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The Exeter Times-Advocate, 1974-12-31, Page 4OUR POINT OF VIEW gairt 20k6stia Predictions of gloom While predictions of many world economists point to gloom and doom. for the coming year, it will be with some reser- vations that we say goodbye to the passing of 1974 and greet the coming of the new year. Recession and depression are words often spoken by those in the know in con- nection with the year to come, but residents of the area can take heart in a few facts that point in the opposite direc- tion, While the past 12 months were herald- ed as the worst in a long time, with shor- tages of major commodities, drastically rising cost of living and hardships for many, we in rural southern Ontario failed to feel the brunt of these blows. Food prices were definitely higher, housing starts declined and some budget- ting was required for most homemakers but, for the most part, local residents con- tinued to enjoy their accustomed standard of living. Unlike major industrial centres, the stability of the agricultural base of our communities helped to bring the area through what many classed as difficult times. There is every indication that in the coming year we will probably fair better than our counterparts in the large cities. Throw it out! their community with a workable sewage system. Exeter likewise, will again be in- volved in a sewer project and the headaches for homeowners and officials that go with it. + + + Water supplies will also continue to be a major topic at local council meetings, as Dashwood, Crediton and Centralia prepare studies and discuss possibilities of ob- taining water from the Lake Huron Pipeline system. Other residents of Stephen township will receive a fresh water supply from the lake while Exeter explores possibilities of piping water from wells in Usborne township. This should be a time of spiritual uplift, of rededication of ourselves to Christ and to His teachings a time to ask for His guidance for the year aboad, Resolutions for the New Year + + + Regional planning will continue in the area with several townships undertaking to prepare official plans' for their region. The main concern will be to ensure that growth is concentrated in the towns and villages with the valuable and irreplaceable farm land being preserved for future use. Communities and municipalities will have to co-operate to ensure that the future of our area is moving, and will continue to move, in the direction, we the residents, desire, Whereas . . The Old Year has departed with his finished Book of Days, Wherein were written failures, trials, heartaches not a' few; Now we're wondering if the New Year will be like unto the Old, Or if each day will bring us an experience strange and new. • Re'solved . That if he brings us tears, not smiles as we had hoped, We ,bear our troubles bravely, and not let our tears o'er flow Into other lives around us that already may be bowed With a weight of crushing sorrow such as we may never know. Resolved , . . That we take the Old Year's failures, trials, disap- pointments . . all, And bury them 'neath purpose strong, away beyond recall: When we see a weaker comrade wandering down the lower road, That we will call a cheery greeting . . . it may save him from a fall. The coming year looks as though it will be a good year for recreation. Plans will continue for a proposed sports complex for all of South Huron to ensure that our children will have better facilities for recreation. Again, co-operation of the many will be required to get these plans off the ground. Senior citizens can look forward to a more rewarding retirement age with the help of several government grants received in 1974. Exeter seniors will soon complete renovations to the club house at the Bowl- ing Green and will have a regular meeting place with facilities for a relaxing and fullfilling leisure time, at the Scout Hall in Exeter. A friend tells me you've really never celebrated New Year's Eve until you've spent it in. Rome. That great city reverberates with booming guns and discharging noise makers from noon on. As night comes, tracer flashes cut the sky until at midnight it seems like all the noise in the world breaks forth. But that's not all. The Romans have the idea that on New Year's Eve you should get rid of all your old stuff. Therefore, the thing to do is to throw out of the window everything that is old . . . old clothes, cracked dishes, a broken down chair . . anything! My friend says you take your life in your hands to walk down the streets of Rome on New Year's Eve! The idea isn't all bad and is one we should emulate in many ways at the beginning of a New Year. It's a good time to throw out of our minds everything that is useless, dead, listless and evil, and get turned on to the good, the new, the bright and joyful things, All of us tend to collect trash like hurt feelings, touchy dispositions, fears, .resentments, jealousies, selfishness and other unattractive traits. Now's the time to throw them all out and make room for whatever is true, good, right, pure, lovely and fine as Paul suggested in his letter to the Philippians. my weekly paper being a week late in arriving.Time after time, I've been tempted to take up my typewriter and dash off an en- couraging note to a weekly editor who has written a particularly pungent editorial, only to pause in the certainty that by the time I'd received his paper, and the time he'd received my letter, the hot issue he'd attacked or defended would be three weeks old, and as cold as a corpse. Well, we mustn't be mean at Christmas, must we? Although I don't see why not. The same miserable sods are going to be around on Boxing Day, and the same inefficient, insolent in- situtions will be back in business on Jan. 1. Since it's too late to wish everyone a Merry. I'll put everything in the past tense. I hope you got exactly what you wanted for Christmas, whether it was a baby or a kazoo or a sober husband. I hope you got Joy. And if you didn't, I hope you were happy with Myrtle or Hazel or Pearl or Genevieve. And the same to you! 'I probably should have sent off a Merry Christmas column to all my readers about the first of November, to make sure it was received by December 25th. I know this won't be. But it's not your faithful chronicler's fault, nor the fault of your favourite weekly newspaper. The entire blame must rest on the broad shoulders - they have to be broad - of that modern phenomenon of efficiency, Canada Post. People in that august in- stitution must be afraid of getting their hands soiled by handling the average weekly newspaper, full of violence, rape, murder and muggings. They probably use a shovel. Shovel it into a corner until some day, between coffee breaks, they are so bored that they resort to sorting and sending the weekly paper. When I was in the business, we used to • mail the paper on Thursday, and people in Ohio or Texas would receive it on Monday. Nowadays I count on Not much change 50 Years Ago Mr. W. H. Johnston moved into his new home on Wellington Street last week and Mrs. Delve is moving into the residence vacated by Mr. Johnston. W. D. Saunders and C. B. Snell will contest the reeveship. There are eight in the field for coun- cillors: Eli Coultis, Jos. Davis, W. T. Gillespie, Jas. H. Grieve, Jos. Hawkins, C. F. Hooper, Thos. Jones and J. M. Southcott, The retiring members of the school board re-elected by acclamation are: E. Dignan, R. N. Creech, J, B. Stanbury, and A. A. Trumper. Mr. J. R. Hind was re-elected by acclamation to the public utilities commission. 25 Years Ago School officials have announded.' 'Classes in the new Exeter District High School will start a week from next Monday. Ron Stephen, RCN, Dart- mouth, Nova Scotia, flew home for Christmas with Mrs. Stephen at the home of her parents Mr. and Mrs. Ed Westcott and with his mother and family, Hensall.. The net proceeds from the draw on "Miss Sorority ,Sue" sponsored by Beta Sigma Phi Sorority amounted to $230 to be used for equipping a room In the proposed hospital. After February 1 the Exeter District High School Board proposes to serve a hot plate at noon to the students in the cafeteria of .the new school, 15 Years Ago Monday's power failure here resulted from a break in the main feeder line, about three miles south of Seaforth. A ground wire snapped and the wind wrapped it around base conductors, causing a short. Four-year-old Christopher John Tinney,'son of Constable H. L. Tinney,' St. Marys was killed instantly Tuesday afterndon when he was• ,thrown from a toboggan into the rear wheel of a passing tractor trailer. . Mrs. Ken Wildfong won the $500 Christmas jackpot prize of the Exeter Business men's Association. About 100 Exeter and district teenagers• attended the dance sponsored for them by Exeter Lions Club, Tuesday. Government upheavals seemed to be an integral part of the passing year. The year 1974 saw the defeat of several world leaders including President Nixon, and chancellor Willy Brandt of West Germany. Canadians, however, expressed their confidence in the way things have been go- ing by returning Prime Minister Trudeau and his Liberal Government with a resoun- ding majority in spite of the fact that they faced the twin burdens of unemployment and inflation. Yet, in spite of difficulties, including a succession of embarrassments from the rotten eggs to the attempt to boost MP's salaries a wopping 50 percent, Canada com- es out of 1974 in better shape than most countries. Municipal elections in our com- munities saw some upheavals and some returns but, with the contest over, we can look forward to local governments that will do their best to keep our communities on top of the problems that may arise from declining world economy. ^ :‘1'" -f- • wow» =.01;r1v.,/ The coming year will see some'ai'Sfigeag' in area communities with plans progress- ing despite rising costs of construction. Sewer projects will be the main topic of consideration in three area com- munities. Hensall residents will see the start of construction of their system and the mess and confusion that goes with a project of this nature. Grand Bend residents will suffer through more debates and discussions on the methods to be undertaken to provide • + + The year 1975 will be a year of confron- tation. The political leaders, at all levels, must be aware that the problems we face require immediate action and the concen- tration of all their efforts. 4 Inflation is no longer a distant peril and many readers will find the need for even more,careful budgeting in the year to come. The largest decline will likely be seen in major purchases but day-to-day buying will probably remain fairly stable. The new year is, nevertheless, a time of hope for us all. Co-operation of all peo- ple, not just in our, own community, but around the world, will be required if we want to beat the predictions of doom from the economists. The new year offers a challenge to us all and b,y winning the fight we will all profit. Victims of inflation One must have sympathy for the Cana- dian housewife as she struggles with con- tinuing inflation. Yet it must be remembered always that she is one of the more fortunate victims of this economic malaise that affects the whole world. Because she and her family can eat. There are too many others who don't eat regularly, and hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, who have gone hungry and died during the past 12 months. Photographs taken in the West African country of Mali recently show once-proud nomads scratching in the dust for grain after an air-drop. In the African region below the Sahara, known as the Sahel, drought has gripped entire nations. In Ethiopia, the worst drought in a century is said to have killed 250,000 people. They who hunger are the true victims of inflation, for the aid they seek is slow in coming. Many nations want to buy wheat 10 Years Ago Reg Beavers was elected president of the Exeter Businessmen's Association to succeed R. C. Dinney. The year 1965 has every indica- tion of being a year that will see considerable construction of education facilities in South Huron and may well bring to an end the lengthy era of the one- room school. George Godbolt, 18-year old son of Mr. and Mrs. Gerald God- bolt, Exeter, is attending the 44th annual Ontario Older Boys Parliament at Waterloo Lutheran University. The Exeter Branch of the Royal Canadian Legion presented five of their members with life memberships this week. Receiving pins were, William Middleton, Jackson Woods, Maurice Quance and Charles Bassett, need you. We hewers of wood and drawers of water, as Canadians are known, have to stick together and keep on hewing drawers. Every time there comes a crack about hewers and drawers, I burst into a hue and cry. Bur- sting into a hue is fairly simple. I can turn purple on very little provocation, as my family will tell. Almost anybody can hew or hue. But the drawers are the problem. Nobody wears drawers any more. How can you cry them when there ain't none. This is a problem that Canadians are going to have to give a good deal of thought to in the coming, year. Well, those are my season's greeting to Awl and Sundry (my legal representatives), as well as to all you faithful readers. And lang may your lum reek, on New Year's Eve. If you wanted a pair of those foam-rubber knee-pads for scrubbing, I hope you got them. And if you wanted a mink wrap, I hope you didn't. I hope you were not pregnant if you didn't want to be, and were if you wanted to be. I hope you didn't bust your bum on those new down-hill skiis, or _ bust your heart on those new cross-country skiis, both of which you are too young or too old to be doing anything with except feeding the living-room fire. If you are old and lonely. I hope you received a warm telephone call - about 15 minutes worth, and not collect - from someone who is young and loves you. And if you are young and lonely, I hope you got a long telephone call, collect, from someone who is old and loves you. If you are a farmer,,I hope you slept on Christmas Eve with visions of sugarplums and ,reindeer fast in your head. Jeez, a guy can't make any money on beef these days. Mights as well get into reindeer. If you are a schoolteacher, I hope you remembered at Christmas that you too were once a fat and ugly duckling, riddled with pimples, shy to the point of fainting if asked a question, lazy as a cut cat, sort of dirty, really, and yet a striving, yearning beseeching human bean. If you were a mother at Christmas - well, all I can say is that I hope you believe in a life after death. And if you were a father, well, all I can say is that I hope you, too, believe in a world in the hereafter. Preferably segregated. If you are a business tycoon, a union leader, or anyone in the upper echelons of education, I hope your ulcer ruined your Christmas dinner. If you are an old maid, and have been lurking these many years in the fold of your "sick" mother's nighty-gown, I hope you decided at Christmas to unlurk. Same for old male spinsters. Unlurk. Boy, that almost sounds like a dirty word, if you practise, Try it. Unlurk! Whatever happened at Christmas, hang in there. We for their people, but can't afford the high prices. Late in 1972, a ton of wheat cost $79. By March this year, it had all but tripled in price. Between 1972 and 1974 fertilizer, which is a vital tool for faster agricultural development, had doubled in price from $70 to $135 a ton. Shipping costs are rising rapidly, and general disenchantment with inflation in the rich countries does not help the aid pic- ture. Politicians who are under fire over rising prices look less kindly upon develop- ment assistance for poorer nations. Yet their need today is greater than it ever was. Sky rocketing oil prices have hurt the poor of the world more than they have hurt us. Canadians, in assessing the impact of inflation on their lives, also should remember the hungry. For they are in the midst of a disaster that was nOt of their own making. MIME:* alinTIMPAI,:.. UVIENNESTSSMILM Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881 Amalgamated 1924 iffte ftmeterZintes-itwocate SERVING CANADA'S BEST FARMLAND C.W.N.A., O.W.N.A. CLASS 'A' and ABC Editor — Bill Batten -- Advertising Manager Assistant Editor — Ross Haugh Women's Editor — Terri Etherington Phone 235-1331 Published Each Thursday Morning at Exeter, ()Mario Second Class Mail Registration Number 0386 Paid in Advance Mara 31, 1974, 5,309 SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada $9.00 Per Year; USA ;11:00• ,V01404MISISYIZEZNOSATAP"'"""'" Editorial taken from Exeter Times-Advocate Dec. 31, 1949 Persons familiar with the conditions of the '70's and '80's see a similarity between the think- ing of those far off days and the conditions that some thoughtful people believe to be ahead of us. Times were hard in Canada in the days im- mediately following confederation. The maritime provinces were restive and were look- ing unhappily towards New York. British Colum- bia was unhappy because the railroad that was promised to re-unite the provinces was not being built and was talking of uniting with the United States. Manitoba and Saskatchewan and Alberta were unattractive to the settler. The Northeast and Northwest territories offered lit- tle in the way of homes. Labrador was a mass of rocks. Northern Ontario was the home of the stunted poplar. Newfoundland was the land of rocks and storms and misery. Few farmers in any part of Ontario knew anything of a bank ac- 9 count. The farmer who bartered his products was in this way caught going and coming by the astute merchant, Times were hard, very hard. The United States was prosperous but Canada seemed to lag in the business world. Canada felt herself • to be the dumping ground of her progressive neighbour. It was at this time that Canadian statesmen conceived the idea of a Canada first policy. They were driven to such a policy. They saw that Canada, if she were to be prosperous, must become a manufacturing na- tion and not be at the mercy of her American cousins. Till Canadian industries got on their feet, they were to be safe behind legislative walls. Canada must be built up. She must be safe and prosperous at home if she were to be respected abroad. If she were to become a trading country she must manufacture at home what other nations might want. In any case Canada was to be built up. Further, it was hoped she would find a ready market for everything they could produce. We have some such hope these days when we seem to be losing our markets abroad. While no encouragement is to be given to any foolish folk who may think that Canada should attempt to become self-contained and isolationistic, in any way, it, is imperative that Canadians do everything in their power to become pre-eminent in manufacturing, and in high quality minerals and farm products. Not a single thing can be neglected in the way of aim- ing to have our Canadian eggs and cheese and butter and wheat and grain the very best in the world. The danger in pursuing this policy is that we may price ourselves out of the market. Our standard of living must be reconsidered and thereby hangs another story. H old 1415 15 WHAT I CALL SOUND FEDERAL-PROVINCIAL CO•OPERATION YU/A GOT 1'FIE 6AL(MES AMP INE CAT THE UMBRELLA. L 5 °Pf°5t NIOWP MEK II 9419 IN urimaKP ?'U.5 of 5mhu- PEN0 1 INATIDN 5? Thoughts for the season