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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1961-02-16, Page 6A Children's Visit To Oxford Ilow does one impart culture ea Children?And an appreciation of beauty in art and archrtee- lure? That is the question I hstied myself when we took a ouse 'in Oxford for a whole Mummer last year, As the. time for departure drew near; I complained tomy three (aged• 11, 12, and 14) that they had not yet been over one of the colleges which all the. world came to see, Even the sight of all those endless bus loads of tourists pouring through the' ancient college doorways every day had not roused a flicker of curiosity. All that my three wanted was punting and picnics on the Cher- well, or motorboat trips on the Thames, or matinees at Oxford's theaters and cinemas, and they did rather like climbing Carfax tower to see the view, They were perfectly happy to do with- out culture, though there had been a reluctant admission that they had enjoyed Oxford's mu- seums, which I had persuaded them to visit one by one,' "Es- pecially the one with the Egyp- fain mummies," they said. But now I put my foot down. They must see the colleges. A walking tour of the colleges was advertised as a daily attraction Week's Sew -thrifty PRINTED PATTERN 4603 SIZES 6-14 Easy princess jumper and blouse — the warm, bright fash- - Ion the school set loves best! Contrast -button trim creates a double-breasted effect. Printed Pattern 4603: Girls' Sizes 6, 8, 10, 12, 14. Size. 10 jumper takes 1% yards 54 -inch fabric; blouse leu yards 35 -inch. Send FIFTY CENTS (start -me cannot be accepted, use postal note for safety). for this pattern. Please print plainly, SIZE, NAME, ADDRESS, STYLE NUMBER. Send order to ANNE ADAMS, Box 1, 123 Eighteenth St., New Toronto, Ont. SEND NOW! Big, beautiful, COLOR-IFIC Fall and Winter Pattern Catalog has over 100 styles to sew — school, career, half -sizes. Only 35e! with a guide provided, And -on a golden summer afternoon, the slcy blue 'above the spires and pinnacles Of Oxford's matchless skyline, wee set cut. A very international group we were, and our guide was most excellent and enlightening. We looked at beautiful old courts bright With flowers, ancient li- braries and chapels full of his- tory, noble halls full of famous portraits, exquisite stained glass windows and carvings, and the three listened and looked duti-', fully, But alas, a look of veiled boredom was creeping over them, and I noticed after .a' time a tendency to hang bark. Would.' the guide notice? But it was that most admir- able guide who saved the day, "Now we'll look at something the younger ones will like bet- ter," she would say, and over and over again found something to 'catch their interest, At Magadalen' College, having looked at the perfection of beau- ty in arohiteeture and gardens,' we walked towhere the deer were grazing under the trees near the ancient, college walls, She succeeded in calling them to the railings, and what is more, produced peppermints (of all things!) for the children to give them to eat, They like pepper- mints, those deer, and we all liked strolling med.-patting them, writes A, M. Blandford in the Christian'Scienoe Monitor, In Corpus Christi College we wandered nut into the lovely old garden with its exquisitive view of Christ Church meadow and the Thames beyond, ""Because we really must feed Christy, the college tortoise," said our guide. And there; sure enough,' he was, with his name painted- on his shell, 'a very tame and ancient fellow, with a very nice tiny cottage. built for, him in the gar- den where the undergraduates were reading and talking under the trees. At Christ Church, biggest col- lege of. all .(for Cardinal Wolsey in the- 16th century believed in doing everything in a big- and impressive way) we were taken up to the library where. Lewis Carroll's corrections of the proofs for "Alice in 'Wonderland" are kept. What delight for the children when they were called to a win- dow to stand tip -toe and look down into a garden, the garden where the, little girl had played who had inspired the story of Alice in Wonderland, which was first told to entertain, her and her friends on a river picnic. That little girl, Alice Liddell, had been the Dean's daughter when Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson) was mathematical lec- turer of Christ Church, and' her greatest joy was to be told won- derful stories by the gentle and retiring. professor. There was the, very same chestnut tree un- der which Alice had played, and there the little green door in the garden wall, that' every child remembers in the story of Alice. How grateful I was to that kindly guide for giving my chil- dren—and all of us— such a de-' lightful afternoon, Oxford is a pleasant place for a child, with its two rivers (where we punted and bathed' all that perfect sum- mer), its tame squirrels that like to be fed. in the Broad Walk, and its lovely leafy lanes beside the Cherwell. But I think the children liked best of all the little 12th century shop'•near Christ Church and the Thames. There we used to stop and buy sweets, from a very kind and friendly shopkeeper, on the way to the river. For that was the very same shop' Lewis Carroll wrote about in "Through, the Looking-Glass"— the shop where Alice' talked to the old woman who later turned into a sheep.' ARTFUL GODFATHER — Pablo Picasso holds his 2-month.old godchild, Poole Dominguin, in Cannes, France, and talks 'with her sister, Lucia, Paola and Lucia are the children of famous Spanish bullfighter Luis Dominguin. hi PRESIDENT KENNEDY AT HIS DESK — President John F. Kennedy swings into his duties on the morning after his inauguration. He sits at his desk in the White House. Suppose we put slips into a hat for all the things that hap- pened during the past week, then pulla slip and see what comes up first, Yes? All right then, here's the first, and what do we have? A hockey game, no less. A hum-dinger of a 'mid- week hockey game between Tor- onto and theleew York Rangers, Wasn't that, a game to watch? We were just about sitting on , 'the edge of our seats during the ; last five minutes of the telecast. When the Leafs finally got a tie - goal I felt as exhausted as if, I had been on the ice myself. But you're not interested in hockey? Ohwell, let's pull another slip out of the hat. "Inauguration 'of President J. F. Kennedy' - that, at least should interest everyone wheth- er you are for or against the new president. What a day - weatherwise-people must have been almost frozen — except the girl who were flannelette py- jamas under her long dr•essl. And to cap it all a short circuit in the P.A. system. I watched the smoke curling around the 'ros- trunr and officials looking under and around It,. yet none of those near it batted an eyelid. It Catch the Stars Stars in crochet! Such dainty doilies are welcome in every household, They last endlessly. Lightning -swift crochet! Star these doilies on table, dresser, anywhere, Pattern 609; direc- tions square 8% inch; round 9%; oval 7x111 No, 50 cotton, Send THIRTY-FIVE CENTS (stamps cannot he accepted, use postal note for safety) for this pattern to Laura Wheeler, Box 1, 123 Eighteenth St., New Tor- onto, Ont, Print plainly PAT- TERN NUMBER, SIZE, your NAME and ADDRESS. JUST OFF THE - PRESS! Send now for our exciting, new 1961 Needlecraft Catalog. Over 125 designs to crochet, knit, sew, embroider, quilt, weave - fash- ions, homefurnishings, toys, gifts, bazaar hits, Plus FREE — in- structions for silt smart veil caps Hurry, send 250 'nowt would have been awful had there been a fire; those in the immediate vicinity wouldn't have stood a chance. I heaved a sigh of relief when the smoke finally cleared away. Seems to' .me many U.S. citifens willlong remember. the day John Kennedy was sworn into office. And of course one naturally wonders what kind of a president he will snake. Quite apart from polities I have reservations about so young a leader but yet I was very much impressed with his inaugural address. I liked his short, terse sentences — far more impressive than a long-winded address would have been. And now for the next slip . ": .. Coach bus service". That's coming closer to home and about it I can say plenty. Here is the story. We had a visitor' who was returning, to Toronto by bus. Because I was etil1 confined to my bed I asked .a neighbour if he would drive her to Cooksville to catch the 7.28 bus - which he did. My friend got her ticket at the local bus station and sat in the car until the bus was in sight —`Rhe ticket agent had said the bus would stop at the sta- tion, But this was one time it didn't' So there was my friend left standingon the sidewalk as lonely as a bride deserted at the altar. The ticket agent was furi- ous as there wasn't another bus for two hours. Fortunately a kindly 'motorist, well known to the agent, offered to drive my friend. to the foot of Jane and Bloor. So that's how she 'got home. Now I ask you, what kind of bus 'service is that? : Seems to me a bus' should be required to stop at all bus stations. If a person prefers to wait inside the office until he sees the bus com- ing he should be able to do so without losing the bus. A com- pulsary stop at all bus stations would give passengers ample time to getout to the. road. Must. we be forever on the run? What of thosewho are old and' crip- pled? Is there no consideration for anyone any more? Has catch- ing a bus now become possible only for the fleet andthe strong?, In all fairness .I should say I have usually found bus -drivers courteousand obliging but then I don't travel by bus very often and in any case I'm the over•- anxious.type more likely to stand in .the middle of the road for fear of missing it. And that, I think you will agree, shouldn't be necessary — at least, not out- side .a bus station. Next slip . . . "the weather". Oh well, there's only oue thing to say about that. 1T'S COLD! Below zero for four consoutive mornings. But 110 snow, no ice, no storms --- we can just telt* ourselves plain lucky. Here we go again . - , "Books read just recently", Oh dear, • why did T pick. that one last? Have just finished a book that I could write about for ages, It is called "Tile Winthrop Wo- man". It is fascinating, parti- cularly for those who ate inter- ested in history as it is founded on fast, To the it is of particular interest as the first part of the book features a district in.Suf- folk, England where I lived as a girl, The period is the early 17th century but the names are the same as when I was there — Bures,' • Boxford, Edwardstone, Lavenham, Groton Hall --= and many others. The Winthrop family emigrated to Massachu- setts, there to make a new life for themselves. The, details are similar to other pioneer stories but these are based on. actual documents. How settlers sur- vived those primitive times is hard to believe. • And the tam-,: ilie they raised. Children born at close intervals, many of them dying in childhood or at birth. Men 'marrying two and three times; each new wife caring for the step -children — and add- ing a few more of her own. And those days are really only a short while back. 'I wonder how much attention is given to pi- oneer history in our schools? Even so, can we expect the ris- ing generation of accept early settlement stories as fact? No doubt they find it easier'to be- • Lave fantastic stories of a space age than hardships relativeto the pioneer period. He Makes Clothes For New' First Lady From the 'perfumed salons of Paris to the swatch -cluttered, world of New York's 'Seventh Avenue; the. topic of conversa- tion last .month was not the new American President but what lois wife was wearing. Jacqueline Kennedy had sparked a revolu- tion in fashion. Milliners were loaded with pillbox hats, hair- dressers were besieged with or- ders for "slash bangs" (under - the -drier talk for' Mrs. _ Ken- nedy's hair style); and a whole 'mew crop of wide-eyed brunette tnodcns filled the fashion maga-. tines. No one was happier about the trend ,than Oleg Cassini, the new First Lady:s "official" couturier. With the exception of one -ball gown (by New York's Beirgdort' Goodman), every dress,'hat, and coat Mrs. Kennedy wore to the officials doings last week came from. Oleg Cassini, Inc., a coup' that could make this Paris -born. nobleman - turned. -needle-work- er the fashion man of the year, or even of the next eight. With, a whole gaggle of- top American designers, Cassini-had submitted 'sketq.'res to Jackie Kennedy as soon as the polls closed. His showing took place at Georgetown Hospital in Wash-. ington, just before her baby son was born. Cassini got the nod, he says, for his "sentheeis of Mrs. Kennedy's elegance," In fashion circles, where the gnash-'" ing of. •teeth almost drowned out:. the clash of scissors,' His critics ' though his connections with the Kennedy .clan played a big part (Cassini has designed clothes for the First Lady's mother-inlaw, Mrs. goseph P. Kennedy, and for two 'of her husband's sisters. Mrs. Peter Lawford and .Mrs. Robert Sargent Shrives.) • Cassini 'vigorously denies any "family influence." He makes no secret, however, of his, long- standing friendship.(and olitic- al support) for the new Presi- dent. They met toward the end of World War II in California, where Mr. Kennedy was recu- perating from his - war injuries, ane 5--..rgller, Who pat i 'four and a half years as a DA, cavalryman, was freshening UI. his Hollywood contacts, i .A fashion man front way beelc Cassini broke ill as a sketcher for Paton in Paris, later worked in arReanneterbeafonrde Ii141 U.S,with his mother, Counten (soeie%Y Eeluinnzst Cho Knickerbocker" for the Hearst papers), He made his mark drap- tog such Hollywood notables as GPaee Kelly, Rita Hayworth, and his second ex-wife, Gene Tierney' (the first was cough - syrup heiress Merry Fahrneye in styles that one fashion writerwaspish- ly described as "alluring. -or sexy." Successful as these have been— the firm grosses $2 million to $S I million a year, Cassini says this ,; style is out for 114x.;. Keniterly. So are the. less than subtle names he used for hie $100 -and up creations, (Sample Cassini title for bare -midriff number: "Navel oeeretions.") "Maybe," he said, "if' Mrs. Kennet y ttad heard seine of the names, she wouldn't have picked me." Mor am i1 *s'1ue• e By 'Anne ice ley .- Q. Is it oensider•-'l re''ty pro- per to type social A. This is quite p'•: •`err and it creasin 'ly nenui^r, teo.. Typed letters should be written on a single sheet, with only one site of the parer teed.' And be :cure. that your signature rf the col of the letter is written be heed Q. Is it, all rig :t t, u.^.e in- formals in riving thanes for wedding gifts? A. Yes, so long as there is no • greeting that substitutes for the written. words of thanks, and if the informal 'ia of K-- c»'•:'iiy paper. It should be sent, of course, first-class mail, sealed. Q. Is It proper to remove serving dishes or dinnerplates first from the table? A. The d;nner pIates should be removed first, then 'the serv- ing :dishes, FIRST LADY —' Mrs. John F. Kennedy, looked on as a fash- ion setter, appears for the Ire augural Ball in a full cape, wearing a sheath dress with sleeveless' sheer overblouse. ISSUE 6 — 1961 BACK TO SIMPSON'S? — Lounging model travels through Rome a la Cleopatra, sort of. Glare mick was a new approach to fashion photography.