HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Wingham Advance-Times, 1984-07-11, Page 30Page, 16
Crossroads -4Y 11, 1
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GARRISON'S GARAGE—Robert King is Frank, the likeable but slightly screwy
mechanic who finds a Revenue Canada man on his doorstep, and Debdrah Kimmett is
Lorna, toughened by her own brush with the tax man, who sets out to help Frank
make some sense of his bags full of notes and receipts iii "Garrison's Garage", Ted
Johns' humorous look at a small-town businessman's brush with the tax auditor,
which opened June 22 at the Blyth Summer Festival.
`Garrison's Garage' a hit
Up rious comedy opens
Blyth anniversary season
By Henry Hess
If its,opening production is
any barometer of what lies
ahead for audiences at the
Blyth Summer Festival in
this, its 10th.. -,.anniversary
• year, we are in for a real
treat.
The Festival opened, its
season June 22 ' with the '
premiere of "Garrison's
Garage", and playwright
Ted Johns showed once
again he has not lost the
ability to find en audience's
funnypjone. With strong
support from an able cast,
well -directed by Katherine
Kaszas and playing amidst
•
elements for a successful
Blyth comedy: rural, nice -
guy underdog pitted against
heartless, big -city bureau-
crat; characters who are
slightly off-the-wall and mis-
taken identity, . with the
forces of good and right
eventually prevailing while
getting off 'a lot of good jokes
at the villain's expense.
In "Garage", the
beleaguered, heroes are
Frank (Robert. King), the
blunt and slightly manic
mechanic whose financial
records are an even bigger
mess than the vehicles he
repairs and Garrison, played
Jules Tonus's gloriously by Johns himself, the garage
cluttered set, he had the owner who fears a tax audit
audience -laughing _virtuallyt_"_...of - Frank -.might_: focus __ at-
from the opening scene to the tention onto some of his, own
standing ovation at the close.' busineggs practices:
"Garage" has. all the On the other side, Blyth
veteran David Fox plays
Blair Daniels, the man from
Revenue. Canada, as some-
thing more than a stereo-
typical villain. Daniels
pursues hiscalling with an
evangelistic zeal, thumping
a dog-eared copy of the.
Income Tax Act instead of a
Bible and working out his
ethical coordinates on a
calculator until he is
distracted by Garrison's
daughter, Lorna, leading to a
Hamlet-esque crisis of"
conscience. He is an oily
character, easy to dislike,
but, human nevertheless.
An unheralded star of the
play turns out to be Ron
Gabriel, a newcomer to
Blyth. _ Restricted to a bit
part as Bert, the befuddled
but always smiling town
councilman, Gabriel still
1*
Naturnaf Museums Musees nationau'
at Canada du• Canada„ .
Canadaa'
STARGZIN;
Lyra represents the mythological
harp, or lyre. that was given to
Orpheus by Apollo and placed in the
• heavens after his death It is the
smallest of the three Summer Tri-
angle constellations. (The most sink-
ing feature of the summer sky. the
Triangle is defined by lines 'ming the
stars Vita, rn Lyra, Altair, in Aquila,
and Deneb, in Cygnus ) The stars in
Lyra form an equilateral triangle, with
brilliant Vega marking one of its an-
gles. joined to a parallelogram It is a
tiny constellation. but an interesting
one even for naked eye viewing.
Vega. the constellation's brightest star
and one of the loveliest in the heav-
ens. 11 is often likened to a blue -white
diamond' Of zero magnitdde — only
Arcturus outshines d in the summer
sky - it is the bnghtest star in the
Summer Triangle (Altair, magnitude
0 77. is the next brightest star in the
Triangle followed by Deneb, pagni-
tude 1 26 A zero magnitud4rstar is
2 5 times brighter than a first magni-
tude star which is 2 5 times brighter
a second magnitude star and so
on ) Binoculars enhance the fiery bnl-
tiance of Vega
Look for Epsilon Lyrae a taint star
near Vega. Binoculars reveal it tb be a
Double Star It is said that those with
exceptional eyesight can see boll
stars without optical aid. In a good
saed.telescope each component of
JULY
LYRA
0 Alpha(Vega)
p Beta (She/yak)
y Gamma (Sulalet)
F, Della
Epsilgn
Zeta
the Double is seen to be double as
well This is why Epsilon Lyrae is
called the "Double Double". Zeta
Lyrae, the star common to the tri-
angle and the parallelogram, is also a
l3ouble. More widely separated'than
Epsilon it has one yellow end one
greenish coloured component. Delta
Lyrae is another excellent Double for
binoculars.
PLANETS: Look for Jupiter, Mars
and Satum (listed in order of dimin-
ishing brightness) In the evening stay.
11 may be possible to see Mercury as
well, but with difficulty bdoause It is so
close to the horizon at sunset. Mars
and Saturn are in Libra and set about
4 hours after sunset Brilliant Jupiter.
in Sagittarius, is in the sky from dusk
10 dawri. •
d h (Universal.Time)
3 07 Earth at aphelion
• 5 21 First Quarter Moon
7 17 Saturn 0.1" Ni. of Moon
7 22' Mars 47S, of Moon
11 23 Jupiter 3` Ni of Moon
13 02 Full Moon
21 04 Last Quarter Moon
28 10 South Aquarid Meteors
28 12 New Moon
30 07 Mercury 7' S of Moon
July is a comfortable and rewarding
time to look for meteors The South
Delta Aquarid shower peaks on the
early moming of July 28, when an e>F•
paarienced observer may see about
20 meteors an hour. (The shower is
diffuse so look for meteors several
nights before and atter the 28th.)
Other diffuse minor streams, spread
throughout mist of the month, and a
few sporadic meteors should reward
the patient Observer any clear dark
night
NATIONAI, MUSEUM
sci nC
technology
1867 St, Laurent Blvd
Ottawa K1A 0M8
almQat menages to steal the
show, needing onl,Y to walk
Onto' the stage to hrthg a
laugh from the crowd.. a is
alao scheduled to appear in
an o upcoming Blyth
production, "Blue City", and
certainly is well worth
watching.
Robert King, who
previously appeared here in
"Country Hearts" and
"Heads You Lose" in 1,982,
makes a fine return in the
role of Frank. He also is
scheduled to appear in the
upcoming productions of
"Blue City" and "Country
Hearts".
"Garrison's Garage" was
a worthy opening to the
Festival's anniversary
season. It is a safe prediction
to be added to the growing
list Of Blyth successes.
BOOK
REVIEW
CHARLES WILLIAMS. Poet
of Theology. By Glen Cava-
liero. William B. Eerdmans
Publishing Company, Grand
Rapids, Mich. (In Canada:
Oxford University Press,
Toronto. $11.25.) 212 pp.
Reviewed by
PERCY MADDUX
A lifelong employee of Ox-
ford University Press, Char-
les Williams was a prolific
writer of books as well as
teaching night school, con-
ducting lectures, and writing
book reviews and other ar-
ticles. Born in 1886 in Hollo-
way, he came on the adult
scene in the pre -World War I
boom. Because of his eye-
sight, he was not accepted
for service during the war.
He married in 1917. As he
died in May, 1945, 'he did. not.
live to see the outcome of
World War .II.
Glen Cavaliero dubs him
"poet of theology" in the
book "Charles Williams",
which is not a biography but
is a description and evalua-
tion of the literary output of
Charles Williams,' not just
the poetry alone. It is, a well
written volume and the com-
mentary is easy to follow.
The reader may not be fam-
iliar with the work of Wil-
Jiams but can still be fascin-
ated by Cavaliero's .presen-
tation, which is a lively in-
troduction to Williams' wort
and an enjoyable piece of
stylistic writing.
Oilmen first struck
black gold in Ontario
If you thought Canada's oil
industry began in the west,
you're right — almost.
It all started in the 1850s in
Canada West — an area
located on the north shore off
Lake Erie in Ontario.
'That's right, Canada's oil
industry was born in On-
tario. In fact, North
America's first commercial
oil. well was discovered in
1858 at Oil Springs, down the
road from Sarnia.
Just four years earlier, a
Nova Scotian. Abraham
Gesner, had invented kero-
sene as a bright, safe light.
But it was produced from
coal and, at that time, On-
tario had no known coal
reserves.
So there wn'- plenty of
interest when .l, rur, Millei
Williams of Hamilton dug hi'
well -in the swamps of Ennis
killen Township. Lambton
County, refined i11. crude
and sold it as kerosene.
Following tliie initial
discovery, Int greatest
gusher the world ha,d ever
.seen blew in al (),il Springs in
January 1862 • spouting six
metres into the air and
flowing at a rate ul 320 cubic
metres (2,000 barrels) a day.
Refineries popped up in
Toronto and n; many other
locations thr•uugh„trt south-
western Ontario The
demand for Williams' kero-
sene was immediate.
Others moved lo' the area
and the village (it 1 ill Springs
was creatid One hundred
wells -were drilled in 1860, 400
more were drilled in 1861.
Land prices skyrocketed,
the population off Oil Springs
rose to 4,000. But as quickly
as it started, the Oil Springs
boom died when the flow of
oil slowed to a trickle within
a year.
BOOM
Attention shifted to a
secondary field at nearby
Petrolia — and here the oil
boom lasted until almost the
turn of the century. There
were 8,000 wells operating at
Petrolia in the 1890s, produc-
tion peaked at 829,000 barrels
of oil a year in 1893.
The petroleum industry
matured at Petrolia.- It was
here that early methods of
producing, refining, ship-
ping, marketing and financ-
ing were fully developed.
Petrolia's drillers
travelled throughout the
world to offer expertise in
FLOWER POWER
If you follow the proper
steps before making your flower
arrangement. it will last longer,
says Tony Hogervorst, rural
organizations contact (()ntarii)
Horticultural Association) of
the Ontario Ministry of Agri-
culture and Foods rural organ-
izations andervices branch.
First, out about two centi-
metres (about one inch) off the
stems and then remove the
lower leaves. Next, wrap the
stems with paper or plastic and
put them in a deep pail of
water at 40 degrees Celsius
1104 degrees Fahrenheit` to
' prevent early, wilting. Once
your-fhrwersare arranged; ", •
keep them from drafts and
heat and store in the refriger-
ator overnight. ' Add fresh ,
water daily for longer lasting,
• blooms.
Steam engineering, black-
smithing and rigging. They,
opened the first oil fields in
Persia (now Iran), Vene-
zuela, Poland, Russia, In-
donesia. Imperial Oil built
its first refinery at Petrolia.
Today, the Oil Springs and
Petrolia fields still produce
oil. However, oil production
in all of southwestern On-
tario is only 600,000 barrels a
year — compared with 1.2.
million barrels produced
\each day in Alberta.
But the past is kept alive
with the Petrolia Discovery
exhibit, run by the Town of,
Petrolia and supported by
various government
agencies and oil industries.
,Petrolia Discovery
illustrates the story of the
development of North
America's petroleum in-
dustry. It, includes a
museum, a working oil field,,
a photograph and movie
exhibit and a park.
Amy is 6.
Amy Has
Arthritis!
30000 Canadian
children under 15
have arthritis. It's not
just a disease of the
elderly. Your support
of arthritis research
can help kids like
Amy get better.
Please ... be
as generous as
you can.
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