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12- “WHITCHURCH-STOUFFVILLE THIS MONTH Bruce Stapley is happy to come back to Stouffville Upon my arrival back in Stouffville just before the New Year. | inquired whether there might be a spot on the paper for a person with my varied background. Indeed there was an opening for an ad sales representative. I begged, and the paper's gen- eral manager, MaryAnn Fleming, took pity. As a result I'm now out there. full of spit and vinegar, singing the praises of Whitchurch-Stouffville's little paper that could to the local business fraternity. by Bruce Stapley They say you can never go home. Don't believe it. My recent return from a one year sabbatical to New Zealand has led to the redisâ€" covery of that sense of fun and excitement that marked my debut onto the Stouffville iournalistic scene some I4 years ago. It was last July, in the midst of a record break- ing Kiwi winter that found us enduring temperatures as low as 5 C without the ben- efit of central heating, that I received an e-mail from Kate Gilderdale. My long time fellow Stouffville freelance scribe had been asked to serve as managing editor for a monthly paper dedicated to the celebration of Whitchurch-Stouffville and its end- less array of notable people, places and things; a reaction to an apparent void. according to a groundswell of local citizenry. I immediately recalled my iournalistic debut back in [987 under the tutelage of Jim Thomas. the Norman Rockwell-esque patron saint of Stouffville ioumalism. Kate and I would traverse the town from one end to the other chronicling tales of people who had flown small planes from their rural Stouffville back yard airstrips, climbed the downtown clock tower once a week to wind the huge old imported timepiece, or pitched to Ice DiMaggio in Yankee Stadium, We were having the time of our lives. and the townspeople seemed happy with ourrcollective efforts No issues later and Kate was admitting to being absolutely gobsmacked, as my Kiwi friends would say. by the positive impact the paper had made on Whitchurch- Stouffville. And she was having the time of her life. Writing was fun again. "It's iust like the old days when we were doing all those human interest stories for the Tribune." enthused Kate. Good luck. I e-mailed back, before sitting down to yet another lamb dinner. This would be a good thing. I mused, in that it would keep Kate off the streets. Flip ahead a few months. Another eâ€"mail from Kate‘s comer of the world, this time proclaiming how the first two issues of Whitchurch-Stouffville This Month had been well received by residents and advertisers alike. So whén'youisiee me on Main Street. advertising sales folder tucked under my arm, please don't ask me to write a story about your oldest son who has captured the dwarf-tossing championship on the local bar circuit. Been there. done that. The steno pad's been traded in for an order pad, and I'm out selling something I truly believe in . Oh, and did I say how great it is to be back home Open Late for yogr Convenience Monday 12 noon â€" 8 p.m. Tuesday thru Thursday 10 a.m. - 8 p.m. Friday 10 a.m. â€" 7 p.m. Saturday 9 a.m. â€" 5 p.m. Sunday 11 a.m. - S p.m. KATE GILDERDALE / STOUFFVILLE THIS MONTH After a years sabbatical in New Zealand, Bruce Stapley has joined Whitchurch- Stouffville This Month as advertising sales representative. Bruce. who was a local free- lance joumalist for 14 years. is also an accomplished furniture maker. and owned a retail store in town for several years. He and his wile. Susan. a teacher at Glad Park Public School. live in Stouffville with their sons. Griffin (left) and Drew. To the Editor Instant heritage poor substitute Sometimes I almost disagree with my ol' ma purely out of habit (and, boy, have I got myself backed into some awkward spots because of it); but sometimes I have no choice but to admit her point and move on. It seems to me she's right that what today‘s builders call ‘heritage' iust ain‘t so. Then her comment about walking the old streets of town set me to thinking: why is it that modern developments rarely feel like neighbourhoods? Conversely, what makes the old streets so homey and wel- coming? I don't think it's iust because the trees have had time to grow and the bricks to weather. No. it seems to me that it has to do with process. I know, they used to draw up plans of subdivision. which were approved by the town; but. then they didn't just go about madly slapping up houses, trying to get them all sold quick as a wink. Instead, people generally bought lots lsometimes a couple to make a large lot], then had a house built to suit their needs and budget. Lots didn't seem to have been sold in any sequence or any hurry. Fifty or sixty years later, some of the double lots were split. leading to the intermingling of a second FREE INVESTMEIN Mike Monefle 34 Civic Avon Unit IOI Stuuffvillv Bus 905â€"640â€"9559 Invt-ulml-nl Rvprosc'muliw generation of houses. adding to the variety - I've always loved that about Blake Street. for example. All these factors seem to create a delightful randomness on the old streets that no developer has ever effectively duplicated. in my experience. Somehow. from individuality and idiosyncrasy spring the look and feel of neighbourhood. Each property has a distinctive house. distinc- tively placed. expressing the character of the original owner and builder. creating the unique qualities that attract the subse- quent owners. The result is a street filled with flavour that invites us to live there or iust enjoy it as we pass through. I suppose some people would like to mass produce this effect, but only the genius of people acting independently can produce it. and the impatience of modern developers is doomed to fail ('Comell'. down by the hospital, imitates some of the old working class areas of the city; but then, they were mass produced tool. I guess we can only try to preserve it where it exists, right ma? lust a thought. uT REVIEWS _ FEBRUARY 2002 The Whisstler Stouffville