letter from a real oldtimer who went
West in 1910, at the age of 17, went
overseas in World war 1. Mr. Smith,
I hope you are well, though you must
be 80, and I'll write a proper letter.
Here's another, from White Plains,
New York. Holy Old Hughiej Dated
Jtme 24th, 1969. It's from A. Leslie
Hill, Captain, Army Nurse Corps, U.S.
Army Reserve (retired). Born in Fergus,
Ont., three score years ago, graduate
of Kingston (Ont.) General Hospital,
served in World War U and Korea, and
read my column to a group of Negroes
in the laundry room. How about that?
Letter ends, “Thanks for your column,
dull or not."
Here's a self-addressed envelope from
Mrs. Walter E. Dorsett, Smiley, Sask.
But I can't find the letter. And another
one from Gordon Fairgrieve, publisher
of the Observer, Hartland, N.B. He has
a subscriber called Bill Smiley, who lives
in Massachusetts, and asks that I drop
him a line. I will, Bill and Gordon.
A note from G. R. McCrea, publisher
of the Herald, Hanna, Alta. He agrees
it's a mad, mad world, has been forty
years in the newspaper “game", started
at $5 a week, and recalls with nostalgia:
"For $5 in those days you could take
your best girl to the local dance, buy a
mickey of rot-gut rye, and, still have
money enough to buy the gal a lunch at
midnight, and some left over for a package
of roll-your-owns on Monday. Boy, was
that ever livin'." Thanks, G. R., for a
grand letter.
From a lady in Bowmanville. She
thanks me for my salute to the house-
wife, and has some good advice: "I
have learned, slowly, never criticize
what someone's doing unless you have
tried it yourself." And it turns out
the lady lived next door for eight years
to the lady who wrote me a beautiful
letter from New Zealand.
In a column this summer, I com-
pared my wife to that bird, the flicker.
Ron Cumming writes from Port Elgin,
comparing husbands to bobolinks. "Before
marriage, the bobolink has a beautiful,
slick, yellow-striped suit and sings a
mate- enticing Bobo-link-a- link- a-link.
After marriage, in late summer, he
dresses in dull brown, and his song is
merely a dull 'clunk'. As a middle-aged
hubby, I keep seeing a parallel."
Woops1 It's not all sweetness and
light. Just reached and read two
letters giving me hell. I must have
written a snarly column about teenagers
back in 1970, for one of the letters is
dated then. One is from a teenager,
unsigned, blasting me in no Uncertain
terms. The other is from a senior
citizen, Mrs. Jessie Slater of Brace-
bridge. One pungent comment: "You
must be a Dagwood at home, and a
rotten father. How else could you have
such a mixed-up family?" Well,i Mrs.
Slater, my mixed-up daughter happens
to be living in Bracebridge right now,
and I've a good notion. to call and tell
her to gd over and give you a good punch
in the nose.
I'm kidding, Mrs. Slater. Kim wouldn't
step on an ant, if she could avoid it. She's
a delightful, compassionate, beautiful and
intelligent young woman, Who is no more
mixed-up than you or I.
And I'm no DagwoOd. When I put my
foot down around here .. . I break a toe.
Well, all I wanted to say was that
you meet a lot of interesting people in
this business.
Sugar and Spice
by Bill Smiley