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The Seaforth News, 1960-04-28, Page 3Harvesting Ice In Bygone Days It was real fun to sit In the comfort of the fireside and watch the Olympic ski jumpers, know- ing I had no responsibilities. "La chute est magnifiquel" said Bert Mjehaud with equal respectful regard. All I could think of was the way the ice used to come back now and then when we went filling the Weston icehouse en a deliciously cold winter day, (The temperature in Squaw Val- ley was reported as a brisk 4U or such, which we sometimes at- tain on a good summer's day if the wind is right.) An ice harvesting crew wits certainly motley. Word would go out that the depth had reached the 14 inches desired and the ice- house would be filled, Anybody who could attend would there- fore show up, and everybody had plenty to do. You'd find the Baptist minister working with a chap who trained sporting hors- es, and the superintendent of schools bandying words with the village ignoramus. If the nights held cold, once the pond was un- covered those 14 inches could stretch to 28 mighty fast, and then you had trouble. It didn't matter who worked with tvhien; the job was to get the house fill- ed, There were no machines in the days I speak of, The Ice was grooved by horses, sawn by hand, and stored by brawn. The run- way from the pond up to the house on shore had a steel frame that just fitted over two double cakes - four cakes, that would be, The clevis on ,the right end fitted a rope leading through pulleys to a team of horses on the bank. The nigh end, nearest the pond, was turned up like skis so it would come sliding down and ride up over the next four cakes, Inside on the aft end it had teeth, to bite into the ice and prevent slipping. So, when you got four cakes lined up in- side the frame, the giddap went out, the horses strained, there was a creaking of blocks, and the cakes went coursing up the runway toward the house. Falling into the drink was standard practice. Even with creepers on, you'd plunk in, clos- ing the door after you and ex- periencing the most awful ablu- tion known to man. You'd come up and the next man would loop an ice hook into your mackinaw collar, jerk you back on the ice, and you'd have the afternoon off. They didn't pay you for time lost, either. The longest trip you'd ever make in your whole career was from the water's edge to the shanty. The shanty was merely a shed to keep the tools in at night, and it had a stove to make lunch- time congenial. Wires , were strung over the stove to dry clothes, assuming that during the day somebody would find them useful. But the gayest event on an.ice pond was whenever the steel frame lifting cakes up the run- way slipped, and the four cakes came back down again. It made a most pretty descent, if you were at a distance. The teamster was the first to know this had happened, for his horses would lunge ahead when the weight was lost. He would let out a yell that echoed on the frost with a flat, frigid tone, and it would be picked up by everybody. The yell was a signal for the men working at the loading place toexecute a swift departure, for when these cakes came down freestyle and whoomphed into the narrow slit of water, the explosion was a monumental event. Anybody re. anywhere around was inundated With a devastating drench which froze immediately. The least suggestion that the frame had slipped prompted such foot racing as would win Atal- anta without apples, even. and a cheering from the pond quite r4 .1 .' Amaricanitiihop,Iam83 Walsh,11 ether priests, sentenced to prison by Chinese Reds for al egret espirmege. JI 11 Most of northern istdifiali 19 firemen kilted. U.S, battered by 1st* in explosion of burning winter snowstorms. whisky warehausa. in Glasgow. MAR. 31. 0.47 let bomber ex nits LltthfRoek, Ark,, residonHal section. Ssnirai killed and Injured. -.reeks t Airliner crash kills 60 near Tell City, Ind, 17 killed when passenger train, ell truck collide et Oakanfield,Cafif. 1,'21 Khrushchcv begin tour of Prance; warns of German menses. 7AR, l Twe earthquakes, seismic wove and tire destroy Moroccan resort city of Aeadir;10,000 estimated dead. British Prime Minister Macmillan arrives for presummit ' talks with eisenheiwsr, Screen Actors Guild strike down Hollywood studios, US, launches space probe Pioneer Y into debit around inc. R:1 9 Spring thaw brings severe floods in 6 prairie states; hundreds evacuate homes, 72 Africans killed, over200 werunded by Shap.avilie, ce in Hot of r South Africa. I i its Newsmap 18 men trapped in coal mine at Logan, W. Ya.; rescue attempts fail. lA14. a French ammunition ship blown up in Havana Harbor; Castro accuses U.S. of sabotage. worthy of that contest. If all went well, there was a resound- ing alarm, and vast cry of "Kout!" a scramble for distance, and then' the hilarity of congrat- ulations. If things did not go well, somebody would clink to- ward the shanty to sit in the steam, The day 1 fell in and was deft- ly jerked back onto the ice by Diddy Howland, the shanty real- ly looked good. Nobody went up with me, the falling -in business being too routine, so I stuck some sticks in the stove, chattered to myself while I undressed, and found it wasn't too bad at that. I exposed myself to the little stove, which was fairly hopping, and in no time my wet clothes were steaming away fine, It was fun to sit in the warm shanty, whose only window gave on the woods away from the pond,- and listen to the muffled activity of ice -cutting - the creak of ropes, the bumping of ice blocks, the calls of the men, and the upping and downing of the great steel frame, sliding in the guides. Then came the tumult, From up back, a wild shout, and then the chorus from the pond. The frame had slipped! Silence, dur- ing which I prestnned the men around the runway ran. I was wrong. They started to run, but mischance saw them all go flat - three of them fell on their faces before they could get dis- tance, and there they were when the thunderous tidal wave came down. The crowd on the pond cheered and applauded, vastly amused, and the three men pick- ed themselves up and ran for the shanty. In they carne, off they stripped, and I helped them hang their clothes. And that afternoon, in the steam, we four ice cutters sat on wooden boxes, comfy though unclothed, and had one of the greatest cribbage games in the annals of winter sports. -By John Gould in the Christian Science Monitor. WHAT! NO CRRVIE? A British expert on crime was amazed, during a recent visit to Jeclda, in Saudi Arabia, to see a porter jogging along the city's busiest street with a large bag on his back bulging with bank- notes worth several thousands of pounds. The man, unarmed and un- guarded, made no secret of his load as he journeyed from one bank to another. "Aren't you afraid of being robbed?" asked the amazed Eng- lishman. But the porter just smiled and answered: "The Sau- di crime rate is the lowest in the world," Puzzled, the visitors called at the local police post to snake further inquiries and learned that the harshness of the law has cleared the town of all crooks. The penalty for stealing is hav- ing one's hand chopped off. CR o.71SM'VORD PUZZLE ACROSS 60. Dispatch 59. Three -spot DOWN 1. Swab. 2. Salutation 3. Hindrance 4. 13artered 5. By 6. Statute 7. Anthrr.poid animals 1. Distilling grain 6. Alaak 9. That girl 12. irin ihhed 18, Finish line 14. Liquidate 15, Leaf a a Corolla 17. Damp 19. Malt drink 10. Not bright 21. Leads 23. MTore'nolo- dlous 27. Untruth 98. Applause 28. Old- rashlond 91. nehnid 83. ttnevon 84. Confronts 35. Mother chicken 68. OurselveS S7. Extremities of earth's axis 88. Quantity of medicine 30. Sailor 40. Thorough- fares 42, Avalanches 46. held a Session 48. T4altonn basket 47. Weep con vat. ninety 40. Tares S8. Consumed 54, Sin 57neeyre , Blusltinetert 8. Pays a 1,111 35, Darden toot 0. Extra part 37. Stuff 10, Lame 88. Abhor 11. Observes 30. Weary 16, Ignited 41. Damn and 20 Award for chilly valor 42 C oatrlx 22. 1-telp 43. Dilatory 23. Display 44. inflamed 24. Walk in urate, p AN. 25. Remnant 08.8 yip "r hair 26. Speed contests dress 30. I;xantinationn 00. A .tendon 81. For fear that 11, (7 tiring cube 32.Units 52. Surrepittlaus 34 Extensive 05 P. st trno-e wood,. ending I 2 3 4 6 b 7 8 r:4.9 •, 10 11 12 'I3 ,..�^, Leri 14 15 16 •1• 17 r•i, 11 18 •: s:•i!E2O:T � 19 20 . 41 22 23 4 25 26 --, 27 `s "l• x "• 1M 20 •4. 29 30 31 32' 33 �34 �38 1 htS^: 35 36 :4 31 - het. 39 40 `.•',•% 41 ENNEOZ M.I ✓✓ .s:er3::'a 1:4:4 42 43 - 44 46 •: 48 70, 4? 50 61 62 , 63 •'x.50 •�. 54 ' ss o y i'S' 66 se A: ::e 3'5 69 Answer elsewhree on this page CAMEL CHORES - Ships of the desert are turned into plow pullers in the Canary Islands, off the coast of Africa. How much does the Canadian farmer net from every dollar of gross income? A Canada Department of Ag- riculture economist, studying financial statements of 13 groups of farms in four western prov- inces found that the average return to the farmer for his labor and capital was about 40 per cent of the gross income. * 5 ' In other words, explains C. K. Varkaris, for every dollar of gross income, the fainter had a return of 40 cents. One group of farms in Alberta showed a negative return in a year when crop yields were low. * n * In British Columbia, farms surveyed in the Rocky Moun- tain Trench area averaged a 40 per cent return on gross income, with mixed livestock farms lead- ing with about 50 per cent. In the central region, farms sur- veyed averaged 47 per cent of gross income., Livestock - crop fanning had a return of 64 per cent. Sixty-five .Fraser Valley dairy farms had returns amount- ing to 43 per cent of gross, and on Vancouver Island, another 29 dairy farms showed returns that were 40 per cent of gross, * f. M In Alberta, two types of farms in the Parkland area were sur- veyed. One was general livestock farms and the other grain farms. The first group was the excep- tion to the general rule, show- ing negative returns to labor and capital, The grain farms record- ed returns that were 38 per cent of gross. a * „ Three groups were studied in Saskatchewan. Two involving large and medium farms show- ed returns that amounted to 74 per cent of gross. The third in- volved snail farms that return- ed 67 per cent of gross ,to the farmer for his labor and capital. Located west of Swift Current, the farms were in five ]munici- palities. „ n m In Manitoba, 58 livestock farms in the Interlake Area had an average return of 45 per cent of the gross income and rang- ed from a low of 43 per cent for the farms that kept 15 to 34 cattle to a high of 48 per cent for farms that kept 50 or more cattle. Another group, compris- ing 54 mixed farms in the Sif- ton-Fork River area, had an av- erage return of 47 per cent of gross income. A third group, composed of 82 grain -livestock farms, showed an average return of 45 per cent of gross. Fifty-two grain farms in the Red River Valley area returned an aver- age of 36 per cent of gross. • * N "Reading between the lines", comments Economist Varkaris, "it is evident that a substantial volume of business is required in order to provide an adequate level of living": Loose smut infection in barley can be reduced by seeding only large kernels, Department of Ag- riculture scientists have deter- mined. Experiments were conducted with bulk barley screened into small, medium and large kernels. * e * In a one-year test with 'Mont - calm barley, relates M, L. Kauf- mann, the smallest seed resulted in plants with a 30 per cent in- fection, medium sized 12 per cent, and large only two per cent. Unscreened seed from the same bulk lot gave a 15 per cent infection in the crop. The Gateway and Husky varieties gave similar yields in a two-year test. e e s All commercially grown var- ieties of barley are susceptible to loose smut and the disease cannot be controlled by chemi- cals. * a In view of the results of the experiments, says Mr. Kauf- mann, it is recommended that only the large kernels be used for seed in areas where loose smut is prevalent. The large seeds used in the tests were those which passed over a 7/64 inch by 14 inch sieve. They represented about 20 per cent of the bulk lot. Bence, about 500 bushels of grain would be required for 100 bushels of seed. Reduced losses from smut would more than compensate for the extra trouble and cost in screening. "If this were put into prac- tice by farmers over a wide area," says Mr. Kaufmann, "the number of smut spores in the air would be reduced and the infection would decrease gen- erally." In the Alps McPherson had hired a taxi at the station to go to his hotel. On the way the taxi skidded downhill and the driver yelled. "My brakes have gone, I can't stop the car! What can I do?" For a moment McPherson was upset, then he rallied. "At any rate, mon," he called, "stop the meter!" South African government declares state of emergency to combat rising Negro unrest. How the Pacific Might Have Been The Pacific Ocean in modern outline is an insuperable barrier to the kind of over -water trans- portation known to primitive man, but we are predicating not fact but an insufficienecy of it if we insist on an ancient Paci- fic as impassable as it is now, or if we cannot tolerate the possi- bility that Santa Rosa was a California coastal headland 30,- 000 to 40,000 years ago. The world in which we live is nowhere stable and in no wise fixed: the forces that have shaped it are not quiescent.... The only certainty we can know about yesterday's world is that it dif- fered, somewhere, significantly from today's. We know a great deal about many regions of yes- terday's world; we have pre- sumed a state of ignorance to be a state of knowledge in vast areas, like the Pacific, and have said that we know this or that much without the fair and hon- est acknowledgment that so much is next to nothing. Among the facts that have long been known is the exist- ence of the west -flowing South Equatorial Current, the current which bore the Heyerdahl expe- dition from Peru to Polynesia. What was not known until the project vessels of the Scripps Institution and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service return- ed and reported in June, 1958, was that this was a weak countercurrent, a sort of back- wash, of a much mightier and faster current that flows east- ward beneath it, 250 miles wide, with the force of a thousand Mississippis. It extends from a depth of one hundred to eight hundred feet below sea surface and is at least 3,500 miles long. What this current must have meant to the Pacific when the world ocean was 400, or 200, or 100 feet lower than it is now, and all Pacific islands were con- sequently enlarged, we cannot yet say, but surely we must be excited enough to dream hy- potheses. - From "No Stone Un- turned," by Louis A. Brennan. A passenger aboard a pleasure boat asked the captain why they had stopped in mid -stream. "The fog is so thick that we can't see to proceed up -river," he replied. "But, captain," the passenger persisted, "I can see the stars." "Yes," he replied, "but unless the boilers blow up, that's not the way we're going." N ESSON fly Rev. ft. ti. Warren, fl.A., tLD➢, Rigliteousnes, and Mercy Matthew 5:8.7; 13:44.46; 18:23-3: 1t is pleasant to be hungry eat you approach the table for a good meal. But to hunger day after day on very meagre rations, as many did in prison camps, is very distressing. The words of Jesus, forming our memory se- lection are, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled." Matthew 5:6. Here is the promise of complete satisfaction for those who have good spirit- ual appetites. They shall be fed, even `fattened' as the Greek word suggests. There is an abundance with God and He de- lights to give to those who seek IBm, Great is the joy of the mars who discovers a treasure in a field, and having sold alt, suc- ceeds in buying that field. So the merchantman who sells all that he has that he may obtain the pearl of great price is well satis- fied. Jesus uses these parable.= to illustrate the value of the king- dom pf God, There is nothing in this World to compare with it. Man should be willing to surren- der anything that he may enter. Jesus said. "Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy." The parable in the les - $on emphasizes the point that only the merciful shall obtain mercy, The Kingg forgave his servant the great debt he never could pay. But the man whu was forgiven hod no mercy on his fellow who owed him but a triflle and who promised to env if given a little time, Thal un- merciful man wnuldn't trait mei cast him into prison. This was sir unjust that the neighbours tied the king who tools prompt action against the servant who had re- ceived such mercy but would not show any to another. God has been so merciful to us in giving His Son to die Inc us that we might be saved from our sins. We ought to have mercy on our fellows. Only thus can we show forth God's love and enjoy His blessing. As I write, race relations in South .Africa are holding world attention. The U.N. delegate from India made a timely re- mark when he quoted, "Love thy neighbour." Mercy flows from love. Q. What does a young man do about the offering when he le accompanying a girl to her place of worship? A. She, of course, makes her own contribution - and he also makes one. ISSUE 17 - 1960 Upsidedown to Prevent Peeking aava .L3A4 aao v 51©©� e i„ J1 VI TOUGH GUYS - Two bear cubs seem unhappy about their human surroundings. They were found in a hollow tree by loggers, and turned over to a zoo. PORTRAIT OR THE ARTIST - Which figure in this picture is really the artist? Creator Walter Dorin is holding the apple in Rome. Painting is in * private exhibition,