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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1960-01-28, Page 3Ron Ambulance On Stolen Gas A wet evening in Giterasey, Reg Blanchford, a youth of nine- teen, took his girl to her doer. kissed her good -night, remount- ed his moter-bike, and roared off into the night. Two minutes later a taxi swung out of a minor crossroad and flung him and his machine with terrific force against a house, He was so badly injured that the surgeon who later attended hina said that he was "theoreti- cally dead," For eight days he was unconscious, or three months on the critical list, but he recovered, That grave mishap inspired him to dedicate his life to re- lieving the sufferenigi of others, In the 1930s Guernsey's 40,000 people were served by only one ill-equipped ambulance with a spare time driver, Prompt first- aid, Blanehford realized, would have minimized his injuries and suffering, He joined the island's newly lormed St. John Ambulance unit, bought a second-hand ambulance with voluntary subscriptions and started a rival service based in a small shed. How he developed this into a first-class land, sea and air serv- ice and earned the G.M., Marl, and the Life -Saving medals by his bravery and resource, Don Everitt relates graphically in "Samaritan of the Islands". Suspended on a rope he made many hazardous rescues from Guernsey's perilous cliffs. In wartime this meant running the gauntlet of hidden minefields. One fisher -lad, climbing a clifF, had trodden on a mine. It blew him on to a narrow ledge twenty feet below. To reach him, Blanchford and his four helpers had to slither down the cliff, grasping for hand -holds, fearing that each piece of grass and jut- ting rock concealed a mine. RaM soaked them; a cold wind lashed their faces and numbed their fingers. When they reached the body it took twenty minutes to get it off the ledge and strap. ped to the stretcher. Several times on the way up, with darkness falling, one or• other of them slipped, nearly dragging the rest down the cliff. On top at last they had to thread their way through a minefield overgrown with gorse and find gaps in the brabed wire. Then they collapsed, utterly beaten. Ill with worry and overwork in 1950, Blanchford went to Petit Bot Bay for a week's hard- earned holiday with his wife. While sitting on the beach he noticed a boy climbing a near -by cliff. "Rona," he said, "I'm sorry, but we'd better go back. Sooner or later that boy will get stuck up there, and the way I feel I just couldn't face having to bring hien down," The boy did get stuck, on a tiny ledge seventy-five feet up. Blanchford phoned the ambul- ance control room, guided the crew to the cliff top, and, despite protests, donned a canvas har- ness attached to a 250 trait rope and swung down. As he sighted the boy, clinging to a sheer slab of rock by toes and fingers, the rope dislodged a large piece of rock above Blanchford's head, It fell between his face and the cliff, hit his stomach, knocked him unconscious and sent him swinging and spinning' across the cliff -face. When he regained his senses he swung himself towards the boy, grabbed him by the waist, pulled himoff the ledge, and lowered him foot by foot to the cliff bot- tom. Then he collapsed, bruised and bleeding, into a rock pool. • After rescuing a boy scout who had fallen into a cliff gully, he went down a sceond time to re- trieve the lad's wallet contain - Ing his Money and return rail and steamer tickets "It's all part of the service," Blanchford Old the scoutmaster, During the German occupation he kept his ambulance going on stolen or smuggled gas, char- coal or. horses, Once he and his assistant, Charles Froome, re- solved to raid a locked German gasoline - drum store not 100 yards from a German billet. The penalties if they were caught would be a long prison sentence and maybe a concentration carnP• They drove up with their van under a cloudy three-quarter moon and unscrewed the rusty hinges from the door, They grunted and heaved to roll one of the heavy drums up a ramp of two planks into the van, Then they heard a car approaching rapidly, "It's the 'greenfly' (Germans) all right,"- Froome whispered. "They look like officers," The vehicle came down the middle of the road. Blanchford knew that its masked headlights would pick out the lower half of the van. The moon suddenly broke through clouds. It was as if a spotlight had been turned on them. He closed his eyes in despair. Then he heard Froorne whispering: "They're turning off. They're going to the house over there," Climbing noisily from the car, the Germans vanished into the house. The night was silent again. The two men heaved the drum into the van and rolled out a second. It was halfway up the ramp when one plank snapped with a crack like a rifle -shot. ' The drum thumped to the ground. Both froze as an up- stairs window in the German billet opened and someone peer- ed out. Another window opened and there was a conversation in German. Then the Windows closed. No search party emerged. Desperately, the two,men jam- med a piece of ,the broken plank under the intact one, heaved the. drum into the van, shut the store doors, rescrewed the hinges and drove off at full throttle. The ambulance would have gas for some time to come. • Once when a gang of thugs blocked the path of the ambul- ance, Blanchford accelerated and forced a way through. A man leapt on the running board and tried to grab the wheel but Blanchford swerved and flung him off. The ambulance forged on, picked up the patient and took another route back to the hospital. By 1954 the land -sea -air serv- ice, run on subscriptions, had eleven men and two secretary - nurses on the permanent staff. It also had a deficit of almost £2,500 before the States author- ity came to its support. Last year the men worked -10,800 hours of voluntary overtime, an average of twenty hours a week on top of their routine forty-four. Blanchford himself has been continuously "on call" for nearly twenty-five years. This splendid story of his pluck and determina- tion is a monument to the Order of St. John motto: Pro Utilitate Hominum, "For the service of mankind." Service, indeed, and enough drama for twenty nOvels! PLAINTIFF BECOMES DEFENDANT William Shaw, 58, called Rochester, N.Y., police to report that someone claiming to be a policeman had snatched his wal- let containing 180. Detectives who arrived on the scene ar- rested Shaw for public intoxica- tion. 1 won't say that I'ni unhicky But let me tell you something, Jack, If 1 started on a shoestring Button shoes would soon come back. CROSSWORD PUZZLE ACROSS 1. Craze 4, Sheltering trees 9. Pronoun 12. Chill 13. Pert, to a continent 14, Breed of AOR 15. Protesting 1R. Roforo 14, Corns by 21 Crustacean 02: infant's food 22. Peck of cards 23, Trowl 20 Taste 51 Male ebIld 05 Exist ss alma ghtm- 25 Earth goddess 36 Sat for a pleture SR. Misrepresent 40. Clamor 41 Nocturnal animal 44. Period 45 Stoke 40.111114 antiseptic nsi4 48 Myriam:11ton 50. Tmlinti mulberry 51. Sell:Int songbird 02. Te the direction of 4. Death 61!. lezPunges FL Draws forth O. Rest DOWN 1. Evergreen 0. Writ aViater 9. Treats 33. Chess pieces maliciously 34. Color 1.0. Vandal 37. Perch 11. Poultry product 39. Tennis stroke 16. Sphere 41. Part of a, 17. Snread skeleton 20. Pallor., 42, Constellation 3. Degrade , 21. Made over 43. Wild animal 4. Division of * 22. Pitting 45, Commanded window 23 Topaz 45 Ignoble 6, Stupid person hummingbird 47. Wax 6. Kindled 24, T.egumo 49. Stockings 211. ThInkn 51, Twitching 7. Deface 27. Body 'Mint 52. The leasi bit 8. Obstruction (collno.1 211 SorroWful 55. (?rel, IP Commit theft 57, T1'110 iiIIIIIMIII1111111111111111111 ii1111111111111111111111111111111111111 iiigigii11111111111NO1111111111810 illillitigii1111111111i1M111111111 illligill111111111111111111M111111 lialli1111111NEM14111111111111 1111151111111111111111111411111 hill115211111111111411111111111111 ' 1111111111111141i1111111111111111 so, Answer el ewhere on this page 4t,gskitt.-k,1/4' • THIS OLD HOUSE IS NEW Linder construction in Charlottes- ville, Pa., is a replica of the house called Shadwell where Thomas Jefferson was born. The site Is. not far from Monti- cello, Jefferson's famous home. Built in the 1730s, the original Shadwell burned down in 1766. THE FARM FRONT r• Jo kL&ea • Shipping apples to British Columbia is like carrying coals 'to Newcastle. Yet that's what happened last year. Apple production in British Columbia last season was the smallest in many years. About 4.2 million bushels were har- vested, compared with six mil- lion bushels the previous year. * 4, * To take up the slack, Ontario and Quebec producers -shipped McIntosh apples to the West coast for the first time in the mem- ory of veteran officials of the Fruit and Vegetable Division, Canada Department of Agricul- ture. Normally, B.C. ships apples eastward - especially later var- ieties and .varieties not produc- ed by growers in the east. * * The sudden reversal in this trend has brought a warning from the Plant Protection Di- vision of the federal agriculture department that eastern ship- pers must live up to regulations laid down under the Destructive Insect and Pest Act. W. A. Fowler, chief of the division's plant inspection sec- tion, points out that the move- ment of apples from Ontario to British 'Columbia is prohibited unless fumigated under the supervision of an officer of the division. This is because 01 the Oriental fruit moth. 4, 1' 4. Further, since.the apple mag- got is known to exist in eastern apple growing areas and not in apples may be exported only from orchards shown by inspections to be apparently free of the maggot. 4. * Economists with the ,Canada Department .of Agrteulture have revised an October quarterly forecast of hog marketings, in the face of. a marked slowdown in production. They now predict an October - to -December marketing of 2.2 million hogs, an increase of about seven per cent over the same period in 1958. The earlier forecast called for a boost of 19 per cent. 4, * A spokesman for the market- ing section of the Economics Di- . vision said he looked for. a 1.5 per cent increase in eastern Canada during the last • three months last year, and a two per cent decline in western Can- ada. 4, 4, 4. This year? Indications are for a decline of roughly 15 per cent over last year's booming hog market. The total output in 1959 is ex- pected to be 8.6 million, where- as this year it may fall to 7.6 million or lower. In revising their figures, the economists predicted a decline of four to five per cent in the first quarter of 1960 instead of the two per cent mentioned in the October prognosis. * * The Agricultural Stabilization Board's support of the price of hogs by outright purchase ended January' 9, and after that date support was to take the form of deficiency payments. Producers who have not regis- tered for participation in the de- ficiency payment program should apply immediately. Forms may be obtained by writing the Ag- ricultural Stabilization Boar d, Canada Department of Agricul- ture, Confederation Building, Ot- tawa, or from the nearest office of the federal department's live- stock division. * 4, * Application cards for regis- tration are being mailed to pro- ducers. These should be com-' pleted and mailed to the Data Processing Unit, Canada De- partment of Agriculture, Ottawa. * * In the case of a farmer hvaing a son or a partner who owns some of the hogs mark et e d, only one name may be registered for one farm enterprise. This means that all hogs from a farm unit or enterprise • must be marketed under one registration pletely separate operation is necessary to qualify for regis- necessary to qqualify for regis- tration as a farmer producer. That Forbidding North Atlantic In Europe, seamen have al.ways known the North Atlantic as the Western Ocean. In the early days the untamable and little - sailed sea, which sent its vio- lent storms to lash at them and beset their_ seapiaxts and their beaches with; tljenoisy, fearful challenge of its gale's, seemed un- conquerable. The 'arch of these wild Atlantic, gales against all Europe is mostslavere in those areas where men are the best seamen, ' and yet seafaring pro- gress here was slow at first, as compared with that made in kinder seas. Arab, Persian, and Indian dhows crisscrossedthe monsoonel waters of the Indian Ocean at least two thousand years before European seatnen could manage anything other than coastwise passages in the open waters of the North At- lantic, and the Mediterranean was at least a galley -filled sea while only the Sargasso weed drifted on the surface of the broad Atlantic. The conditions were very dif- ferent. In the tropic waters of the -Indian Ocean there were clearly defined seasons which brought their own winds - the good north -easter, with clear visibility and ideal sailing con- ditions; the turbulent sou th- wes ter, which could blow hard but at least provided easy means to sail home again. There was a wind to go out with and and another to return with, and, in the northeast season, there was a reasonable assurance of con- tinued good weather. Fishermen working from open beaches could develop craft suited to their purposes, and mariners could learn to extend coastwise passages to ocean wanderings as fax as the • monsoon blew. Primitive ships could suffice, In such conditionS, and did. Even in 1956, many such ships ooh - firmed to sail Eastern seas. But in Europe it Was not so. The North Atlantic, beyond the tropic's edge, could blow gales at any season, and there were no seasonal winds, obligingly changing directions twice a year, to help mariners on their way. On their way to what? What lay lo the West, beyond all that bitter sea? In the East were silks, spices, jewels, gold. The Old Worlds turned east. The long spice and rieh silk roads led there, and the European ern- poriums for both centered on the Mediterranean, India, Per- sia, Araby "The Blest," were the sources of riches and of trade. What point was there then in sailing out into the Atlantic, bound for nowhere? European seamen -had no incentive to make bold transoceanic voyages. So the Atlantic was not crossed by ships for centuries and, in the end, its opening was a chance by-product of the quest for a sea route to the East. Scholars had long. theorized that to sail west would bring ships east, if they sailed far enough, and it was the East they sought, -From "Wild Ocean" by Alan Villiers, Saving Water By Treatment Municipal water systems and their customers, the citizens of larger United States municipali- ties, are overlooking a ready water supply through waste wa- ter treatment, according to Mark N. Hollis of the Federal Public Health Service. M. Hollis said that, some six or, eight years ago, the Ameri- can public was spending $200 million a year for waste water treatment plants, but it had re- cently jumped this figure to $400 million a year. But he thinks the rate should be "above $500 mil- lion." He did not say "$500 mil- lion"; he said "above $500 mil- lion." Members of the great bureaucracy at Washington are cagy about putting a limit on any estimate of any future spending. If Mr. Hollis said how much water was being conserved by these treatment processes, the news story did not quote him. Possibly the reason that we are making slow progress in this field comes from the fact that we talk too much about the cost and too little about the amount of water we will derive from it. • The treatment of contaminated water for reuse by the public has been fully demonstrated. It was in wide use in Germany before World War I, But there is an obstinate popular prejudice against turning to it in America. Waste water conservation at any such figures is not good campaign material. This treament of waste water is going to be especially import - 'ant in Texas as time goes on, Our surface water comes pri- marily from a number of rather small parellel rivers, nearly all of which are contaminated with various forms of waste materials. The time is not far distant when we will be consuming the total capacity of these rivers to pro- duce fresh water. We should adopt, first, a much stricter pro- gram of prevention of water con- tamination in these streams and, second, a program of condition- ing this water for reuse. The two programs will supplement each other because the less con- tamination, the cheaper the re- conditioning. - Dallas News. "And what's your name?" the teacher asked the little boy. "Julie," was the reply. "Ah, you mean Julius. We never use abbreviations in my class. Now, little boy, what's your name?" "Billions." UNDAYSC11001 _LESSON Iter fl 1arelli,1 en 0..‘. The Converting Power of the Oo,spel Acts 16:13-15, 25-34 Memory Selection; Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. Acts. 16;31. Next to the scene of Paul's conversion, perhaps the next most fascinating scene in the story of his life is that of his night in the Philippian jail and the conversion of the jailer It was no pretty sight as Paul and Silas lay with their feet fasten- ed in the stocks with their backs bruised and bleeding. The beat- ing had broken some of the blood vessels. Some of the blood had clotted. These men were no criminals. They were God's messengers of the Good News of the Gospel. In the name of Jesus Christ they had cast the demon out of a young lady who was a sooth- sayer or, as we would say to- day, a fortune teller. The men who made money from the girl's work were angry and instigated an uprising against Paul and Silas. They should have rejoiced that another had been freed from the clutches of Satan but their greed for money blinded their eyes to the glories of the Gospel. Missionaries still meet with this type of violent opposition. In our own land the opposition is more subtle, But the forces that make money on the weaknesses and sins of others are well or- ganized and can fight back with vigor when disturbed, /f one emerges from one of the more desperate gangs, his life may be in jeopardy for a time, at least. The prayer and praise of Paul and Silas were heard by the prisoners. How unusual it was! Then God intervened with an earthquake, The prisoners were loosed. The convicted jailer ask- ed that most important ques- tion, "What must I do to be saved?" The answer, which is our memory selections, was a simple one. We are saved, not by what we in our strength can do, but by trusting in Jesus Christ and what He has done for us. We are saved by grace through faith. The jailer was a new man. After he was baptized he washed the blood off the stripes that had been laid upon them. How ten- derly he must have done it! Then he fed them. It was a happy home. Jesus Christ had come into their lives. And it came about through the faithful wit- nessing of two of God's children, while enduring suffering for Jesus' sake. ISSUE 4 - 1960 Upsidedown to Prevent Peeking 41s 15, 11 9 0 d 9a Lyon i9 9 S / W p Re L2 'Berill:Al a 8 a 3 39 1114/11.1. 8'''FJs 0 (1 3 7 3 a 0 a 8 d PI 10dVdmilVal? 9N IVV.LSNOW321 .7 417_1 ;glillSWEINVE4116112111°f7; 0 &0A 9 IT'S REALLY HERE - You know winter is here for good when the ,small ones drag sleds around wherever they go. This youngster samples the white stuff from o car.