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page 2 the tribune thursday oct 9 1969 a sunday success from an attraction standpoint the extension of markham fair into sun- da will be recorded as one of the most successful innovations in the shows 114 year history from a financial standpoint gate receipts must have exceeded all pre vious earnings there were those who opposed the sunday program and said so this is their privilege we trust they did not attend the board in its judgment felt that four days rather than three could be a benefit they attempted to provide attractions in keeping with the occasion we heard no complaints only compliments markham fair is big and getting bigger with this thought in mind some new parking scheme must be arranged some folks were required to walk almost a mile to reach the grounds we would suggest that the direc tors arrange a shuttleservice to and from established parking areas simi lar to that used at the international plowing match vantype vehicles could be acquired at very little cost and utilized for this purpose the school procession dropped from the friday agenda will not likely be resumed the monster dance a saturday night feature is possibly a thing of the past we dont think either was greatly missed certainly the sunday parade was the most colorful since 67 and should be continued it was a great show all round long may it last how lucky we are in canada the writer has just returned from a trip to the old country including southern and northern ireland the trip was not new as we have made it numerous times before but the im pression of how lucky we are in can ada grows stronger with each visit true these countries have made great strides over the last few years but the people are still miles behind when it comes to personal comforts we talk about our poor in canada but the ratio of haves and havenots is many times greater in the british isles the strifetorn areas of northern ireland make the poorest streets in toronto look quite respectable we grumble about our taxes our govern ment and how various services are handled but do we really know how the other half lives only by com parison can one truly appreciate the good fortune we enjoy basically the difference is that we are new and they are old it is much easier to begin from scratch with something new than it is to change from something that is old to some thing new thus their progress to what we believe to be a comfortable living is slow these things cannot help but make an impression and the conclusion particularly for canadian is inescapable how lucky i am how lucky we are a broken record in an effort to arrive at some con clusion concerning boundary lines of municipalities within a proposed york region warden stewart rumble called representatives of king whitchurch and east gwillim- bury townships aurora newmarket and stouffville together for a candid discussion of the topic sept 24 in our opinion the entire three- hour gathering was a waste of time for instead of discussing boundar ies as warden rumble had hoped some members insisted on debating the pros and cons of regional govern ment itself something we now feel is an absolute certainty it is this very kind of inactivity that initially forced the governments hand and queens park will act again unless representatives can show some signs of reaching a com mon agreement without provincial interference but an impasse on amalgamation issues within the county has been a problem for years county welfare and assessment was approved only after many months of haggling and infighting hon william davis has been sever ely criticized for implementing his county board of education program in the manner he did it is our opin ion that if he had not taken the initiative the plan would be still hanging fire while hon darcy mckeough has been less firm in his approach the time is not far off when he too will lower the boom and heads will roll a century of silence 8 this 7 ton cannon is perfectly harmless dated 1868 it stands guard near the entrance to the ontario county building whitby harry hooper i sometimes we shoot an arrow in the air which comes to earth we know not where at others we drop a pebble in a pool and the ripples made are really cool something like this happened re cently to my fatherinlaw on our last visit to him inspired by who knows what hidden emotions he flab bergasted us by quoting verbatim hundreds of lines of poetry he had learned in public school some little while ago he is 78 this was an entirely unexpected facet of grandads personality we gawked with admiration and he lit up like a neon sign with modest pride most of us cant remember an eightline poem for two weeks after memorizing it how many can remem ber hundreds of lines after almost 70 years but one thing bothered him he couldnt remember all the stanzas of an old favorite the village black smith it had one verse in particular which he wanted to get straight be cause it was a solace to him in his loneliness since the loss of his wife the smith had lost his wife too but was pressing on most of you middleaged and older folk will remember the poem or at least a few lines as i do under a spreading chestnut tree the village smithy stands the smith a mighty man is he with large and sinewy hands and something something some thing arms are strong as iron bands grandad is a man of great persis tence and he determined that hed remedy the lack he wrote to a farm ers magazine the free press week ly and asked if anyone could help supply the missing verses he was overwhelmed almost phy sically by the response approxima tely 150 letters came pouring in people from ten years old to those in their nineties wrote him some re membered studying the poem and chatted about the good old days of the oneroom rural school others sent the whole poem some wrote it laboriously with rheumatic fingers some had it typed one lady had torn the poem from an old reader a school reader that is not an old person who was reading it one cus tomer went to the trouble and ex pense of having photostatic copies made what really delighted grandad though was the kindness of the notes and letters that accompanied the poem one lady sent a long list of other poems from the old grade three and four readers and the letters came from as far east as nova scotia and from bc in the west thus my fatherinlaw learned of the power of the press something 1 learned years ago but i also learned that the term is misleading the people who plan and execute editorial policy and news coverage for the daily papers have the hilarious idea that they have tremendous power that they influence peoples thoughts and actions it is to laugh elections are surest proof of this the dailies could be unanimous in supporting one man for a certain position and as likely as not the canadian people with their own sense of when they are being pushed around would elect his opponent no it is the little things that dem onstrate the power of the press some thing which touches a chord or a nerve in the reader and rouses him from his habitual apathy to heights of kindness or fury ive recently had a good example not long ago i mentioned here in one paragraph a woman who is strug gling to raise a family of six decently on welfare a good and kindly woman of riondel bc read by bill smiley it and responded she wrote and of fered to send a box of clothing for boys it arrived today and ive just had a call from the woman on welfare she was terribly excited the whole family said it was just like christ mas there is a lot of warmth in the world still lets help spread it around in a generation that needs to realize it tofkbji martin kernagham is a pitcher with cobourg squirts the team that eliminated stouffville in the ontario semifinals martins mother mrs patricia kernaghan sends the follow ing note dear mr thomas the tribune ar rived today of the pictures martin has had taken we cherish this one the most we would like to compliment the stouffville management players and spectators for their display of good sportsmanship over the past several years we have had an opportunity to meet many people we will never forget the kindness shown us by the residents of your town our team is now meeting sarnia for the ontario championship mar tin has been practicing every day with the help of his older brother martin says his success is due to the splendid catching of jim orourke a team mate thanks again for your cooperation mrs patricia kernaghan grafton ontario dear sir several weeks ago i attended your trade fair or i suppose i should say our trade fair since we have just moved to this village and are pleased to make it our home the fair and everything about it impressed me and my family i am sure stouffville is a better known place for having organized such a show while there i purchased several tickets on the kinsmen club beef draw from a smiling young man in the conversation i asked him what the money was to be used for he replied that the club hoped to raise 1000 for their annual payment on a 5000 note for instruments pur chased 10 years ago for the stouff ville drum and bugle corps i said that i had never heard them play and his reply was sir i have been with this club 2vn years and have not heard them play either i am wondering if i might be of some assistance beincr a former band member perhaps there are other men in the village who miirht also desire to help throutrh the tribune could you publish the names and phone numbers of persons we might contact thank you interested newcomer editors note the band president is rae mcfadden 103 baker avenue his phone number is 6401262 dear sir there has been considerable dis cussion by both stouffville planning board and council concerning an ap plication to erect four town houses on clarke street before either body turned thumbs down on this request i feel the mem bers should have taken an hour to view similar structures at the inter section of hwy 7 and wootten way in markham town in my opinion their design is quite acceptable and would improve rather than deteriorate property values perhaps its still not too late to con sider the matter further id like to iive in stouffville but present homes are priced out of reach kenneth taber markham rr 2 the ribtxtxt established 1888 c h nolan publisher jim thomas editor noel edey advertising published every thursday by the stouffville tribune limited at si main st stouftville ont tel 6102101 single copies 15c subscriptions s500 per year in canada 750 elsewhere member of audit bureau of circulation canadian weekly newspapers association and ontario wtokly newspapers association second class mail registration number 0896 what did you do last sunday by jim thomas how did you spend last sunday i suppose you loaded all the kids into the family car and headed out on a color tour into the country no well then something a little more personal like snoozing between in nings of the world series semifinals not that either okay i give up but ill tell you what i did i attended markham fair but before you shake your head off in disgust and tsk tsk me to death i want a chance to explain i didnt go down to join the maddening crowd that surged through the midway or shake hands with my neighbor that i see every day but just to view the parade you see i endured the mid way on friday and shook hands with my neighbor on saturday so there was no need to go through it all again but i love a parade and if watching a procession of miniskirted major ettes on sunday is a sin then im guilty so colorful in fact was the one mile promenade that ill bet that st peter himself would have touched down for a groundlevel peek any way i felt no threatening tug at my conscience for being there regardless of the trend towards wideopen sundays i still draw the line as far as our own children are concerned mind you im not as strict as my parents were when i was a kid but we still have rules and regulations as long as were all liv ing under one roof theyre expected to abide by them for instance church and sunday school are musts the four oldest have grown up with it and a team of horses couldnt hold them at home on sabbath morn the youngest attends too and remains just as long as his mother can keep him quiet heading the nono list are cards any kind of cards be it euchre bridge crazy eights or snap also out is dancing even as much as a jig in the middle of the living room floor not that theres anything really so wrong with either pasttime theyre merely handmedown restrictions that we enforce aside from menial chores like soaking diapers and making beds no physical labors are allowed this in cludes such things as mowing grass changing storm windows ironing or even shining shoes there are six other days in the week for work of this kind and i for one have no inten tion of changing it im well aware that many folks will poohpooh such policies and have right to my face whats the difference between watering your grass and cutting it they ask i must admit its a bit difficult to come up with a sensible answer to each his own i say i dont feel you can legislate peoples habits its been tried but it hasnt worked live and let live for instance if your neighbors comely wife decides to sunbathe in her birthday suit whats a fellow supposed to do enjoy it ignore it or call the police the answer is ob vious j the same goes for activities on sunday some like to go out for a game of golf i dont but that doesnt make a game of golf on sunday wrong some enjoy the crush of a crowd in a midway at markham fair i dont but that doesnt mean the midway on sunday should be closed the do as i do slogan is no longer relevant down on the farm when i was a lad the most pressing sunday prob- v lem always occurred at haying time father would listen to the weather report on radio shake his head in obvious despair and predict a total loss of the entire crop do you think maybe we oughta haul in a load or two hed ask it sure sounds bad for tomorrow we never did mother saw to that but times change just think after 114 years even markham fair was open on the lords day some did not go thousands did its a matter of choice