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The Citizen, 2019-07-04, Page 4PAGE 4. THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, JULY 4, 2019. Editorials Opinions President: Keith Roulston • Publisher: Deb Sholdice Editor: Shawn Loughlin • Reporter: Denny Scott Advertising Sales: Brenda Nyveld • Heather Fraser The Citizen P.O. Box 429, BLYTH, Ont. N0M 1H0 Ph. 519-523-4792 Fax 519-523-9140 P.O. Box 152, BRUSSELS, Ont. N0G 1H0 Phone 519-887-9114 E-mail info@northhuron.on.ca Website www.northhuron.on.ca Looking Back Through the Years CCNA Member Member of the Ontario Press Council The Citizen is published 50 times a year in Brussels, Ontario by North Huron Publishing Company Inc. Subscriptions are payable in advance at a rate of $38.00/year ($36.19 + $1.81 G.S.T.) in Canada; $180.00/year in U.S.A. and $380/year in other foreign countries. Advertising is accepted on the condition that in the event of a typographical error, only that portion of the advertisement will be credited. Advertising Deadlines: Mon. 2 p.m. - Brussels; Mon. 4 p.m. - Blyth. PUBLICATIONS MAIL AGREEMENT NO. 40050141 RETURN UNDELIVERABLE CANADIAN ADDRESSES TO CIRCULATION DEPT. PO BOX 152 BRUSSELS ON N0G 1H0 email: info@northhuron.on.ca July 4, 1968 Jim Armstrong brought a number of his friends and colleagues together to mark the construction of his Pietenpol ultra-light aircraft at Sky Harbour Airport in Goderich. The celebration marked the culmination of seven years of hard work on the aircraft, which was truly a labour of love for Armstrong. Armstrong said he had purchased plans for the plane from B.H. Pietenpol in Minnesota seven years earlier. The plane, when first designed by Pietenpol, had been powered with a modified Model A car engine. Keith Raymond of Brussels Public School was named the winner of the Intermediate Boys’ Championship at the annual three- school field day, which has been held in Blyth that year. July 4, 1973 Blyth Village Council was planning to protest the condition of Blyth Public School to the Huron County Board of Education. Brought to the table by Councillor William Howson, the issue was a sensitive one for many members of council. “I think we’re being left out by the board,” Howson said. He added that while other schools have portable classrooms, Blyth Public School has been forced to hold Kindergarten classes on the stage of the auditorium. In addition, he said the school didn’t yet have a placard with its name on it or landscaping of any kind. After receiving final approval from Queen’s Park in Toronto, Huron County’s first-ever official plan was put into practice. Almost immediately, the county filed its first amendment to the plan, contained within a 33-page document, approved by Huron County Council. Both Morris Township Reeve Bill Elston and Huron County Warden Roy Pattison were part of events with Queen Elizabeth II during her visit to Ontario. Elston dined with the Queen at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto, while Pattison was part of an event with the Queen at Centennial Hall in London during the royal tour. Blyth was one step closer to having sewers after receiving approval from the Ministry of Natural Resources for further work on the sewer project in the village. July 5, 1995 Former Blyth Clerk Helen Grubb had launched a wrongful dismissal lawsuit against the village, naming 10 individuals in the documents in addition to the village itself. When The Citizen asked Grubb what she hoped to achieve with the lawsuit, she said it was less about a settlement than it was about putting her life back the way it was. “I didn’t relocate my family and invest in a home to be insulted the way I was. I just want my life back,” she said. After filing the suit two weeks earlier, Grubb said she had yet to hear a response from the village. Union Gas began expanding natural gas service to Wingham and its surrounding communities of Blyth, Teeswater, Londesborough and Belgrave. Construction was already underway for the $11.8 million expansion project, which had been approved by the Ontario Energy Board on June 20. By the end of the year, it was estimated that the expansion would bring natural gas to 3,000 homes and 500 businesses in the area. The production of This Year, Next Year would soon hit the Blyth Festival stage. Written by Norah Harding, the play would tell her own story as a war bride. Born in England, she married a Canadian soldier and came to Canada in 1944. Harding’s interest in theatre first began to blossom in 1975 when her husband passed away. At that time, she thought about putting pen to paper to tell her life story, thinking it would make for interesting viewing. July 9, 2009 Dr. Michael Curtis and Dr. Carmen Schmitz were both welcomed to the Clinton area at a time when Huron County hospitals were desperately vying for doctors. A special welcome event was held for the doctors at the Regional Equine and Agricultural Centre of Huron (REACH) as they had both expressed an interest in horseback riding and outdoors activities. Angela Kirkwood and Katy Heady, both of England, spent some time in Huron County through the Junior Farmers exchange program. The two women stayed with Jacquie Bishop of Bluevale for a week before heading back to England. Sparling’s Propane of Blyth was again expanding its footprint after purchasing Caledon Propane in Bracebridge. The company planned to expand its ability to provide enhanced customer service and delivery through the new location. For the first time in its history, Canadian Blood Services would be hosting a blood donor clinic in Blyth thanks to the combined efforts of the village’s Masonic Lodge and the Blyth Fire Department. The clinic was set for July 28 and local Mason Greg McClinchey said it was Blyth’s low population that was cited as the reason the village had never before hosted a clinic. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada. We are not responsible for unsolicited newsscripts or photographs. Contents of The Citizen are © Copyright Rural influence will be missed With her replacement, Stephen Lecce, representing a suburban Toronto riding in a government that’s already urban-thinking, rural Ontario may come to regret the loss of Lisa Thompson as Ontario’s education minister. Hailing from our own Huron-Bruce riding, Thompson could see firsthand the challenges rural schools and rural school boards face. In a government headed by the mercurial Doug Ford, who thinks he always knows a better way to run things than the people who actually have to run things, having someone with rural a background speaking for education was a reassurance we won’t have in the future. Thompson and many of the other cabinet ministers who lost their jobs when Premier Ford shuffled his cabinet on June 20, were good soldiers trying to carry out his agenda. For many in Ontario, Thompson got off to a bad start almost immediately after taking the job when she vowed to implement the Premier’s pledge to halt the teaching of the modernized sex education curriculum, adopted by the previous Liberal government, and return to the previous curriculum. Cuts made to the budgets of school boards in an effort to reduce the provincial deficit (which had been made worse by Premier Ford’s tax cuts), also caused Thompson to lose popularity in her own riding with protests outside her Blyth constituency office becoming a common sight. Still, government policies are unlikely to change under Lecce. With Premier Ford’s obsession with fewer but larger governing bodies, there will be no one with rural experience to argue that there are limits to how big rural school boards can be. Rural residents may soon sense they have even less ownership of the school system than they do now. Despite the things she did that made her unpopular as Minister of Education, we may come to wish Thompson had kept that job. — KR Ugly messages must be allowed As Canada celebrated its 152nd birthday this week, one of the hallmarks of our country – political freedom – is being put to the test. Leading up to this fall’s federal election, the Nationalist Party of Canada wants to be registered as an official party, able to run candidates in October. The party, which is under investigation by the RCMP in Saskatchewan, is not something to be proud of. Spouting conspiracy theories and using the sort of language that demonizes groups like Jews and Muslims, most people might wish such a party didn’t exist in Canada. In fact some people have argued that Elections Canada should not allow the party to run candidates. But free speech doesn’t mean free only for people we like and agree with. Forbidding people to voice unpopular beliefs will confirm to them that there are conspiracies against them and help them recruit members. With the rise of far-right parties in many European countries and the divisions U.S. President Donald Trump has fueled south of the border, it’s indeed troubling to have a party like the Nationalist Party of Canada given official recognition. Hopefully, few Canadians will vote for them even if they have candidates on the ballot. If they do garner any significant number of votes, it will be a signal that there’s something wrong in our country that we must correct. It’s hard to realize that there are people who have nasty things to say but in a free country we must work hard to implement the declaration of Voltaire: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” — KR Who can beat Trump? With the first debates already beginning among Democratic Party candidates for the party’s nomination for the 2020 presidential election, the long, long, long campaign has started. Seldom have so many people outside the U.S. had so great a sense that they have so large a stake in the outcome of an American election as this one. With an unstable, egotistical bully occupying the president’s office of the most powerful country in the world, we all hope the Democrats can pick a candidate who can relieve us of the fear of how badly Donald Trump might harm the world. So with 20 candidates facing off at the beginning of the campaign that doesn’t even see its first Primary for more than six months, the emphasis is on picking the candidate who has the best chance of ridding us of Trump, more than who would make the best president. Candidates who might potentially make excellent choices at other times in history, may find themselves quicky shunted aside if they seem incapable of winning the sort of down and dirty campaign Trump is likely to fight. Meanwhile, with so many candidates in the field, the Democratic candidates are already doing Trump’s work for him by attacking each other, uncovering the sorts of weaknesses the Republicans can exploit when the presidential election campaign actually begins next year. So much is at stake for the world that we can only hope the Democrats can get it right in selecting their candidate. — KR &