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Home My WebLink AboutClinton News-Record, 1977-03-10, Page 4PAGE 4—CLINTON NES -RECORD, THURSDAY, MARCH 10, 1977 V\#IIiat.. w.e t In Canadian identity Some critics claim Canadians have no identity, but that's ridiculous. Here are just a few simple ways you can till us from the rest of the world. A Canadian has a white salt stain halfway up his trouser leg. A Canadian goes to a party in a $200 suit, in a Hathaway shirt, a St. Laurent tie, and walks around all evening in his stocking feet because he doesn't want' to get the hostess' floor dirty. A Canadian considers it one of the greatest thrills of life when snow doesn't stick to his shovel. A Canadian wants a storm door for his birthday. ,To a Canadian, "full frontal" means a girl walking around in a parka, toque and lined jeans, but with the top buckle undone on her galoshes. A Canadian cries when he sees a snow plow heading for his driveway which he's just shovelled out. A Canadian woman burns her bra only if she's out of wood. At parties, a Canadian asks you upstairs so, he can examine your caulking, and get the name of your weatherstripping man. A Canadian gets a wild look in his eyes and sucks on his mitts everytime he passes a travel agency advertising a special to Nassau. A When a Canadian thinks of Hell, he wonders what the heating bill must be. When a Canadian mother sees an icicle, she never breaks it off because it may be her child's nose. A Canadian tikes to keep his un- derwear on the hot air register over night so it will be warm when he puts it on in the morning. A Canadian gets mad at anyone who breathes in his car because it frosts the windshield. A Canadian wishes radio stations wouldn't interrupt weather forecasts with news,( commercials, music etc. A Canadian spends a lot of his spare time at the office coat rack, looking for his toe rubbers. To a ;Canadian woman, the three little words she hears most often are "Straighten the wheels!" followed by, "Gun it now!" A Canadian knows it's morning when the sky in the east turns from black to dark grey. A Canadian prays his daughter will marry someone whose father owns a snowblower, and live happily ever' after. A Canadian never waiks into an office building or theatre without first wiping his feet on the slush. A Canadian , wonders if the car behind is going to stop. Who says we have no Canadian identity? Sugar and Spice/By Bill Smiler -Who needs taxes? There's something- wrong with the economic set-up of our society. This con- clusion was the one 'I came to after checking over my T 4 form the other day. I turned white -and then red -when I saw what everybody is clipping out of my pay cheque. The first, and worst deduction is for in- come tax. The feds got me for more in taxes than my hard-working father ever made in the two best years of his life put together. Then I started wondering what I get from Ottawa for my thumping contribution. I wasn't exactly impressed when I totted it -up. I don't get welfare or unemployment insurance or the old age pension or the baby bonus. I get the Trans Ca -nada highway, which I use every 12 years, if I can find a spot in the never-ending line of Americans hauling trailers of campers. I get the CBC, which is one of the country's great losers, finan- cially and culturally. I get the Mounties. Who needs them? I get protection from our gallant armed forces, who could probably - wrestle Iceland to a draw, although I wouldn't bet on it. I get the privilege of contributing to those handsome pensions of MPs and civil servants, with their cosy, built-in escalation. I have the privilege of kicking in so that Otto Lang can fly around like Henry Kissinger. I help pick up the tab for those federal - provincial -meetings, at the last of which so many of the provincial premiers were hard into the sauce that it wound up in a verbal donnybrook. ' I also receive the privilege of helping pay for Skyshop bribes in Quebec, and nuclear bribes in Argentina and Switzerland and Israel and lord knows where else. I' have the additional pleasure of helping to pay for a wildly proliferating civil ser- vice that offers me such inessentials as Manpowers, ads telling me not to smoke or drink too much, and vast quantities of propaganda churned out by the hacks of Bytown on the Rideau. I am permitted to help pay for the annual deficits of the Post Office, the CNR, the CBC, and practically any other "business"' run by the fells. In addition, they'll let me kick in to help pay our native Canadians millions. of dollars for a lot of moose pasture and tundra that wasn't worth a plugged nickel until someone decided to run a pipeline through it. As I said, somebody has got things back- ward. The government offers me all sorts of things I don't want or need, and fails to offer me any of the things I do need. Anil that's only the beginning. Insurance companies are taking me to the cleaners: fire, life, term, health, automobile. And the only way I can get even is to set fire to the house, smash up the car, contract a disabling disease, or die. It doesn't seem fair. I paid a chunk into the Canada Pension Plan. The only way I can get it back is to get old. Unemployment Insurance cost me $172 and I've never been out of. a job in my life. The union cost me $325, which is probably used for a fund for a strike, in which I will not participate. In addition, they levied me $1,750 toward a pension plan. By the time I get around to collecting from 'it, one of two things will have happened. Either I'll be dead (and I hear there are no pensions in heaven) , or my annual pension will be alorth three loaves of breathand and a can of beans, with inflation. And the whole thing expands downward. The provincial mafia nails.me for hard -top roads into cottage country when I don't have a' cottage weed cutters, geologists, fishing inspectors; health care for every hypochondriac in the province; homes for the aged and homes for the insane and. homes for foster children; and a hundred other things I do not need. Then the county takes its cut. I help pay for reeves to go and get drunk at the Good Roads Convention, for County Health Units, County Assessors, County educational empires. And finally, the municipal mafia puts the gears to me, for arenas I don't skate in, swimming pools I don't swim in, healthy salaries for firemen and cops and every other bird who can get on the payroll. But when I say "Don't cut down my trees, please," they tell me I am standing in the way of progress. Nor does it end there, unfortunately. It comes right into your own home and sits down beside you at your own hearth. The old lady wants a gourmet cookbook, $20; the daughter wants $250 for fees for a university course; the son should have a little donation in Paraguay to keep him from starving the grandboys need new shoes at 12 bucks a rattle. I don't need a single one of these things, yet I am the one who has the tambourine constantly shaking under my nose. Free enterprise be hanged. There's nothing free about it, and the only en- terprise involved is the considerable amount used by various parties to separate me from every nickel I earn. On the other hand, maybe I'm lucky that I don't need a single item from the- endless list of .garbage for which' I am being clip- . ped. You have to get old or sick or stupid or poor to collect most of them. "I'd like to tell you what we're doing to make this a less secretive and more open government, but it's a secret." Odds 'n' ends,- by Elaine Townshend Gift, for a brother-in-law I have a problem. My brother-in-law's birthday is only a few days away; and I have no idea what to give him. He's one of those people who has everything. With a charming wife, three great .kids and a sister-in-law like me, what' more could he want? When he was turning their basement into a family room, a gift presented no problem. I simply took my oldest nephew to the store, and he pointed out the tools his dad needed. Now, the rec room is finished; John has a huge collection of " tools, and I'm confronted with the same old question - what can I give him for his birthday? r learned long ago not to ask him what he wants, because the answer is always "a corvette." He rates horses as highly as Corvettes, and since I can't afford a real horse, I've substituted inanimate objects. So far, r ve given him 'a wall tapestry with three palominos embossed on it, a pair of book ends in the shape of horses heads and a brass door knocker that resembles a horseshoe. I fear another horsy gift for the house will cause my sister to, holler, "Whoa!" Maybe I'll combine his two loves, horses and Corvettes, by buying an ornament sh ped like a horse, that he can mount on the hood of his Corvette whenever he gets one. I could givehim a box of turtles; they're the only kind of chocolates he likes. He'll have to eat them quickly or hide Member, Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association The Clinton News -Record Is published each Thursday at P.O. Box 39, Clinton, Ontario, Canada, NOM 110. It is registered as second class mall by the post office under the permit number 0817. The Nor -Record incorporated In 1924 the Huron News -Record, founded in 1881, and the Clinton New Era, founded In 1885. Total press run 3,100. linton NewsRecord ,11t• *CNA Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association Display advertising rates available on request. Ask for Rate Card No. 7 effective Oct. 1. 1078. Getieral,Minag' er - J. Howard Aitken Editor - James R. Fitzgerald Advertising Director - Gary 1,. Hoist 'Assistant editor - Cht'is Zdeb Office Manager - Margaret Gibb Circulation - Freda Mcleod Accounting - Marian WUlson ySubscription Rates: Canada - $12 per year U.S.A.- $1510 Other -$18 Single Copy - 2Sc 4&�� • the box before the rest of us nab ortto it, though. I'd take him out to dinner, but he'd probably expect a restaurant other than MacDonalds. He thinks John Denver is a fantastic singer, and that's one point on which we agree. He'd enjoy listening to a Denver LP, but that's what I gave him for Christmas. For three weeks, I wrestled with the temptation to spin the record on my own turntable ... I don't feel strong enough to fight a similar battle in March. I'd give him a subscription to this newspaper, but he might read my column now and again. I wouldn't be able to make any remarks about him, and that would cramp my writing style. My parents are giving him a shirt. Maybe I'll buy a tie to go with it. There's always room for one more in his closet. In the'pastfew years, lottery tickets have become popular presents. If I bought John Loto Canada or Wintario ticket and if he won a million dollars, I wonder how much he'd share with the generous person who made it all possible. I've put a lot of thought into John's birthday present, and I've reached this conclusion -; Regardless of the gift I chose, he'll be happy because he values the thought behind the present more than its monetary worth. Therefore, he'll accept an ornament instead of a live horse; he'llappreciate a tie more than a tuxedo, and he'll enjoy a Big Mac as much as a steak. I hope. From our early files s • • • • • 10 YEARS AGO March 9, 1967 A dart team from, Clinton Branch of the Royal Canadian Legion won the J. Douglas Thorndike zone dart ' cham- pionship trophy for the first time. The tourney was played at Exeter Legion Hall last weekend. The trophy was put up by Mr. Thorndike, a former zone commander, and zone sports officer and former president of Clinton branch. Members of the Clinton team were Gordon Dalgliesh, Hector Kingswell, George Yeats and Reg. Smith. , This year the Clinton Figure Skating Club's carnival is aptly titled Centennial Ice Revue. The numbers include a Centennial salute and range in time from the Roaring Twenties to the Space Age. The Clinton club is par- ticipating in a new venture this year. Five Figure Skating Clubs, under the guidance of figure skating professional, Robert McCrabb, are co-operating to produce their respective car- nivals. The clubs which Mr. McCrabb instructs are Stratford, Goderich, Mitchell, St. Marys and Clinton. By doing this the benefits are many. A member of the local club said we are furtunate to have good skaters from the other clubs for our carnival. Nearly 50 canvassers and committee members of Clinton's canvass for funds for the new community centre, heard one of Canada's best speakers at a meeting in the Legion Hall last Wednesday. Rev. Findley Stewart, D.D., who is minister of ' Canada's largest Presbyterian congregation in the City of Kit- chener, gave the canvassers a talk, entitled "Head, Heart and Hustle". The address was most appropriate for the big Clinton Centennial project. 25 YEARS AGO March 6, 1952 - At a committee meeting of Huron Central Agricultural Society in the Board Room at which W. R. Lobb, president, was chairman, committees were chosen to make arrangements for the annual Spring Fair, Satur- day, May 31. • Named to secure judges were: Stuart McEwen, Dr. George S. Elliott, Ernie Brown, E.J. Jacob and James Lobb. Those in chse of the programme will be Fled Gibson, W.P. Roberts, Dr. J. . Shaw, Melvin Crich and John F. Clegg. The members of Clinton Library: board held its annual meeting on Wednesday evening last, in the library. The chairman, Mr. B.J. Gib- pleased with the way the firemen bings presided, and present were handled it, as very little water Miss M.A. Stone, secretary, Mrs. damage was done. L.M. McKinnon, W: Brock Olde The prize list of the Huron and G.H. Jefferson. Miss Edna Central agricultural Society's Jamieson was absent on account annual spring show has been of illness. The librarian, Miss issued, and distributed to Evelyn G. Hall, Mayor G.W. Nott possible exhibitors. A fine lot of and Town Clgrk -M.T. Corless, attractive prizes are offered, also were present. including several , valuable The librarian read her report special prizes. $800 being offered What you think Mow''' f N.•' f.'.{}l+lL:v rr}''. AGv Custom Dear Editor: Just a few words to express my appreciation to the local rag for sponsoring the can- didates' meetinglast Thursday night. I felt as though something had been accomplished, regardless of the erection outcome. (This j written before the vote.) Th candidates were very well- spoken, and the boldness of the citizens in, attendance really amazed me. The actually asked questions and volunteered information. ,I have been at meetings in the Town Hall when the room was so quiet you could have heard a loose denture drop. I am now wondering whether people are finally getting over their shy, retiring ways, or perhaps realizing that their situation has become desperate enough to deserve their attention. I would like to say something about people who come late to meetings. This must be a quaint local custom. It certainly provides a welcome diversion from the evening's business. Because the early comers have . the irritating habit of sitting where they please, we have the spontaneous en- tertainment of watching nearly' a score of late -birds pick their way through the rows of the 'assembly, vying for odd chairs left vacant here and there among the crowd. All this to much scraping of chairs and shifting of knees and feet, ' muffled excuses, and genera amusement. It is particularly humourous to observe two people make their way with some difficulty toward an • empty spot in the middle of the crowded row, only to - discover that -it contains not two, but ONE eligible seat. Forfeit your turn and 'return to the rear. of the hall, to the suppressed merriment of all spectators smugly occupying chairs. 'P An unintentional advantage of this contest is its value as a 04 test of the candidates, whose goal •it, mut be to retain their presence of mind and remember their places in their speeches, no matter in what antics the spectators engage out on the floor of the hall. I must give credit; the nominees knew their stuff and were not robbed of their powers of oration, despite the A many efforts of the --inventive citizens to leave them speechless. There is an alternative ,to the Disappearing Chair Game. It is called The Underbuzz. In this, clever old gentlemen seated in the row along the back wall exchange witty remarks too' good to stand up and share in general, but loud enough tib' earn the appreciation of their immediate neighbours and provide a distraction for those down the row, and in front. Naturally, the object of this is to un -nerve the speakers at the front of the room ; they can see , lip moving, and hear a mm bling and muffled snicker , but cannot hear enough to know what wisdom is being aired at the back. °This should cause them to wander in mid - sentence, trying to determine what they can have carelessly said that is so controversial. All in all, it was a highly informative , evening — even entertaining — and the coffee was actually GOOD! It was refreshing to mingle in- formally after the speeches, • and chat with the people. Perhaps the coffee party shall - replace the cocktail party as an occasion to ex- change ideas and hash over local issues. But how• will we get people to spill their secrets and schemes if we ply them with coffee? Sincerely, Reginald Thompson, Clinton. • those institutions which comes in for praise at times and why should it not. The following from the Seaforth Expositor praiseworthy refers of it and Dr. Gunn who established it some few years ago: - "We notice by the NEW ERA that preparations are in progress for the enlargement of the Clinton hospital. At present there are three or four waiting for for, 1951. The membership had1n prizes. , rooms, all the available beds increased to 1074. Of these 341 As roads will probably be clear being filled. This hospital was were juveniles, that is, children early this spring, it is expected up to Grade 8. that the Clinton spring show will The circulation for the year be well attended and indications showed a substantial increase in are that it will be even better than the reading of the children's usual, which is saying a lot. books - 6745: the adult non-fiction 75 YEARS AGO 4,236 and adult fiction 11,142; a March 7, 1902 . total of 22,123. , The regular March Town Clinton and District Chamber Council meeting was held on of Commerce held its March Monday evening. the Mayor general meeting in the Town presiding and all the aldermen Council Chamber last evening present. when the members had the The street committee reported privilege of hearing an inspiring that they had considered the address by Dr. H.A. Showalter, matter of the town building its Stratford business executive and own sidewalks and are of the head of Kist Canada Limited, and opinion that a much greater when several matters of im- amount of walk can be laid by the portance were* duscussed. town than by private contractors President H.E. Hartley was in and can be done at much less the chair. cost than by others. Horace Elvidge stated that the By motion, the street corn- CNR was considering in- mittee was authorized to procure troduction of a Sunday evening the necessary supplies to enable train service, which would make them to lay the granolithic walks connections at Stratford. It would and to ask for tenders for cement. leave Clinton about 6:45 p.m. and The chairman of the street return about 10 p.m. , committee was instructed to The Chamber passed a have the, stone on the square resolution requesting the CNR to broken for use on the streets and inaugurate this new service, in the chairman of the property view of the increased RCAF committee was instructed to traffic at this point. A letter to report at the next meeting what this effect was ordered sent to disposal can be made of the old R.C. Gadsby, District Passenger buildings in rear of the market Agent, Toronto. square. 50 YEARS AGO The Clinton March 10. 1927 Who said girls couldn't play ke eh? On last Friday night hoc y the girls staged a terrific battle with the Stratford girls and won by a score of 2-1. Owing to the soft ice the girls had a hard time to keep the puck moving. There. were many thrills packed into the game and at times it roughened up considerably. The first meeting of the new hospital board will be held in the board room of the town hall on Monday evening, 'March 14th, att half past seven o'clock. Fire was discovered in the office of the Clinton Garage between one and two o'clock Friday morning. The alarm brought the fire brigade quickly to the -scene and it was soon under control. The fire, which is of unlc"gown origin., started near the wall at the ceiling of the office and was confined to a small area, the wood above the door and the ceiling being damaged to some extent. Mr. Inkley was much Hospital is one established a couple of years ago by Dr. Gunn, the well-known and popular practitioner of that town, and is conducted under his im- mediate over -sight. It has been very successful, and has been doing a good work, and with increased facilities its usefulness will be enhanced. It is an in- stitution which was much needed in this county, and all will be pleased that it is so well sup- plying the requirements. 100 YEARS AGO March 8. 1877 If. all those in this town emigrate to Manitoba next spring, who are at present so inclined, or express themselves to that effect, there will be scarcely any one left here, and we would advise the legislators of Manitoba to enlarge its borders, "to admit of the rush." Joking aside, we have no doubt a large number hereabouts will go, as land has advanced so much in value here that it cannot now be obtained at a price that is within reach of many. As an evidence of the unusually fine weather we have been en- joying, and also a singular cir- cumstance for March, we may mention that Mr. Jas. Stoddart, living near the river, has an apple of tree on which are four blossoms. Better Dear Editor: Sometime ago I wrote to draw your attention to the fact that the Clinton News - Record was not arriving at our place until Tuesday or Wednesday of the following week of publication The late arriVal had occurred for over a year. However, I am happy to say that/ since January of this year it has been arriving on Friday or Saturday which certainly adds to its at- traction. My mother was a Clinton girl and when she and my father Were married in 1912, he" always renewed it for her birthday (they lived in Goderieh Township and the • family subscribed to the Goderich Signal heretofore). My husband has been giving me the subecription •to the Clinton News Record as a birthday present also and it has followed us in our military travels across Canada and to England and to France. It was a letter from home and from that distance, it did not matter when it arrived as long as it came. My husband is from Western Canada but he enjoys Smiley's column very much as well as your editorial page, etc. Sincerely Helen Collier(nee MacMath) (Mrs. D.W. Collier), Rk 3 Komoka, Ont. News -Record readers are encouraged to express their opinions in letters to the editor, however, such opinions do not necessarily represent the opinions of the News - Record. Pseudonyms may be used by letter writers, but no letter will be published unless it can be verified by phone. b , r Smile • A wealthy Texan bought a vacation home up north. When someone asked what he was going to call it, he said, "Canada." • •