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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1975-07-23, Page 10tztvitiff.. MORE!. ',,sR•o • ' Test after test proves conclusively fertilizing pastureland works. "It has been estimated that less than 10% of Canadian pastureland receives any regular fertilization. Yet, if farmers were aware of the dramatic benefits of regular fertilization, I have no doubt there would be a boom in the use of this practice." — From a letter by CIL Agronomist Glen McCann to 'Agromart' Managers. • More Yield: With rotational grazing and proper fertilization, yields can be doubled. • More palatable: Cattle show a definite preference for good, succulent pasture — well fertilized pastures are more palatable, • More Nutritious: Adequate fertilization and good management practices will have a dramatib influence on the nutritional quality of pasture. Risk of nutritional deficiency is substantially, reduced, resulting in better overall performance. • More Intake: Because fertilized pastures are more palatable, cattle will increase dry matter intake. • More Profit: A balanced fertilizer program combined with good manageMent Will be directly reflected in more P°ur10sof lNQGI Per acre produce bedaUse you can graze more cattle per acre, Blyth Festival performing miracles nightly e By David Woods The facts about alcohol-related illnesses in Ontario are pretty sobering in themselves. They don't need to be dramatized by any old-faShioned hellfire preaching. To start with, alcohol is extremely expensive, but relatively speaking it is not expensive to buy. For although some would argue that $7.00 for a bottle of spirits is pretty steep, the true cost of "booze" has actually declined as a percentage , of disposable income over the past couple of decades. No, the really staggering costs of alcohol can be seen in our health care bill. As Ontario's Minister of Health, Frank Miller, put it in a speech recently: "The Ontario I taxpayer forked out $89 million through general public hospitals in 1971 for illnesses related to alcohol .. that, plus another $17 million through the mental ' hospital system; about $9 million through the Family Benefits Act, r and more than $11 million and local organizations , st arted getting the theatre back into shape, The theatre building was saved and then the next installment of the miracle happened. James Roy, a native of the Blyth area who had been involved in summer theatre in Quebec City and with Theatre Passe Muraille (the Farm Show people) in Toronto, started . working on the Blyth Summer Festival only this Spring. In four short months he's collected a company of professional and local amateur actors and managed to stage an original Canadian play. Much of the amazing progress comes, according to James' wife Anne, who does publicity -for • the Festival, because of the support of Blyth people. Individuals, businesses and the village council have given money and time to get the Festival started. It's a success story and if the audience who belly laughed and chuckled through the second performance of Mostly In Clover Thursday night, tell all their through Children's Aid Socieities, for alcohol related problems." - Those are some of the visible costs. Ilf you add to thein physicians' fees, the fact that alcohol plays a part in half of all traffic accidents in Ontario, and , the enormous losses to industry of alcohol-related absenteeism, the price we're paying for alcohol is truly astronomical. On the issue of productivity -- or the lack of it -- alone, the Addiction Research Foundation estimates that 14 million persons hours are lost each year in Ontario because of alcohol. Even if you total that up at, the minimum hourly wage, it would add up to a large amount. But behind all those dollar figures there are some disturbing personal statistics. in Ontario today, close to 300,000 people drink enough alcohol to endanger , their health. Of these, more than 145,000 have reached a stage of alcoholic illness. The solution isn't to ban "booze" or to tax it out of reach of the average person; rather it is friends, Blyth Summer Festival is going to be around for awhile. The Blyth players put on a friendly performance. There are lets of smiles and chuckles and good rapport with the audience as the cast of five play various roles in a number of sketches about rural. Clover in the depression. Music, chiefly from guitarist and singer Gordon. Bradley who introduces each section of the play, adds a lot to the show. It's toe tapping memorable music too and sometimes Bradley gets the whole cast ivolved, as when it's getting on to winter on the Boyel farm and Mother (rosy cheecked y oung Angela Guy) proclaims "It's stove m ovin' time" and gets father, hired man and son (young Mark Battye is just right for the part) to shift the heavy awkward cast iron stove back to the parlour. The stove is Bradley, sitting on a chair strumming his guitar, and singing "It's stove movin' time" while the movers grunt and groan and mother tries to make up her mind about, where the stove should sit. simply to emphasize that alcohol is a chemical that, if it is not used sensibly and in moderation, can very easily become addictive and harmful. The step between regular or heavy social drinking and total dependence really isn't very great. As the Ministry of Health's recently-introduced alcohol information program points out: "Mix a little thinking with your drinking. Ask yourself why you drink, when, how much -- and on how many occasions than you did, say, a year ago." That way, you may be able to head off a very costly problem. "That was some blast!" Writers Steven Thorne and James Roy have fleshed out Harry Boyle's description of Huron rural life effectively. Rqn Swartz, who is. Grandpa and hired man in other scenes and Jim Schaefer who is father Boyle and Miss Guy do a really funny step dance routine that shows how elections go in Clover. Bradley sings about romances breaking up and stores losing customers during election time when all of Clover divides into camps, Grits. numbering 49, Tories, 29 of them, and one independent. One of the best sketches of the evening has a group of rural ladies listening in on the party line, thrilled by the story _ of Grandpa Boyle's romance with Viola Marshall, the lady who runs the gift store.The telephone operator listens in too, gives the odd cynical comment, and is told off every time by a chorus of self righteous listeners - in who say `helen, get off the line, The man's' entitled to his privacy." The romance ends, grandpa (a Catholic in his seventies) tells the audience because 'Viola, a Methodist in her sixties wouldn't agree ;to' have the children brought up in my faith." The play gets in some good humoured swipes at religious intolerance and, there's a fine strong sketch about a slow witted hired man who hangs himself after he's teased unmercifully, but the evening is mostly a humourous one. There's lots of fantasy an actor turns into old Nell the horse, for a spine jarring buggy race to school, and kids in a rural classroom act out Captain Kidd and Robin Hood day dreams as a way. of escaping from a mouthy, boring teacher. Mostly in. Clover was written after the .actors together worked out improvisations on the characters and happenings in Mr. Boyle's books, and the production "still changes a bit every night", says Keith Roulstori of the Blyth Standard who's on the Festival's board of directors: These changes, the real ability of all the actors and their fresh, alive characterizations of the people of Clover,should . keep Mostly in Clover a hit for the season, which ends August. 2. The Festival company is offering a series ; of theatre workshops, free, for anyone in the area who is interested, every Saturday morning for four weeks. By Susan White There is a kind of miracle being performed in Blyth these nights. The brand new Blyth Surnmet"F'estival is performing Mostly in Clover, a play adapted from Harry 3. Boyle's books about growing up in Huron County, to good crowds. The prefessional theatre group, with some amateur actors, are also putting on Agatha. Christie's ' famous lohg run record breaking play The Mousetrap on alternate , nights. The miracle is not that the group is good -- the performance of Mostly in Clover that two of the company adapted is excellent -- but that there is summer theatre in Blyth at all. Not much more than a year ago Blyth's Memorial " Hall, the interesting old theatre where the Festival performs, was condemned as unsafe and noises were being made about tearing it down. A hard working group of Blyth people rescued the building and with the help of the village council 10-,-THE BRUSSELS POST, JULY 23, 1973 Today's Health Alcohol abuse costs taxpayers CREAM PUFF ! 1973 DiusuNIA11045 St M ho bii of all an far Cc St of Bar Of r thei Log spei grai Let Met for i M Bass seer WhE itres Weel h( ct or ty b( or he St el: sp co su ed Ht pe Lo far an Vi( ret Su Se( Sp J Lin Ga Jac Vic Lar hat disc Michelin Tires, Power Brakes, A.M. - F.M. Radio, Bucket Seats, 6 Cylinder 0.11.0. Engine, 4 Speed TrkAntrrAggioi);11"0-Weit• An t n a LIKE NEW GERALD'S DATSUN LTD. DATSUN Ph o tier 5214010 1111110••.,...,