HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1979-07-25, Page 4Perspectives
pleas to the accompanying
adults to help keep the noise
down.
But not him. He seems to
have a built-in tolerance
toward such distractions.
When it's time to roll home
he seems as fresh as ever,
ready to put the gas pedal to
the mat and make time with
the best of them down the
open highway.
Perhaps his training for
driving a bus comes from his
love affair with miniature
standardbreds. Before I met
him I thought that these little
horses were just a bunch of
ponies that amateurs like
myself hitched up to a
borrowed sulky and took
over to a local track for a
Sunday afternoon's race
with other like-minded
characters.
Not so. It's a game for
professionals, This fellow
has a couple of thousand
dollars or so invested in each
of his little horses, animals
that can walk, I should say
pace, all over a good number
of your standard-bred horses
that race at the regular
tracks such as Dresden or
Windsor. it seems that the
little horses cannot race for
as long a distance as their
bigger relatives but on a
short track can really go at a
good clip.
It takes a lot of energy and
patience to race horses and
it's not always a bouquet of
roses waiting for you in the
winner's circle. It's muddy
tracks and other drivers who
don't hesitate to cut you off
even if it means a bad spill
for somebody else, as
happened to this fellow this
year already.
It's long cold hours of
working a horse in the winter
when you would much rather
be inside with a warm cup of
coffee instead of facing the
rear end of a horse and the
front end of a lazy wind—too
lazy to go around so it goes
right through you.
Yet, I'm sure that there's
an element of excitement
and thrill there that makes
the long days at the wheel of
the green bus, threading in
and out of traffic on the 401,
just a little more acceptable
because there's always the
summer racing season
ahead of all those June
school trips,
ifeM11".,7H'
elaWn me memory
Page 4 Tirnoi,Adyocate, July 25,1979
........ • `=.•
Times. Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881
*on** tom" Mom, ft** hiliamm acalawkzazxia-.....afr
ames dvora e
ror WA.* Mg. 1121
n TrAVE1
sources, we have read of very few
other practical applications of the
proven theory. Some years ago the
Hon. Alvin Hamilton, former minister
of Agriculture in the Diefenbaker
government, was reported to have in-
vested in a plant to produce methane
from animal manure out in
Saskatchewan.
It sounded like a tremendous idea,
for the extraction of the gas left the
fertilizing qualities of the manure un-
diminished - and odorless into the
bargain.
Certainly the process of extracting
methane from municipal dumps should
fill more than one urgent requirement,
for our larger cities are trying in vain
to find land into which they may dump
their wastes. If a fuel potential can
offset the nuisance value of garbage we
should be doing all we can to promote
the plan.
Wingham Advance-Times
don't appreciate genius. If we do, the
paper is filled with junk. If we make a
change in the other fellow's write-up,
we are too critical; if we don't we are
sloppy or asleep.
"IF we clip things from other
papers, we are too lazy to write them
ourselves; if we don't, we are too stuck
on our own stuff. Like as not, someone
will say we swiped this from some
newspaper. We did,"
Amalgamated 1924
RATMAROUNO.
"Doug just remembered he buried five cases of beer from last year's shortage,
but forgot where."
Getting healthier, thanks
To the editor:
It seems rather pointless
that the Exeter Business
Men's Association request
that Exeter main Street
traffic be detoured for
sidewalk sales days.
Countless strangers
passing through Exeter 'must
have wondered the reason
for the detour, as there was
no indication of why it was
closed, They probably
thought Exeter was in-
stalling sewers,
Editor — Bill Batten
Assistant Editor — Ross Haugh
Advertising Manager — Jim Beckett
Composition Manager — Harry DeVries
Business Manager — Dick Jongkind Published Each Wednesday Morning
Phone 235.1331 at Exeter, Ontario
Second Class Mail
Registration Number 0386
SUBSCRIPTION RATES; Canada $11.00 Per Year; USA $22.00
Dawned if we do
Is it worth it?
New energy source
SERVING CANADA'S BEST FARMLAND
C.W.N.A., 0.W.N.A. CLASS 'A' and ABC
Published by J. W. Eedy Publications Limited
LORNE EEDY, PUBLISHER
Editors of the Campbell, B.C.,
Courier write: "Getting out this
newspaper is no picnic. If we print
jokes, people say we are being silly; if
we don't they say we are too serious
and need a laugh. If we stick too close
to the job, the boss says we ought to be
out hunting up news. If we're out too
much he wonders where we were in-
stead of being here for phone calls and
unannounced visitors.
"If we don't print contributions, we
Between the years 1967 and 1977, 38
Ontario children were killed in school
bus accidents. In that same ten year
period, 2,172 suffered personal injuries,
mostly caused by poor bus design and
faulty equipment.
According to a spokesman for the
Ontario Association of School Business
Officials, plans of the federal depart-
ment of transport to improve the safety
of school buses would be an expensive
and unnecessary change. Among these
proposals would be higher seatbacks
with increased padding, stronger body
joints and protective cages around gas-
oline tanks. These alterations would
cost $1,200 and $2,000 for each bus.
Ottawa backed away from the im-
provement program last fall and will
likely be under similar pressure when
this matter comes forward again.
A St. Thomas man has proven the
feasibility of using waste products as
an energy source. Assisted by govern-
ment funds, he has tapped an old dum-
ping ground, long since filled in and
covered, to provide a big supply of
methane gas. And that gas has been
heating a 20 x 39 foot greenhouse for
some time. He says the supply of gas
from that one dump will last the pre-
sent operation for 15 to 20 years.
Installation costs of such a heat
source are high, says the green house
owner, but after installation the fuel
itself costs nothing. Oil-fired heating
units cost their operators in the range
of $25,000 per acre per year. In addi-
tiOn, of course, the burning off of the
trapped methane may well prevent a
tragedy in the future when uninformed
developers try to use the dump site for
housing.
Despite some public discussion on
the use of waste product gases as fuel
By
SYD FLETCHER
He's kind of a little guy,
one you might not notice on
the street unless your kids
were with you. They'd
probably know him because
he drove them on that big
green bus on their school trip
to Toronto or Midland or the
Zoo.
You name it, if there's any
place that is worth visiting
within five or six hundred
miles, he's been there, ac-
companied by fifty or sixty
of our nations finest, trying
to outdo themselves singing,
laughing, asking where the
nearest bathroom is, or
saying, I'm going to be sick,
I really think I arn, what'll I
do, I think I'm going to be...
Some bus drivers refuse to
go on long distance trips, For
theft it's a not too subtle
form of torture, After fifty or
sixty miles you begin to see
the signs of strain—short
temper and eyes darting
nervously from side to side,
There's a great temptation to sit
down and write a column this week
that is light and breezy to convey to all
my readers that after a sojourn in
hospital, the editor is back at his desk
and everything is okay.
That is impossible, because
everything is not okay with my world,
but then, having had ample opportunity
to look back, there is an admission that
it never really was many times.
Similar to your life, mine has had its
ups and downs and there was a great
deal of "the good life" and there is a
solid base on which to build for a future
that is slowly becoming clearer and
more optimistic.
For those not in the know, and In a
small town that number is com-
paratively small, the writer's two-
week stay in hospital was in the psy-
chiatric ward at University Hospital.
Fortunately, I was able to recognize
that I was having a problem that I
could not handle by myself or through
some very kind and patient friends.
Similar to the home handyman who
recognizes a plumbing problem and
believes he can handle it, the flood was
not abating and in fact was getting
worse.
Too late we often find that by the
time we smarten up and call the
plumber, there has been considerable
more damage done through our own in-
eptitude. The plumber can fix the
cause of the problem, but even he can't
help you with repairing the damage
that the flood caused.
The main problem in my life is a
ugar at,
Dispensed by Smiley
For weeks I'd been telling her. I said,
"The jungle is coming in on us. I'm not
kidding. It's bloody jungle out there,
and it's going to get us."
She thought I was hallucinating
again. Jungle. Creeping in. Rubbish.
And then I took her out and showed her.
She hadn't taken a good tour of the es-
tate for a couple of years. And what she
saw shook her, "You're right. It is a
jungle,"
A few years ago we had a
kaleidoscope of colour out there.Now
it's ahnost solid green, relentlessly
creeping in from all sides.
We had two rose beds. We had ac-
tually planted some roses in them, and
some of the roses actually grew. Peace
roses, Dypsomaniac roses. Red roses.
As soon as they bloomed, I'd cut them,
put them in a vase, and we'd sit around
looking at them as though we'd borne
children,
I cut them back dutifully, piled dirt
around them in the fall, and'a couple
even bloomed the second year.
The roses were planted cheek-by-
jowl with a fine healthy row of peonies
that produced almost obscenely. The
second year of the roses, the peonies
were a little sick. The third year they
were definitely ailing.
This year that particular flower-bed
has produced two peonies, three
rosebuds, two elm trees about eight
feet high, a healthy young maple, and
enough hay to feed a herd of cows. The
jungle.
Our other rosebed was somewhat of
a failure from the beginning, despite
all the fertilizing and fussing.
Therefore, when a couple of acorns the
squirrels had missed sprouted, I
thought, "Why not? It'll add a nice
touch of green." Almost overnight, it
'seems, those acorns have grown to
marriage problem, and through my in-
eptitude I was attempting to place the
blame on many of the wrong causes.
What transpired was a month of con-
frontation that widened the gulf
between myself and the woman I love.
Every emotion that the human mind
and heart can muster was thrown into
the fray, but unfortunately I was not
always fighting on the right battle
field. Much of the enemy was within.
The stay in hospital gave me the op-
portunity needed to take a good look at
myself and to recognize some faults
that had never before been evident. I
started to learn new and exciting
things about communicating and inter-
reacting with others.
It was a course I wish I had taken
many years ago and had then been
lucky enough to enrol in refresher
courses through the years.
A good friend who went through
some of the same help tells the story of
an acquaintance who suggests that
those who come out of psychiatric help
"are never the same".
While the comment was intended as
a negative one, he obviously does not
understand the situation. My friend
and I agree wholeheartedly that you
never are the same if your treatment
has been successful... you can be a
much better person. It is in many cases
a treatment you give yourself.
While I would wish to advise readers
that everything has been patched up,
that is not the case. There has been too
much hurt to arrive at that point so
quickly.
sawlog dimensions.
First few years here we had tiger
lilies and all kinds of other exotics.
This year we had tigers. You could see
them sitting there in the jungle at
night, peering with yellow eyes. Some
people might say they were cats. I
know they were tigers.
A few years ago we had brown-eyed
daisies galore. This year we had
brown-eyed children galore, slashing
and galloping through the jungle that
once was brown-eyed daisies.
Even the woodpiles are creeping
closer. At first they were orderly
woodpiles, in their place, ready to be
thrown into the cellar, adding rather a
quaint touch of rusticity to the
backyard, as it once was.
Then we started piling fallen
branches on top of them. Now they are
horrible woodpiles, crooked and
beckoning, festooned by vines and
other creeping green things.
Used to be a fine young spruce grow-
ing near the garage. Top of it would
have made a nice Christmas tree. It's
grown so fast in fifteen years that it's a
hazard to low-flying airplanes.
We have squirrels so big and so bold
they'll jump up on the picnic tahle and
snatch the second half of your peanut-
butter-and-honey sandwich without so
much as a, "Do you mind?".
We have robins who pull out worms
as big as rattlesnakes, and then have to
surrender them to grackles as big as
seagulls, strutting about the clearing in
the jungle in that ugly, pigeon-toed gait
of theirs.
Bees as big as beavers buzz around
our beer bottles, Huge black ants hoist
themselves up the hair on my legs, spit
in my eye, and waltz off to attack a
starling. Every day we move our lawn
chairs a little closer to the back door.
However, Kaaren and I have started
to look positively at the situation after
so many frightening weeks of
negatives and have set a mutual goal to
attempt to get the marriage back
together.
To facilitate that goal, the writer has
moved out of the family home into an
apartment that is, fortunately, very
close to home.
We have negotiated an agreement
whereby we can both provide that
which each of us has to offer to our four
very special boys, albeit on a part-time
basis.
Hopefully, our roles as parents will
be strengthened considerably and that
our roles as friends with many of you
will follow the same pattern.
Over the past many years, I have en-
joyed sharing the good times of the
Batten family with you and now find it
very healthy sharing some of our
problems because unless we are able to
do that with each other we are not real-
ly communicating.
I do not suggest I have been able to
fully cope with that which has
transpired or that which the future will
bring, and in some ways I hope some of
you will be able to give both Kaaren
and me the type of understanding that
is required.
We think that we have reached a
healthy state in a bad situation and it
will take time and effort to narrow the
gulf.
Out front, our mighty oak grows ever
greater, peers in windows, rubs his
nose against panes, chuckles with
amusement, gives the brick a smack
with one of his huge hands, and goes
back to waiting for the next month
wind, so that he can drop a dead branch
across our TV cable wire.
Up the back of the house crawls a
great green vine, with tentacles like
those of a giant squid, slowly, careful-
ly, and with super-human skill pulling
bricks loose, one by one. Every so often
it starts to die, and I watch with glee
and hope. But no, fresh green tendrils
sprout, every one of them a potential
brick puller.
We hack, we chop, we slash. To no
avail. Everywhere the trees, the
weeds, the vines, crawl toward and
over the house, insidious, malicious,
whispering to each other their eventual
triumph.
In this steady, frightening encroach-
inent of jungle, there is only one bright
spot, one thing that won't grow.
That's the privet hedge between the
yard and the street, that gives us about
as much privacy as a strippper at a
medical convention.
Planted at great expense, trimmed
with decreasing regularity because
there's nothing to trim, it looks like a
kid who's been in a fight and had a cou-
pie of frontleeth knocked out. that's the
good part. Down at the other end,
where the snowplow man dumps forty-
eight tons a year, it resembles a pygmy
with a bad case of malnutrition.
That's the way we plan to go, when
the jungle forces us to flee, Straight out
through one of the gaps in the hedge,
pushing the grand piano in front of us.
responsible for the party's
position regarding changes in
Canada's competition policy,
presently the weakest in the
industrialized world,
The new minister points
out that he's not simply against
"bigness."
"Bigness to create economy
of scale . , . within a specific
activity of production, manu-
facture, or service, is a fact of
life, and to do so is in the pub-
lic interest," Huntington em-
phasizes.
He believes such activities
are necessary if Canadian com-
panies are to withstand the
rigors of international compe-
tition.
The concern lies with those
firms that seek power for the
sake of power.
"It seems to me that every
time we allow a particular
group to have power, you can
be certain it will find ways of
multiplying in order to gain
more power," he says.
The challenge, according
to Huntington, is to find new
ways to restore the basic in-
centive aspects of the small
business world before the sys-
tem itself is destroyed.
"I give that objective a very
high priority," he adds.
Small business, it seems,
has a concerned voice in the
corridors of power, a minister
prepared to fight for compe-
tition legislation that really
counts.
J
eighth will be built in Exeter
soon. Tentative approval
was given to the local
congregation of Jehovah's
Witnesses to erect a hall in
the north-west section near
No. 83 highway.
Blaring of the plant whistle
Saturday marked the end of
the pea pack at Canadian
Canners Ltd. here. The corn
pack is expected to start on
August 24.
A land judging competition
for Grade 12 students at
SHDHS will be sponsored by
the Ausable Authority this
fall. Over 50 students are
expected to take part.
15 Years Ago
Officials of the Exeter
Industrial Development
Corporation and members of
council were on hand
Wednesday to welcome
Exeter's newest infusbry.
Custom Trailers Ltd. The
Corporation executive
spearheaded a drive to raise
funds for the building which
will be located on the Keller
property on Highway 83.
Between 25 and 30 "in-
terested citizens" using
donated machinery, money
and materials erected a new
ball screen at the girl's
diamond in the Exeter
Community Park over the
weekend. RAP refused to fix
the dilapidated structure,
although at their meeting
Monday, they passed a
motion aughorizing in-
terested citizens to do it!
The SHDHS board
received approval from the
provincial government this
week for the proposed 1110
vocational addition to the
high school. Approval from
the Ottawa is still needed.
Included in the extensive
addition will be seven
classrooms, a science
laboratory, a carpentry
shop, drafting shop and a
motor mechanics shop.
Workmen completed
construction of the sanitary
sewers on Sanders and
Andrew Streets yesterday
and the pouring has also
been finished by Hammond
Construction on William St.
from Huron to Sanders.
Surely the association
could get handy with a bit of
paint and make signs to
indicate Exeter sidewalk
sales are being held! If the
association goes to the
trouble of getting permission
to have the detour at least let
the people know the reason,
This would be the least
expensive method of ad-
vertisement and the signs
could be used annually. gib
Jean E. Simpson
It's ironic that in the Year Of The
Child, we are prepared to trade a few
dead and injured children for some
questionable savings in school board
budgets.
An official of the Ontario Public
School Men Teachers' Federation looks
at a "double standard", - one for the
automobile and another for school
buses, as unacceptable and should not
be tolerated.
With each succeeding accident in-
volving a school bus, the alibis for inac-
tion become weaker. Over 600,000
children travel this way every day of
the school year. What is their safety
worth? The problems are known and
the technology for their solution is
available.
St. Marys Journal Argus
55 Years Ago
Mr. J. Passmore Hensel'
has recently installed a large
radio receiving set in his
store, You are invited to drop
in and hear this outfit.
A monster Sturgeon fish
was captured by the
fishermen at St. Joseph
measuring nearly six feet in
length and weighing 137
pounds
The wine factory at St.
Joseph was torn down last
week.
Mr. George Layton and
Mr. John Laporte were
elected as Huron
representatives to the new
Ontario Bean Growers
Association at an inaugural
meeting in Zurich last week.
The editor of this paper is
on tour with the Canadian
Press Party in England and
Europe.
30 Years Ago
B.W. Tuckey former reeve
of the village, christened the
new pumping system at the
Moodie well Thursday by
using a well known soft drink
which, by an odd coincidence
is distributed by Tuckey
Beverages.
Loreen Venner, Iris
Tomlinson, Barbara Brint-
ness, Olive Petrie, Marilyn
Skinner, Jean Thompson,
Kathleen Armstrong, and
Shirley Harness are at-
. tending Girl Guide Camp at
Kitchigami.
Cal Fahrner, Sarnia, Bob
Pryde London, Mel Gaiser
Shipka, Ray Wuerth and
Douglas Pryde Exeter
motored to Washington last
week. '
James L. Hendry,
manager of the Bank of
Montreal branch in Exeter
has received word that he is
being transferred to the
branch at Owen Sound.
20 Years Ago
The hot summer has given
Tuckey Beverages Ltd.,
Exeter its "biggest season to
date," according to manager
Ross Tuckey. The 11-year -
old firm has increased its
staff to 30 to handle the
demand.
A new church, the town's
By W. Roger Worth
Canada's new Minister of
State for Small Business and
Industry is just getting settled
in his new Ottawa office but
he's already taken a swipe at
some of the country's corpo-
rate giapts.
'In a maiden speech follow-
ing his cabinet appointment,
Ronald Huntington expressed
strong feelings about corporate
concentration in the form of
conglomerates.
In particular, he knocked
the massive companies that
"cover a wide and diversified
interlocking of corporate ac-
tivities."
Roger Worth is Director,
Public Affairs,
Canadian Federation of
Independent Business.
"Such giants can, and do,
speed up the massing of capital
into the hands of a few people,
and that power can threaten
the survival of our free enter-
prise, incentive oriented soci-
ety," he said.
Harsh words indeed, but
Huntington should know what
he's talking about.
As a small businessman in
British Columbia before en-
tering politics, Huntington
founded two successful enter-
prises, one with sales of more
than $10 million per year.
In addition, as a Conser-
vative back bencher, he was
Canada Mainstream Canada
New Minister Talks Tough
+CNA
The jungle is moving in