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The Huron Expositor, 1987-07-08, Page 2A2 -- THE HURON EXPOSITOR, JULY 8, 1987 FA.Huton osltor BLUE .. RIBBON SINCE 1860, SERVING THE COMMUNITY FIRST AWARD 1987. . Incorporating The Brussels POS$ ED.BY.RSKI, General Manager Published in - HEATHER,McILWRAITH, Editor. ,, eaforth, Ontario ' Very Wednesday. Morning', Mornber Canadian Community Newspaper Assoc, Ontario Community Newspaper Assodation, . Ontario Press Council • ' Corn nonwealth Press -Union International Press institute - •' Subscription fates: ' The Expositor is brought' to you' Canada '20:00 ayear, in advpnce each week by the efforts of: Senior Citizens -'17.00 a year in advance Pat Armes,' 'Nellie Blake, Outside Canada '60:00. a year. in advance Brasile Broome, Karen Gor- Single Copies - .50'cenis each dner, Joan Guichelaar and'Bob ' . McMillan .. Second class.mail registration Number 0696, WEDNESDAY :JULY .8, 1987 .• . - Editorial and Business Offices - 10 Main Street, Seaforth . Telephone (S19)'527-0240 - • Mailing Address - P.O. Box 69, Seaforth, Ontario, NOK 1WO No credit to town Comments made by a London alderman concerning the town of Seaforth • have both town officials and town residents in an uproar. And it's no wonder. Anyone whoread the' comments, which appeared on page A9 of,,Satur- day's London Free Press, could not help but be insulted. The comments are a very real attack on the intelligence of Seaforth residents and them= i portance and the viability of a small town in a big world. Alderman Gary Williams, himself a native of Seaforth, is no credit to the town, which in all likelihood probably played a big part in'getting him to his present position. ' His comment that h.e sees no point in, spending money on improving. HighW y 8 because "Seaforth has had 2,000 people for the last 50 years" is.clearly an uneducated one. He is obviously unaware of the tremendous amount of time and effort the community is investing in itself. Another comment that "it doesn't,make a tinker's difference, you're not going to get major industrial development in Seaforth. It's still an.hour away from anywhere. There's no skilled work force", not only, reflects' a flagrant disregard for his hometown's struggle to survive, but it is also a slap ih the face to all those who chose to live there. He has painted the residents of small towns as stupid, fumbling individuals, when it is obvious the only fool here is Mr. Williams. It would be interesting to know what diploma and?or degree it is, that gives Mr. Williams the authority, or the right, to comment on the economic • development activities of any municipality in this area. It is one thing for him to oppose improvements in the Highway 8 corridor between Kitchener and Goderich, but quite another to deem certain municipalities as unworthy of the service. Mr. Williams suggests the highway money would be better spent widen- ing Highway 4 from Arva, just north of London, to Clinton. The towns along that route are already thriving, so perhaps it's time to do whatever little can be down to help those, like Seaforth, that are struggling. . • Small towns everywhere, are feeling the need to get more industry into their vicinity, and an improved highway corridor would certainly make some towns more attractive. Many farm people need to have off -farm income to survive, and there is no reason why industry and agriculture cannot work side-by-side. After all neither could survive without the other. • It's time Mr. Williams shook off his totally -city demeanor and remembered that his roots are still irrevokably small town. -H.M- Awed by masters of the game I felt a littlebit like Dorothy tripping, through the Emerald City. For one thing everything around me was green : se very, very green,. , When I got the word that I would be view- ing the Canadian Open in Oakville' I'm not exactly sure how I felt - excited, I guess. After all it had been an event I'd been plann- ` ing on attending for years, but somehow• never, ever got around'to'it. This' year I did, - and it was well worth' it. At first I must admit I was a bit skeptical - .espeeially since it meant starting the day ,at the unfathomable hour of 6 a.m. But once on ' the road the skepticism disappeared and the drive itself became•almost too unbearably long.. • Finally at 8 a.m, , we stepped,, out of the car, walked 'across the street, through the club's main:entrance, and over to the .first green: . Our timing' was perfect. Minutes after we positioned ourselves around that first hole' Lee Trevino teed off. We watched him putt out, then continued to follow him around the first nine holes of thecourse. Although .the score indicated Trevino was not playing. his best, it was still a -real thrill to rub shoulders •.with this man who has been a top name in golf for as long as I can remember: • After nine holes with' Trevinowe d'eeided to pick up on a few of the other golf notables on the course. We watched as Jack Nicklaus • putted out at the third hole, walked.with him 'to the fourth tee, then down to the fourth. • green. SWEATSOCKS by Heather McIlwraith opted for a look at his drive.. ' • As we approached the tee, he looked up at us, then down again at the golf ball in his ' hand. The next thing we knew Murphy was tossing .the ball to.' my partner. We must. .have looked a little bit shocked because his next words were, " See ifou can make a par -with -this, I ca'rr'y' Well, we. ended up walking theentire18' holes of the golf course, before breaking for lunch, and I must say I was ready for lunch -'. if only because it afforded me the opportuni- ty to sit down. I was .exhausted. I can't 'im- agine how the.golfers manage to not only walk the course but hit the ball 70.to 80 times An, , how about those caddies - those golf. Small towns have lots to offer In an article on page A9 of the London Free Press on Saturday, July 6, regarding the widening and improvement of Highway 8 to better *service our community and others, the following quotation appeared from a Mr. Gary Williams, an alderman. in the City of London and chairman of the city's environment and transportation com- __suittee_andsupposedly .anative of Seaforth; Quote - -A native of Seaforth, Williams sees no point in spending money on improv- ing Highway 8. 'Seaforth has had -2,000 people for the last 50 years. ft doesn't make a tinker's dif- ference, you're not going to get major in- dustrial development in Seaforth. It's still an hour away from anywhere. There's no skilled work force' " End quote. Yes indeed Seaforth is a small town, but typical of thousands of other small towns twross Canada. Some, are a little larger, some smaller, but where would Canada be . without its small towns and rural com- munities. Do we want a cou_ntry,of only huge cities like Toronto? Sure we are missing a lot of the big stores and services that are available in a city like London, but just the same we do live .here and raise our families here and wr need jobs to support our families and pay our bills just like the people of London. Perhaps we are mainly an agricultural area, but there are townspeople who need to earn a living and indeed how many of our farmer's and/or their wives and families need to work off thefarm to survive? Seaforth has just lost one of its major in- dustries due to a lack of dernand for a Cana- dian made product. not a lack of skilled labor to manufacture that product and many people are facing unemployment. At a time when our town is trying to create jobs TO THE EDITOR mark by attracting new industry, do we 'really need comments such as this one made by Mr Wiiliams2isheinsinuatingthatanyone who works in a factory, be it in Seaforth or Stratford or London, is an unskilled laborer? Or is it our farmers he thinks are "unskilled"? I wonder what skills Mr. Williams has in regards to making shoes or boilers or ploughing a field or milking a' cow. We each have our own skills and abilities. I believe Seaforth and the surrounding area has a very targe and well qualified. work force and all we need is the opportunity to put it to work. I think Mr. Williams owes the people of Seaforth and area a retraction and an apology for his statement. Votes truly, Helen McNaughton Kids ripped off My name is Mieh'elle Dillon and I'Pi 12 -years -old. I'm mad. I hate the 7 percent provincial tax and now the conservatives are sneaking in 12 percent more on treats such as ?otato chips, popped corn, and pop- sicles. I feel that the government is just tak- ing advantage of all kids that pant vote. I will ask my parents to vote against them, and ask my friends to ask their parents too! Yours truly Michelle Dillon Stay in Seaforth like home On a recent business trip to London, On- tario, I had the pleasure of visiting the town of Seaforth. I was a guest at the home of a L'Oreal employee, Piet Lomas and his wife, Rose. As a major part of my job takes me all over the country, hotel living and restaurant food plays'a large role in my life. It was a delightful change to have a home cooked meal of excellent quality catered by 'Coun- try Catering' operated by Anne Ste. Marie delightful acniuspnere, which was catereu. by Anne and John, and my charming hosts Piet and lose was second to none. The evening was truly completed by my overnight stay at `Homestead Bed and • Breakfast." Once again, I would like to comitrennd Anne and John for making My . stay in Seaforth, a 'Horne to Home Visit.' Ray Plunkett Ontario Technical Manager and John Paterson. The food, the unte, the L'Oreal Coiffure' Seaforth a friendly town On June 18 — Kindergarten, Grade I and 2 Philips and Brett Finlayson, Seatotth pupils from Vanastra Public School visited P.U.C.; Joyce RMbey, Grace Dolmage and Seaforth as a follow -Up to a community staff of Seaforth Conlinunity Hospital and study. Our thanks goes out to the following Lions Park facilities. people who contributed their time and These people helped show us that Seaforth knowledge to make this a worthwhile learn= is the Friendly Town". ing experience; George Garrick, Fire Teaehers and students of Kindergarten, Chief; Hal Claus, Chief of Police; Tom Grade 1 and 2,Vanastra Pubile School. While he wasputting out -on four we node - ed 1986 Canadian Open champion Bob Mur- phy walking over to the seventh tee, and 'there's a virtual mountain to climb down on number 10, and ,that, once you've 'made it down there's no easy Way to get 'back up after the 15th hole, So I was more than ready to relax at noon. ' y After lunch we found ourselves in the valley and amidst a huge -canting •nt follow- ing the tournament leaders. And,although it was exciting to watch the unbelievably near flawless performance of .eventual winner ' •Cprtis Strange and second place finishers, David Frost, Nick Price and Jodie Mudd, it was perhaps more exciting to Watch Cana- dian Richard Zokol's atteinptto cut strokes .. off his score and catch those leaders., • ' - But if the truth be known, it was all ex- citing -;the golfing, the golfers and the course: • • a b gs look like they measure several feet around the middle. I can't even begin to im- agine what it would be like to lug one of them around' the course. I find toting MY . golf bag around the Seaforth course a chore, and both the bag and the course are small in comparison to what, I saw on -Sunday. The yardage on .the course, when con- verted to miles, indicates the course itself is at least four miles in length. Needless to say, that four miles only takes into account the distance from the tee off areas to the pin, it doesn't take into account the distance between pin andtee off, or a'li the extra walking you do when you're not following the prescribed course. It doesn't tr+ll you And'while I can never hope to be even half as good as those golfers participating in the :• Canadian Open; it was encouraging to see that someone, somewhere has managed to master the game to a certain extent. It was also encouraging to see that even those who have mastered the game somewhat'can hit the ball out-of-bounds; send it into the beach and even lip out or totally miss the cup. I guess what I really found put was 'that if you watch a game, it's fun'. If you play it, it's recreation, and if you work at it, it's golf. • What I saw Sunday was golf as' I've never . . seen it before. "IF yOU'QE ANvni/A/G LIKE YER oL 1/12An% 5on/, YOLJZt PROBABLV NEVER AN6UNT ��. To VCN r Canada a victim of power struggles FROM THIS ANGLE by Patrick Mattis The details of assorted power struggles have long been common reading material in the Canadian daily press. The provinces versus the feds over the Constitution, Canada versus the USA in the free trade talks, civil servants versus the govern- ment over everything from wages to job security. It all makes for great copy. Well, maybe not great copy, but it does fiII the pages. One might think that we in the comniuni- ty news field would get far few chances to act as harbingers for the parties involved in sueh power plays, but this is not so. In the last few weeks, readers of local' papers in Huron County have been offered all manner of controversy. This week we have Huron's urban mayors vieing to wrest some power from what .they perceive as a rural dominated county council. We have also seen evidence of a looming clash between small municipal police forces and the council's which con- trol them. The subtlties behind these disagreements are sometimes not so sub- tle, but can be overlooked by those failing to read between the lines. From where I sit, it's interesting to note the means by which the. opposing sides choose to snake their point. Take the police matter for example. One week, we have menthe's of the local police force petitioning the police conunission for increased manpower to lighten a heavy workload. The following week comes the public announcement., that mayor's in Huron County are considering the idea of disbanding local forces in favor of Cranbrook JULY 8, 1887 Robert McDonald, near Ctanbrook, had a Togging bee on Thursday of last week. There were about forty men and eight teams. The boy's worked like heroes setting up about nine acres. A picked team from the Seaforth Lacrosse Club went to London on Dominion Day to play a match with the London Club, this being one of the Western Ontario cham- pionship series. Me. John Hannah, proprietor of the Seaforth and Londesbero creameries has sold the butter Made at these creameries during May and up to the 23rd of June, Prom the Londesb-oro Creamery he sold 23,162 pounds and froint the Seaforth creamery, 20,850 pounds. The price re'alized was 18 and a half cents per pound, being one regional -style OPP policing to combat high budgets for local forces. The local police have subtly put their case before the public in the last two weeks by changing the style of their weekly report to the local paper. Where•we-used to get only the details of serious or unusual crimes, we are now receiving a laundry list of every occurrence, from thefts to noise complaints, handled by the force. The motives on both sides are obvious. in the county [atter, Exeter Mayor Bruce Shaw grabbed some front page headlines in a major daily paper by threatening to "secede" from Huron Conn- ty if county council doesn't take his town's concerns mote seriously. I won't suggest that Huron mayors don't have some legitimate complaints about the way things are handled by county council, but Shaw's c'ornments should be viewed as what they are, a ploy. No town has declared separate status front its county for 80 years. because the municipal government system has moved too far along the road to centralization of services to make the move practical. While these types of power plays are in- triguing `for a while, they generally become long drawn-out affairs. While' no likes the interuptions caused by strike's such as the recent postal dispute, at least that type of thing is usually over with quickly. The two sides slug it out for a few rounds, somebody backs off and things go back to normal. I have a feeling these other issues will be making news in various forms for a long time to come, f'm willing to make some predictions at the outset. First of all, no town the size of Goderich is going to go for OPP policing in place of the focal force. A constant police presence is needed as a deterrent to crime Second, the Goderich force is unlikely to receive the additional manpower it wants, and needs ttwo or three new officers' because the cost would be prohibitive. but it might get one more in the fall. Third, it will beat least five years before any significant alterations are made to the structure of county councils in Ontario and when reform does come, it will be provine'e-wide, not just in Huron. as a result of a study currently being done by the provincial govetnnient (that's 'why 1 say it will take at least five years?. One more thing. I would bet a week's salary (if I could find someone to take on so paltry a wager) that we never see the day Exeter, or any other town goes so far as to secede from the recently -rocky union of Huron. man holds Icy; in bee .1N THE YEARS AOONE from the Archives i cents per pound more than was realized last year at this time. The friends of Mr. Sathu'el Ciarke, who, kr a time Was editor of the Sun'hewspaper tri Seaforth, will regret to Pearn that on ac- count of illhealth he has been cofnpelled to leave Canada, and has returned to his native country, Ireland, where he intends residing for title with the hope that the change may be of benefit to him. Mr. Alex Stewart, president of the Seaforth Caledonian Society, was one of the judges at the games at Goderich on Friday. JULY 12,1912 There are now about 8011 telephones work- ing under the Brussels rural system and new phones are being installed almost weekly. After an absence of ten years or more, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Knight, of Marlette, Michigan, were visiting friends in Mortis last week. Mr. Knight is a brother of the late David Knight of Morris. Turn to page 6A