The Rural Voice, 2002-08, Page 18CABLE
• Galvanized Aircraft Cable 1/16' to 5/16'
• Wire Rope 3/8' to 3/4'
• Stainless Steel Cable 1/16" -114'
• PVC Cable 1/8' • 3/16' Clear & White Coat
ROPE
• Polypropylene - 1/4" to 1/2"
• Nylon 1/4', 1/2', 5/8'. 1'
• Hemp 1/2". 314', 7/8", r
CHAIN
Grade 30, 3/16" to 1/2"
Wide range of thimbles,
shackles, cable clamps, etc.
Above are stock items
Other sizes and grades
available by order
Custom-made
LOGGING
CHOKERS
519-524-9671
Fax: (519) 524-6962
53 Victoria S.,Goderich, N7A 3H6
Suppliers of...
*VANGUARD SWUM
KELLY PORTABLE
SEED CLEANING
Available to Clean
Fall Wheat
Convenient and
Economical
Serving Mid -Western
Ontario
Ripley, Ontario
NOG 2R0
395-5960
1-888-844-1333
14 THE RURAL VOICE
As one character in the play says
"Farming does not go on here
anymore, Aylmer, it goes on in the
American Senate."
Instead of being trapped in his
barn, in Bamboozled Aylmer is sent
on a journey when, as part of his
duties as a new appointee to the Hall,
he has to search out the farmer most
fit to inherit the earth and present him
or her with the "golden calf' and he
has two days to do it.
"He sets out and in his explor-
ations hefirst visits a sort of middle-
sized farm, and then a giant farm."
ff
sonWayne, (played by
hn Jarvis) meanwhile, is
most insulted by the
presence locally of Mennonites who
seem to get along on their 50 -acre
plots while he "with 1,000 acres,
feels that's the absolute smallest he
can be and still survive."
Wayne's wife, played by Caroline
Gillies, as a part-time teacher whose
salary keeps the farm going, keeps
asking the thorny questions about
what they're doing.
"What's going on is a real war of
ideas," Johns says of the current
debate in the countryside. "I've just
barely touched on it, enough to know
that there is a huge amount of stuff
going on. It's partly a conflict
between big farms and little farms.
There's a conflict between
generations, especially in the world
of women."
Then there's the world of high
technology on the farm, genetically
altered crops and the distrust of
assigning more power to huge
corporations. "Corporations haven't
been very well behaved recently," he
laughs, days after the latest financial
scandal at WorldCom.
"I've gone through tons of
material trying to sort this stuff out
and," Johns said, adding with a
chuckle, "normally things sort
themselves our a little faster than
this."
"I guess you could start with
almost any sector of farming and
totally immerse yourself trying to
figure it out." He chose to deal with
cash -cropping and pigs, with one
neighbour seeking to construct a
4,000 -head hog barn.
There's the question of how big
does a farm have to be, Johns says.
Farms keep getting bigger "and at
what point that farm turns into a
corporation is a matter of dispute.
"It's quite breathtaking when I
drive down the line where 1 grew up
(near Mitchell) to see, I think perhaps
one out of eight buildings left there.
They are gone, not just abandoned,
gone period and these were
substantial houses.
"I think as farmers grow older the
temptation to take the golden
handshake must be overwhelming."
Johns says he's bothered by the
wasting away of the small towns and
villages of the region and the loss of
the surrounding%'farms that have
traditionally supported those towns.
"I'm not totally convinced that
there's an iron law (that it must be
that way)."
Though he tries to examine issues
from a humorous standpoint, Johns
also says "I think it's an important
show. I like to think that in some part
of its existence Blyth (Festival)
continues to be a theatre for farmers
and for rural communities. I think it's
important that in some way it be an
arena where these disputes are
ventilated a little bit.
"There's nowhere else on earth, I
think that you'd see a play like this.
Really, I don't think there's a theatre
on earth that would put on such a
play, for such an audience. I like to
think it's because the theatre is part
of the culture here and Blyth in its
best moments mirrors that culture."
Bamboozled: He Won't Come in
From the Barn, Part 11 opens at the
Blyth Festival on July 31 and plays
until August 31.0
Farmers have fun
at city kid's expense
Barnboozled is one of two
farm -oriented plays to round out
the 2002 season at the Blyth
Festival.
The Drawer Boy, Michael
Healey's internationally -acclaimed
play is a fictional story based on
the visit of actors to the Clinton
area to research the play that
became the international hit, The
Farm Show. Here to two bachelor
farmers have fun at the expense of
the city -born actor who comes to
learn about farming, yet he also
teaches them a thing or two.0