Loading...
Clinton News-Record, 1981-11-25, Page 4it .�..,,, PAGE 4--c NNI WS VQRP, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER25,19e1 The c TWareOayt at ®o,110#1til. Nlataa. O Mirka. 011iaada.s11!M 11& Tel.;MY-stis. Cabbed- N,l fr.Oiliest • Alba per Year 10,11416 40,010 Om' Yew tt NfOidideredaq eitstied well fop?'ka part arils emir lira pww+M natabor 6111:. 1ltarsn fytrwi1r1.N111111. arid Tito Oaten New Jim letalMe MIL 'Wel pryer rwaa$ f9Y. 1linto�Z NewsRecord �A MEMBER JAMES liBisWiUALO - Editor SHELLEY McPHEL'-F1Al$T - Mows Editor GAIYI ANT. Adopt/Nina Momper M1*TH akkteER. Advertising- MAQGA1 T'.L. 011111. Office Monagor MARY ANN NOL1ENilICK - Subscriptions Q O 0 MEMBER Abpleyy advertising rates available an ratiatert. Aa` far 1®ata. srd Na. 18 aHsativa Oct. 1. Nail. Barki(ng up the wrong tree • Over the past decade, the dog problem has come and gone in Clinton as the population ebbs and flows, and in all those years, a number of solutions have been tried. Still we have the problem: dogs running at large, tearing into garbage bags. and in some cases terrorizing children. Over the last ten years, a number of answers to the age old problem were sought, some far moreexpensive than others, some more successful than others. First there wos an animal control officer (dog catcher), who came from Goderich on -apart -time basis and picked, up the wandering dogs, took them to the pound run bythe Goderich Veterinary:; Clinic, where they could be claimed by the owner by paying for the dog's, upkeep. If none one paid, the dog was destroyed., The solution. worked. for a while, but was' very expensive, as the town tax- payers, had' to •eat only pick up the tab_for the dog catcher's salary, but pay the poundfees as well. Unfortunately that solution onlylasted a few months when thelrnan quit4o take° full time job, as by-law control officer in Goderich. :Oben a fine system was set up whereby the owner of the errant beast was given a hea y. •ine. But enforcement became a real problem by police as many times it was hard to determine who owned the . untagged dogs. This was all followed, by a expensive <trap system set up by the police and the public works department. The trap was baited and placed out when, police received a com- plaint. But.again it met with only limited success, and took up many hours of ex- tra time for the police to'cieck the trap. Even though we do hove a tough' by-law about keeping dog's from running loose, just os soon as the sun goes down, many citizens, including those who. should ,know batter, tubo their dogs out to wonder. around in the night causing *eadaches.for the other lave abiding dog owners. Now Mayor Chester. Archibald has- proposed a new tougher by-law that would allow only one dog per house, and the howls of protest are almost as loud as a stray dog .singing a midnight to a passing truck. it may not be the answer, but if not,= thenwvhat. If we hire a full-time dog catcher, and that's whatit would take to control the problem, it would cost- at least another $25,000 a year from the taxes to pay for salary and poundage fees. Why should the whole .town pay for the ir- res nsibilities of a few dog owners° The new by-law will get first reading at the next council meeting on. December 7, and I'm sure council. would welcome any input. By J.F. A SfQdentahre ..guinea pigs About the only, thing constant in education, it seems, is change. The suggestion is that the mammoth contingent of civil servants has to keep• coming up with new conceptsto justify their positions and alt too often the change is made for nothing more than the sake of change, says the Exeter Times Advocate. Unfortunately,.. entire 'generations of students have suffered from some of the poorer innovations in which they have been used as guinea pigs. The ministry of education has now written draft guidelines to a news and compulsory "lifeskills" credit course that it wants to introduce into every high school in Ontario. The con- cern, apparently, is that students are not graduating from high school with enoughlife skills required in the workplace or in their personal lives. Obviously, if the new courses are going to infringe greatly on the time for academic or vocational studies, the risk arises again that the school System will turn out graduates who are lacking in those skills, says the T -A. Some of the suggested courses have merit, but the pst experience of mistakes should prompt all those involved in the decision to move with caution and care. The appreciation of the arts and nature should not be added at theexpense of literacy. Change should be made for the sake of improvement and not merely change, says the T -A. • Legion friends C remembering our past 5 YEARS AGO December 2,1976 The future of the Clinton Public Hospital is still up in the air as the Ontario gover- nment continues to fight to have the facility closed, along with three others in the province. The hospital re -opened its second floor a month ago, and it is nearly full, with a total patient load of about 45 patients in the 68 - year -old hospital. Outgoing Tuckersmith Township Reeve Elgin Thompson predicts that the two- year-old Vanastra indoor swimming pool will close within a year's time if it fails to reduce a $82,000 deficit. ``All I can do is hope something will happen to keep the pool open for Vanastra,"'he noted. 10YEARS AGO December 2, 1971 John Van Gastel hit Clinton like tor- nado last week and the town may n, e quite the same again. Mr. Van Gastel, who recently purchased the former Canadian .Forces Base, Clinton, paid a hurriedvisit to his newest project last Wednesday: He buys and sells companies like some people change clothes and to be successful in that business, you have to have sound financial backing and an intense knowledge of business. Those two assets certainly will be important if the project is to be a success. If the venture is a success, the whose future of the county may be changing. Members of the Clinton Colts gathered for a banquet at the Hotel Clinton on Saturday night to celebrate their winning the Ontario Baseball Association Cham- pionship. They were presented with trophies by the town of Clinton. Gordon Hill of Varna was re-elected to a third term as president of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture at last week's annual convention in Hamilton. He told nearly 400 delegates that federation membership must reach 11,000 by next April. 25 YEARS AGO December 6,1956 With the preChristmas resistance to sales talk at its usual low, several housewives in Clinton and area have been taken in by fast -talking door-to-door salesmen. The latest to come to light is the Spring -Fair may. go under Dear Editnet I am writing this letter to tell the citizens of Clinton and the surrounding area about the plight of the Clinton Spring Fair. The Clinton Fair is a very important part of Clinton's history, amounting to 127 years of continous effort. If that isn't worth saving, I don't know what is. The Fair is being hit with the same financial problems that a lot of businesses are facing. The Fair is also a business, not one that needs to make a profit; but a business that has to break even. Our aim is to carry on the Fair's history, supply entertainment for the people, and give exhibitors a chance to display their baked goods, handcrafts, and livestock. Although our financial " situation is serious, an even more serious problem is the lack of new members who could offer new ideas, management and enthusiasm. Some of our members have been on the Turn to page 13 We've changed There has been a tremendous change in the manners and mores of Canada in the past three decades. This brilliant thought came to me as I drove home from work to- day and saw a sign, in a typical Canadian small town: "Steakhouse and Tavern." Now this didn't exactly knock me out, alarm me, or discombobulate me in any way. I am a part of all that is in this coun- try, at this time. But it did give me a tiny twinge. Hence my opening remarks. I am no Carrie Nation, who stormed into saloons with her lady friends, armed with hatchets, and smashed open (what a waste) the barrels of beer and kegs of whisky. I am no Joan of Arc. I don't revile blasphemers or hear voices. I am no Pope John Paul II, who tells people what to do about their sex lives. I am not even a Joe Clark. I am merely an observer of the human scene, in a country that used to be one thing, and has become another. But that doesn't mean I don't have opinions. I have nothing but scorn for the modern "objec- tive" journalists who tell it as it is. They are hyenas and jackals, who fatten on the leavings of the "lions" of our society, for the most part. Let's get back on topic, as I tell my students. The Canadian society has roughened and coarsened to an astonishing degree in the last 30 years. First, the Steakhouse and Tavern. As a kid working on the boats on the Upper Lakes, I was excited and a little scared when I saw that sign in American ports: Duluth, Detroit, Chicago. I came from the genteel poverty of On- tario in the Thirties, and I was slightly ap- palled, and deeply attracted by these signs: the very thought that drink could be publicly advertised. Like any normal, curious kid, I went into a couple, ordered a two-bit whiskey, and found nobody eating steaks, but a great many people getting sleazily drunk on the same. Not the steaks. In those days, in Canada, there was no_ such creature. The very, use of the word. "tavern" indicated iniquity. It was an evil piace. We did have beer "parlours," later exchanged for the euphemism "beverage rooms." But that was all right. Only the lower element went there, and they closed from 6 p.m. to 7:30, or some such, so that a family man could get home to his dinner. Nota bad idea. In their homes, of course, the middle and upper class drank liquor. Beer was the working man's drink, and to be shunned. It was around then that some wit reversed the old saying, and came out with: "Work is the curse of the drinking class," a neat version of Marx's(?) "Drink is the curse of the working classes." If you called on someone in those misty days, you were offered a cuppa and something to eat. Today, the host would be humiliated if he didn't have something harder to offer you. Now, every hamlet seems to have its steakhouse, complete with tavern. It's rather ridiculous: Nobody today can afford a steak. But how in the living world can these same people afford drinks, at cur- rent prices? These steakhouses and taverns are usually pretty sleazy joints, on a par with the old beverage room, which was the epitome of sleaze. It's not all the fault of the owners, though they make notmng on the steak and 100 per cent on the drinks (minimum). It's just that Canadians tend to be noisy and crude and profane drinkers. And the crudity isn't only in the pubs. It has crept into Parliament, that august in- stitution, with a prime minister who used street language when his impeccable English failed, or he wanted to show how tough he was. It has crept into our educational system, where teachers drink and swear and tell dirty jokes and use language in front of women that I, a product of a more well- mannered, or inhibited, your choice, era, could not.bring myself to use. And. the, language of today's Students, from Grade one to Grade whatever, would cirri the hair of a sailor, and make your maiden aunt grab for the smelling salts. Words from the lowest slums and slum- miest barnyards create rarely a blush on the cheek of your teenage daughter. A graduate of the depression, when peo- ple had some reason to use bad language, in sheer frustration and anger, and of a war in which the most common four-letter word was used as frequently and absent- mindedly, as salt and pepper, have not in- ured me to what our kids today consider normal. Girls wear T-shirts that are not even fun- ny, merely obscene. As do boys. Saw one the other day on an otherwise nice lad' Message: "Thanks, all you virgins — for nothing." The Queen is a frump. God is a joke. The country's problems are somebody else's problem, as long as I get mine. I don't deplore. I don't abhor. I don't im- plore. I merely observe. Sadly. We are tur- ning into a nation of slobs. odds 'n' ends Kitchen magic I don't want to brag about my culinary feats, but I've managed some tricks in the kitchen that few cooks can match. The most unique was created about a year ago. Ketchup was a vital ingredient in the recipe. A bottle was approximately two-thirds full of "slo-ow good" ketchup which refused to come out. After some bumping and pounding, I laid the bottle on its side. I was hoping the con- tents would get the hint and begin sliding down one side of the neck of the bottle. The bottle began to roll toward the edge of the counter. I made a grab for it, but bumped the bottom of the bottle instead causing it to somersault onto the floor. Muttering, I began checking for red blobs. There was no ketchup on the floor. There by James Fitzgerald a look through the news -record files Sale of so-called "hand -painted" . table cloths for the unlikely price of $25 each. In January, or any month of the year, this sort of sales talk would very likely get short shrift by the busyhousewife, but right now when gifts are a problem, and the really important gifts are hard to decide upon, it seems the answer to a shopper's prayer. Be ye not deceived. These self -same cloths, , complete with hand -painting (which really isn't), are on sale in at least one Clinton ladies wear store for the reasonable price of under $10 each 50 YEARS AGO November 26, 1931 The annual horseshoe club duck supper was held in the firemen's hall on Wed- nesday evening of last week. Messrs. G.L. Hanley, G. Murdoch, G.N. Davies and L. Cree being the committee in charge of the complete arrangements: Cards were'in- dulged in after the supper. At a public meeting, called by the mayor to discuss a Community Christmas Tree; Mayor Cooper presented a plan for the placing of two trees, one at the post office square, upon which will be placed gifts for every child under sixteen in Clinton, and another smaller one in Library Park, which will be lighted for ornamental e purposes. 75 YEARS AGO November 30, 1906 The many young ladies who responded to the advertisment, "Cupid's Arrow," will be pleased to know that their descriptions ( with reg. numbers instead of names) will appear, free, in the January edition of "Cupid's Messenger," the best matrimonial paper in Michigan. Others wishing to join, address, Editor, Cupid's Arrow, St. Joseph, Michigan. The members of the Canadian Order of Forresters, did a thing which was highly commendable, and shows the benefit of fraternal societies, even when a society is under no direct obligation to do what it did in this instance. It is well known that Mr. Sam Barr has been in delicate health for Some time and unable to do what he would otherwise have done for himself had his circumstances been different. The society ordered that the sum of $5 be paid to his daughter weekly, for nursing and medical attendance, this being entirely in- dependent of the usual sick benefits paid members of the organization. We say all credit to any society that is generous in this way, an the COF has not sought the publicity we are g ving it in this instance. 100 YEARS AGO December 2, 1881 A delicate youth -in -town suggests that the practice of raising the hat to lady acquaintances be suspended during the winter months; it chills him to think of it, poor young fellow.. Mr. A. Knox, "Holmesville's genial by elaine townshend was no ketchup on the countertop. There was no ketchup on the cupboard doors, the stove or a nearby chair. How lucky can you get, I wondered, as I glanced upward. The kitchen ceiling was painted green but on that particular day, it looked like a pizza generously sprinkled with tomato bits. I know that what goes up must come down, but I did not realize that what goes down can come backup so high. No one can top that stunt, I thought, but meone did. Apparently someone ac mplished similar results with a bowl of mashed potatoes. He was just trying to be helpful but his hostess was not impressed. Some visitors don't understand my culinary logic. For example, I always leave an open box of baking soda on a shelf to keep the refrigerator smelling fresh, even though the only other contents are three-quarters of a pitcher of orange juice,, half a pound of butter in the butter keeper and a vegetable crisper filled with apples. My kitchen routine is sunple. i eat ween I get hungry. What I cook is decided by what I can find. The time to shop comes when I can't even find enough leftovers for a creative casserole. To conserve dishwashing detergent I on- ly wash dishes when the sink becomes fill- ed with dirty dishes or when I can't find a clean pan to cook dinner in. With a simple cooking routine and a few culinary tricks, anyone can overcome minor upsets. Problems are bound to oc- cur because Murphy's Law invades even the kitchen. We all know that if we drop a slice of toast it will land buttered side down. A cake will never fall unless it's for so- meone's birthday. And, cookies will never burn unless we're baking them for a bazaar. ` landlord," has thoroughly renovated his hotel and made some very important changes in the same. The house is well furnished, and every convenience and accommodation can be given to the travelling community. Read the new names written last week in Jackson's autograph album. There are now about 300 names written in it. The drawing is to take place on the 24th of December, and all, whose names are written in it, are invited to be present. Messrs. W. Doherty and Co. received orders for 35 organs one day this week. the readers write letters Who can take our - family pet? Dear Editor: Here it is Monday morning - the beginning of a new week. Sometimes it takes that extra surge of energy to get up and geared in to approach the respon- sibilities of the upcoming week. One of the major and possibly the most important responsibility to me is the welfare of my family. Listening to C.K.N.X. radio, again Clinton has made the news. No it wasn't the lice prot*em, or the filling of the vacancy on the council. It was the problem of dogs running at large. Admittedly this is a problem. However, today our children left for school a little more than just concerned. Apparently, the council has suggested that our Clinton homes should be limited to one dog per household. Our children asked if this really could be made law. The answer I gave was yes I suppose so if council passed a bylaw. "Well, can't we do anything about it?" they asked. Maybe a letter to the editor of the News might help, I suggested, so thus the pur- pose of this letter. We have two dogs in our home and in the eyes of our children they are members of our family and rather important ones at that. People that care for their pets do not let their dogs run at large whether it's one, two or three dogs. Limitation of the number of dogs per household is not the answer to the problem. There will still be dogs running at large because of the few irresponsible people that allow this. Are those of us who care for our. dogs suppose to sit back and allow this to happen? We have licences for our dogs and we do pay extra for the additional dogs. Our dogs only leave our property when taken for a walk on a leash. My husband remarked that next thing we will be told the number of children to limit our households to. Granted, this is done in some countries, but I don't think the idea of this is to keep them off the streets. This certainly is a problem. Will it be when our licences expire that someone will come and decide which one of our pets has to go? Who will make this decision? That person is surely not going to be very popular in the eyes of our children. I can't offer any sure fire solution to this problem, but I do feel that the majority of the people should not suffer for the Irresponsibility of a certain few. Thank you for letting me voice my opinion on this subject Yours truly, Mrs. Marlene Verbeek I)o you hare an (Onion? relay not teriie us a letter to the editor, and let everyone know. 111 letters are published, proriding they ran be authenticated, and lese'ndotty"ttts are allnu'e'el• 111 letters, he►tra're'r, aro' subject to editing for length or libel. 1. / •