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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1983-09-28, Page 33We specialize in . . Hats -T-Shirts-Sportswear For CLUBS • ORGANIZATIONS • SCHOOLS We also do Silkscreening & Photo Engraving Come In and see our line of Sportswear MARTY'S PLACE Main St., Seaforth 527-0363 eauER TRAVEL SERVICE 1 MAIN ST., SEAFORTH Welcomes you to Oderfest • AMSTERDAM Christmas and New Year's Flight 599 Adult S549 Child FLIGHTS TO WESTERN CANADA • VANCOUVER • CALGARY �• EDMONTON s249 s209 2O9 � PAGE 12 • Rugbraiding is passed through generations Viola Taylor, an accomplished rug maker whose work is on sale at the Van Egmond House, says she'd teach anyone who wants to learn the old art of braiding rugs. filer mother taught her, when she was a girl growing up on the family farm in Tuckersmith. And she thinks it's important that techniques of the old crafts get passed on to the younger generation. Mrs. Taylor's mother also taught her quilting and sewing and an aunt showed her how to knit and crochet. Circumstances though meant Mrs. Taylor had to put her crafts qn hold for years. She had two young daughters to support on her own after her first husband died many years ago. With only a public school education, "I didn't go to high school. 1 didn't have a chance to", her options looked limited. But the family home was paid for and she had just enough money to take a hairdressing course in London. She then set up her own business in her Crombie St. house. "Hairdressing worked out really well," she says, noting there ware only three hairdressers in town then. She ran her business for 17 years and when she retired 10 years ago. she and her second husband, Harold Taylor, got into crafts again. Especially rugs. N[MBLE HANDS Mr. Taylor, who died two years ago. had had "stroke after stroke" and it was hard for him to hold a hammer or Please turn to page 19 Tasty - Nu Bakery and Cheese House FRESH BREAD ROLLS * PASTRIES Over 40 kinds of delicious donuts "Fresh Daily" CANADIAN & IMPORTED CHEESES "Fresh off the block" Seaforth 527-1803 \ "Welcome to Ciderfest"! HILDEBRAND FLOWERS 15 Main St., Seaforth "Complete Floral Service Funeral - Weddings Everyday Arrangements BRAIDING: Viola Taylor shows how to braid this all wool rug. Welcome to .. . the t)th Annual Van Egmond Oder fest David Longstaff OPTICIAN Seaforth 527-1303 rnneottig KEM PAINTS _ v G l• r� v� WALLCOVERING WINDOW SHADES INTERIOR & EXTERIOR DECORATORS HILDEBRAND PAINT & PAPER 15 MAIN ST. SEAFORTH 527-1880 b A swashbuckling hero, Colonel PAGE 13 fought for liberty in Upper Canada BYFRANK JONES TORONTO STAR (Editor's Note: The following story. by Frank Jones in the Toronto Star Dec. 27. 1981 describes Van Egmond history as well as the current struggle to restore and revitalize the Van Egmond house.) He was a Dutch nobleman who fought with Napoleon at Moscow and Waterloo; he was a visionary who almost singe -handedly opened up this corner of southwestern Ontario, but he died in Toronto charged as a traitor for his role in the 1837 Mackenzie rebellion. Col. Anthony Van Egmond was a swashbuckling. eccentric hero in the fight for liberty in Upper Canada. Yet efforts by history buffs to preserve and restore his son's home. Van Egmond House. on the colonel's old estate are foundering because. their chairman suspects. Van Egmond is still regarded as a traitor in this part of the world. Paul Carroll says the Van Egmond Foundation, of which he is chairman, is being forced to sell off a crucial three -acre site linking the handsome Georgian Van Egmond House with the graveyard where Col. Van Egmond is buried. Although the site has been identified as an importart 19th century archeological site by University of Western Ontario experts and although it is vital to the integrity of the restoration scheme, the land will be subdivided for housing. he said. Red tape and two years of bureaucratic delays by Queen's Park while the foundation's interest charges at the bank steadily mounted helped to created the crisis. Carroll said. Now. he said some board members favor winding up the whole project rather than going ahead with a scaled-down. version. Col. Van Egmond would have sympathized: In his 10 dramatic years in Canada he, too. had his little run-ins with the authorities. Van Egmond came of noble stock and was born a count in Holland in 1778. He followed his father into a military career. and when Napoleon invaded Holland in 1794 he was conscripted into the French army. In the next 20 years he saw much action. reportedly took part in the retreat from Moscow and only left for the New World after taking part in Napoleon's final debacle at Waterloo. He and his wife, Susanna. and their children prospered for eight years in Pennysivania then, with a caravan of Dutch settlers looking for new frontiers, set out for Upper Canada. Making room for a poor family in the boat across the Niagara River, the Van Egmonds left part of their extensive baggage on the U.S. side for collection later. The goods, including the only two portraits in existence, of Anthony and Susanna. were stolen. Van Egmond, a tall. stooped figure who always wore a felt hat because, it was rumoured. he had lost his ears to frostbite in Russia, quickly contracted with the newly established Canada Company to build about 35 miles (about 60 kilometres) of road through the wild Huron Tract in return for 13.000 acres and cash. Within a year, with work gangs laboring through the winter and sleeping in shacks built at intervals along the route, the job was done, though an early traveller reported that here and there giant elm trees, too large for easy felling, still stood in the middle of the road (now Highway 9). Van Egmond, meanwhile, built a combination inn and home near Seaforth and cleared 100 acres of land the first year. A touching account survives of the little ceremony in August. 1829, attended by Canada Company officials, when Susanna Van Egmond cut and bound thefirst sheaf of wheat ever grown in the Huron Tract. She handled the sickle with a practised touch, a horn of whisky was served and the company adjourned to the Van Egmond house for an ample dinner rounded off with a dessert of red and black raspberries picked along the wooden snake Please turn to page 14