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Page2 Friday, February 9, 1979 CASTOR REVIEW CASTOR COMMENT FRANK : + - YOU GOT GREAT HEIGHT ON THAT DoueLE AxeEL" -NOW LET'S WORK ON YOUR LANDING" Gorrespondence Editor, Castor Review: We have received the paper for over a year and my wife and I enjoy it very much. As I was raised in Russell but left in the fall of 1918 I often return to the village and visit my sister, Mrs, James Dempsey. Your paper is very interesting, although there are not many around that were there when I went to school. I read some time ago that one of our great statesmen, the Rt. Hon. John Diefenbaker, also took your paper; so as the saying goes, it must be alright. Wishing you and your staff every success. J. McShea, Gananoque, Ont. Success Story Hugh Latimer, a_ founding member of the Russell Old-Time Music Makers reports that the band is doing great and looking forward to a full schedule for '79. Keep the music coming guys. Unity up for grabs Unity is a word badly misused in Canada at the present time. It's misuse is reminiscent of the Bible statement which talks about people crying "peace, peace and there is no peace."' This country is beset by a plethora of voices coming from committees, task forces, acad- emies and others similarly qual- ified, crying unity, unity, when the prospect of unity seems to be becoming dimmer and dimmer. What none of these groups seem to remember is that they are talking about Canada, a nation with a history of more than one hundred years of national existence, a nation not lightly to be tossed away at the behest of groups or individuals whose concern appears to be one of making theories appear attract- ive, or of dealing with a particular situation at the ex- pense of the nation's future. It is remarkable how rarely the word Canada appears in the various reports and recommend- ations flooding out from various sources upon the bemused people of this country, whose main desire is to go about the business of building a better Canada for the future, as they did so well in the past. It is also beyond understanding that this nation, one of the most prosperous and progressive and truly democratic of all the nations of the world, should be subjected to unremitting barra- ges of synthetic soul-searching aimed at telling the people of Canada where we went wrong. The simple fact, proven by results, is that in the main, we didn't go wrong. Confederaton was a stroke of genius brought about by people able to grasp the grim realities of a time and world where the United States, emerg- ing from a great national conflict, would soon represent the greatest power on the American continent if not the world. They knew that Canada would have to stand alone and so they created Confederation. There was dissent in Quebec among those who felt French Canadians were surrendering too much of their language and culture. There was dissent in English Canada by those who felt English Canada was conceding too much. In that respect, the situation was the same as now. The latest task force report talks as though the question of French-English relations is some- thing that arose in the last few decades. This is not so. French-English relations have been the crux and cog-wheel of the Confederation package and the national existence of this country since Confederation and way back before Confederation. Right back to the copitulation terms on the Plains of Abraham. It is time to lay them to rest. There are approximately six million French Canadians in Canada, seven to eight millions of English, Scotch, Irish descent and ten millions who are neither of French or English descent and don't give a damn about the age-old friction of French and English which has been an albatross around this country's neck for a hundred years. They want to get on with the business of nationbuilding and the French- English bugaboo won't let them. The Robarts-Pepin Task Force, after peregrinating around the country for two years and interviewing everyone with an ax to grind or a better mousetrap to sell, came to the conclusion that Canada was founded on two principles, cultural duality and regionalism. This is like saying a man is a man because he speaks two languages and lives in the country. It is reducing over-sim- plification to absurdity. Canada is a nation because millions of people over one hundred years have worked to make it a nation. It is a nation because millions of Canadians believe it is in their interest and that of their children to maintain it as a nation. They proved that belief in 1775 and 1812 and 1914 and 1939 and will undoubtedly go on proving it whenever the occasion arises. CASTOR REVIEW "One Canada"' Box 359, Russell, Ontario Editor: 445-2080. Sports: Jack MacLaren, Edit- or, 445-2131; Peter Van Dusen, columnist; Garey Ris, reporter, 445-2069. News: Suzanne Schroeter, 445- 5709. Photographs: Mary Rowsell, 445-5244. Advertising: Michael Van Dus- en, 445-5770. Layout: 5707. Subscriptions: Tina Van Dus- en, 445-5707. Bookkeeper: Joan Van Dusen, 445-2080. Mark Van _ Dusen, Stuart Walker, 445- Submissions preferably typed, double-spaced are welcomed, publishable at the discretion of the editor. Published by Castor Publish- ing, Russell, Ontario. President: Thomas W. Van Dusen. Printed by Eastern Ontario Graphics Ltd., Chesterville, Ont. NEXT DEADLINE March 2 NEXT ISSUE March 9 Second Class Mail Registration No. 4218 ISSN 0707 -- 4956 One Canada Be at one with yourself and with your fellow man. He is your friend. Be at one with the sales clerk, the child. Each shares with you our complex heritage. By birth or choice this land is yours. Why not share it with a friend? Ottawa-Carleton. summer, it is a washboard. want you. Sigh. proceed. Ottawa. possibility of rape. before the public. one, interfering with no one. impassable Dream The apparent aim of regional government to catch individual municipalities napping and suck them up like some conglomerate invading body snatcher seems to have broken down outside Russell Township's northern frontier. That's where the North Road, officially County Road 6 but alternatively known as the Oregon Trail, Gaston's Gaff and the Chilkoot Pass, winds its rutty way toward a juncture with Osgoode and Cumberland Townships, the southern and eastermost tentacles of the Regional It's also where, during a recent mild spell, the last mile of northerly link with Highway 417 and Ottawa-Carleton was reduced to a kidney-punching, teeth-rattling, bum-bruising quagmire. This mile stretch, we are told, is a regional responsibility yet, at the best of times, in the dry heat of For years, Russell Township residents have been pressuring local politicians to improve the North Road and some work has been done on it. But what use if it is to lead to mile-long mud bath that a rocket-powered car with a parachute would have trouble fording. Maybe the region doesn't like Russell Township anymore, maybe it has given up on it and wants to forget that it even exists. After all, even oblique hints at amalgamation have been venomously repudiated by Russell residents in the past and, in a gesture of flagging its tongue from afar, the region uprooted signs placed by Russell Township at the Boundary Road Exit of 417 to show the way to Russell. So maybe the region wants to keep us bottled in to show us who's boss. You know, if you don't want us, we don't Registry rhubarb So the province is going ahead with a proposed one-storey extension to the Russell Registry office. We'd be the last to suggest that Wendell Stanley and staff don't need more space. But we're the first to suggest that an addition to the existing structure is not the proper way to We maintain that a spanking new building to house the office could be erected for little more than the estimated $266,000 cost of the extension. We also maintain that any tampering with the old brick office will devalue it as an historical monument, one of the finest in the Castor area. The registrar has expressed concern that the province might transfer the office right out of the village if the old building is vacated. We're sure his concern is well founded but we doubt the government is foolish enough to commit political suicide in a community that has always shown it enormous support. There has been similar fear Alexandria and Morrisburg worried for years that the registry offices there would be consolidated at Cornwall but whenever the province would come too close to enacting such a plan, the public hue and cry would scare it off. We still suggest the government invest its money in a new registry office and turn the old building to some community organization for continued regular use and preservation. And let's not worry about the office being relocated to some other Russell County centre. The province doesn't need or want that kind of ccutroversy. Making the point The authors of a report on rape issued by the Ontario Provincial Police are scrambling for cover under a barrage of furious criticism from rape crisis centres in Toronto and The Ottawa centre, after faulting the OPP for "placing the blame on the victim"' went on to say, perhaps with more truth than poetry, "No one asks to be raped." This is the kind of truism that no one likes to dispute. Nevertheless, the OPP, on the basis of an analysis of sexual assaults on females over six months, are trying to make the point that certain kinds of conduct in certain kinds of circum- stances certainly leave a person exposed and vulnerable to the If this is viewed as a suggestion that some people by their actions, their indiscretion, are inviting trouble, then so be it. Of 72 cases examined, the OPP found that 32 victims had hitch-hiked or accepted rides from strangers. Surely getting into a car with a total stranger on a highway is leaving oneself open to danger. Anyone how says or thinks otherwise in only encouraging young people to take unnecessary chances. And the OPP are only doing their duty in bringing these dangers Death on Church Street A big, old raccoon was shot out of a tree back of a property on Church street in Russell Village the other day. The same raccoon was seen in the same backyard, skeltering about after a freezing drizzle a year ago. All last winter, his tracks were seen going down to the Castor and along the river as he went about his business, bothering no We are informed that a raccon pelt is currently worth about $35 - $115 dollars and that probably explains why this old raccoon will not be seen again in the vicinity. Municipality of in other communities. Dogged It's the time of year for rural residents to keep an extra wary eye on their dogs. Roaming deer -- and their still are a few in Russell and Osgoode Townships -- are easy prey for Nancy Freeman marauding packs of dogs who kill for the pleasure. Make sure Fido is under control at all times. You'll be doing a favor for the deer and the family pet who might otherwise end up being shot by Conservation officers.