HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1977-04-06, Page 2Wild swans in Tuckersmith
Amen
by Karl Schuessler
Sprink means auction
You may think a sure sign of spring is
kids ridipg their bikes. Or girls skipping
rope. Boys playing marbles. And father's
flying kites. •
But I have my own spring forecas• ts.
And let me tell you --spring is here. Spring
has arrived.
It's all those farm auctions coming up.
The sales registers in the newspapers
bulge and farm goods come busting out all--
over the grass and fields and sheds,
And my wife's on the go scrounging out
every last bargain after a winter's dearth.
"I only paid a dollar for it," my wife
announced to me after her first foray out.
It's good she started off that way. I
figure she couldn't do much damage with
a dollar. Then she let me have it.
"It's a pump organ."
"But we've already got one,"I said.
"But it's only a dollar and it's as big as a
piano," she gloated.
And heavy as one, too, I though t.
"But we don't need an organ -
like-a-piano," I said, "We've got one of
each already."
"But it's only a dollar," she insisted, "I
was just trying to help F ranklin Buuck out.
He kept saying. 'Who will start me off on a
bid? $15.00? $10.00?"
No one budged. He waited. Time was
getting on. "How. about five?"
No sound.
"Okay," he stomped his 'cane on the
shed floor, "Who will give me a dollar?"
No one.
"Won't anyone give a dollar for this
organ?" he pleaded.
"Okay," my wife said, I'll give you a
dollar."
"Sold" snapped Franklin Buuck and the
organ was all hers.
She's been working a miracle all week on
that organ. She's wanted to prove to me
that spending that dollar was a good
investment .
Of course I had to see to it that three men
hauled the filthy, peeli ng and broken
down thing to our place. They barely
managed to push it through the doorway.
And there it's sat for a week now right in
the hallway, Arid there's where she and
Russell Piper went to' work.
The real miracle worker was 77 year old
Russell Piper, He showed us once again
that his 35 years of organ tuning and repair
still live inside him. Russell proved he
could bring back old organs to life.
My wife helped him along. She drove
Russell back and forth from Seaforth three
days in a row. She rummaged around in his
old shed--roof collapsed and all--to find
brass reeds and spare orgah stops.
She took him into Robinson's LuMber in
Mitchell for a piece of cedar. He needed to
whittle out six organ pegs. The mice had
chewed out the others. H e covered the
bellows box in new leatherette, bought
from the scrap pile at Lou Heimbuck's
upholstery shop.
And Russell bought ten inches' of strong
'wire at FaustS--only ten inches, Mind you. I
don't think Ken's ever sold such a short
piece of wire before. And right 'before his
eyes, Russell twist the 'wire round, asked
for a hammer, and on the store's vise,
clamped to the counter, Russell hammered
out a reed hook. He needed one to pull out
the brass reeds for cleaning and repair.
And while Russell fixed up the inside,
my wife took care of the outside. And what
a job they did! The quarter-cut oak wood
now sparkles. And that Blatchford Organ,
Galt, Ontario now puts out a mellow:tone.
Those two are gloating over the organ
they fixed up. The think they've done me a
great favour by bringing another music
maker into the house.
But I say the real favour is bringing in
Russell Pipet. He's the treat who came to .
our house for three days. It was like old
times -- when. Russell fixed up our other
organ a few years back. Now we could
listen to Russell once again. Hear how he
and his father fixed organs all over
Ontario. How on one Sunday he wheeled
from Seaforth to Mitchell and back. On a
bike, that is.
We can hear how this bachelor chuckles
when he tells our daughter the first 40
years of marriage are the hardest.
This was our treat -- to hear and see
Russell Piper again. To watch him eat the
barbeque spareribs he said he'd walk a
thousand miles for. And to watch him wait
until My wife sat down before he started to
eat his dessert. And when I noted our
family wasn't that polite, Russell just
lowered , his head .and':-said; `Yeah, I was
brought up right, Wasn't I?"
I'd say we had two miracles in our house
laS1 week: that dollar organ and Russell
'Piper.
A generation of kids who are fluent in both English
and French would be a huge boost to the future, of
this country. The- large number Of reasonable people'
in, Quebec who do not favour separation will be more,
not less in favour Of keeping Canada -together When
they see English Canadians making honest efforts to
learn Canada's Other language. But that's not the
Pi•enbh „
Main reason that We should insist our kids learn.
The main reason it a selfish one. People Whb speak
two languages haVe Wider opportunities than people
who Speak only one. Ask a European, '
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6, 1977
INFIUSSELS
ONTAVO 10
Serving Brussels and the surrounding community.
Published each Wednesday afternoon at Brussels, Ontario
by McLean Bros. Publishers, Limited.
Evelyn Kennedy - Editor - Dave Robb - Advertising
Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association and
Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association
*CNA
Subscriptions (in advance) Canada $8.00 a year. Others
$14.00 a year, Single Copies 20 cents each.
rrs:710Nop
Brussels Post
An opportunity
It's about time that Ontario put more emphasis on,
teaching kids French.
There's lots of evidence that someone who speaks
two or more languages is more mentally agile than,
someone who speaks only one. A person who speaks
two languages is twice as employable, and twice as
open to experience and more than one culture as a
person who speaks only one.
Any unilingual Canadian who's been to., Europe
comes away a little ashamed and depressed at how
easily Europeans speak several languages.
Canadians, meanwhile, make a fuss about French on
cereal boxes. It's just as easy, to see bilingualism as
a fantastic opportunity rather than as a threat and a
plot to undermine Canada's "Englishness."
Canada has two official languages, as much as
some of us hate to admit it, just as our country had to
two founding peoples. French Ian guage rights are
guaranteed in the BNA Act. That's the reason our
government pushes for us- to learn French, rather
than Spanish or German which could" be equally
enlightening.
It's crucial not to et a backlash against the Parti
Quebecois' anti-English language policy turn us off
from wanting to. learn French. The PQ's
discrimnatory policy is wrong .... if they get away
with it (and we hope that's unlikely) they 'II be the
losers by violating human rights. If 'we react by
hardening against French we'd cut off our noses to
spite our collective face.
Regardless of what Quebec does, EnglishCanada
will come out ahead by putting more emphasis on
learning. French.
We should spend our tax dollars teaching French
to kids with their receptive minds rather than middle
aged civil servants whose main reason for taking•
language classes is to get salary increases.
Ontario's throne speech plan to put an additional
$67 million into, improving French teaching in
elementary schools is an excellent place to start.
Locally, we're proud to' see the Huron Perth Roman
Catholic Separate School Board voting to extend
French instruction in their schools.
The province will giv e special grants for French
immersion in the schools and there's lots of evidence
that this language teaching method really works. In
the U.S. a French immersion program, using
Canadian ideas and materials (and that's a switch)
has been a tremendOus success in a Silver Spring,
Maryland elementary school.
The principal there says his English speaking
students, who are taught all subjects inFrnch, have
increased reasoning powers in both languages. The •
program is heartily supported by parents who are
convinced that fluency in another language can be a
huge asset to their kids.
Ontario Should also make French compulsory in
our high schools once Sgain. There's no sense at all
in spending $67 million more in elementary French
if kids don't continue to learn the language, French
should also be required for entrance to university ,..
another langUage helps all students, be they future
dent Sts, engineers or teachers, think better.
The feds and Ontario have also announced that
they'i,re co-operating on a clastrOoM eXchange for
students in Quebec and Ontario. That too can Only
help us understand each other.
But We have to make a personal effort too. We •
must decide how we feel about our kids learning
French and let our School boards MP's arid MPS
know NM We feel.