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Mini Comment Although there la much publicity about the expansion plans of the Town of Milton and an anticipated to Increase In population few dally papers are giving much Ink to the tremendous expansion in Acton and area It Is quite possible that Actons population could Increase by at least percent and quite possibly more when all the housing units planned are completed We were Interested In an article along those lines In the magazine Executive about Construction Co and the president John Bull which mentions the new housing development In Acton We will merchandise and market that better than other builders have done Mr Bull said predicting that the company can teach construction people something about merchandising Weve Just finished one of the first market research studies ever done before a new development Before we started we went out and surveyed about percent of the homes in the whole town Acton Continuing Mr Bull said the Acton project will nave 320 residential units and will increase the population by about 29 percent It Is a sleepy town now of about people by the time we put In our houses it will be we hope a growing restless town of about We did our market research to find out who had moved there where they had come from what they liked about it We were putting selling propositions from people already there We had some assumptions and the real estate agents had some pretty good theories but we didnt have qualified data Now we have We know how many of our prospective new home owners should come from within the Acton area and how many from outside and where they are going to come from We might well have launched our advertising against the city of Toronto Now that we see the data we know that would have been an error Mr Bull told Executive They are finding In the UK that a town may have only 25 or acres that can be built on If they throw that open and let every house builder In they are going to get a hodgepodge So Bovis with Its reputation for new town work can go to the municipal officials and talk to them about how they visuaUzc the best use of that land and how to integrate it into the total town planning concept We havent seen much of that In Canada yet There is hodgepodge building very poor planning In most of our smaller suburban areas Town planning is only now being forced on municipalities by the Ontario Municipal Planning Board Mr Bull observed Perhaps this town and its residents were not aware they were being Inserted Into a construction data test tube when the company moved in to construct homes But you certainly cant accuse John Bull of soft soaping the Industry or the town although he is certainly open to the charge since he Is the former vicepresident and director of marketing for ColgatePalmolive Residents here were not likely aware that Acton Is a sleepy town and that the additional population which brings will likely change into a growing restless town of about However it is always interesting to hear the opinion others about your community The heading on the article about Mr Bull is What can a Soap Man teach the Construction Industry Now we should ask what can a soap man turned construction mogul can teach us about a small town What may seem to be a sleepy place could be simmering underneath In true small town fashion but no one would know but the people who live there and take part In all the activities Bovis Indeed has brought a new dimension for cooperation between builder and council which has delighted the mayor and other members of Acton council The property has been going to be developed for many years by various developers but months of fruitless haggling never seemed to settle anything It seemed as if developers thought they could and outfox the town fathers and settle for something better than the subdivision agreement hammered out by the town Although it was a sometimes tedious wait and the long hours spent bargaining with developers seemed fruitless it Is evident council and the hydro commission took the right tack by insisting the agreements to be honored Along came Bovis and was willing to develop and cooperate fully with all the towns regulations underground wiring curbs and roads and money for other provisions such as extra school rooms sewage and storm pipelines etc For the mayor and council It was a welcome change from haggling with other developers Of course it was no accident that the Bovis group came along to develop the subdivision simultaneously almost with the announcement that GO brains would soon be running a scant eight or nine miles away to Georgetown The market Is here It is part of the irony of the TorontoCentred Region plan that the area they chose to expand GO Train service to next Is slated tor slow development while the Milton area now slated for more rapid development has no such service Obviously all the departments of Government do not coordinate any better than other organizations We hear so much about pollution these days it Is always Interesting to hear what other towns are doing about it Take for instance Pink Texas The eight citizens of Fink as a prelude to their eighth annual celebration of National Fink Day have taken preliminary steps to annex nearby West extending municipal boundaries two miles Some concern was voiced that would aggravate their one pollution problem in view of the celebrations and added population However the nearby communities of Denlson and Sherman Texas have indicated their boy scouts and war veterans auxiliaries are willing to incorporate Finks pollution abatement Into their recycling drive again Finks only pollution problem In case you havent guessed Is m occasional excess of empty beer cans But what problems annexation can cause Most teachers do return early Secondary school teachers who voted per cent against any policy requiring teachers to return to school prior to the official opening were not so vehemently opposed to the return as they were to the fact the order would come from above as they termed it Our teachers In who want to meet do so voluntarily said the teachers through the executive The decision must be solely made by the teachers Teachers contend they are professionals busy taking courses and other relevant work through the summer to prepare for the school years and must be free to plan their own activities Cm the one It looks as if the teachers have a case Many of them spend most of their vacation Improving A reporter from the Oakville Daily Journal Record Actons Prospect Park on a recent weekend His impressions of the park were published ACTON The crowd still hasnt found Fairy Lake park here It is a quiet lake in a beautiful setting where swans and geese feed along the shoreline In fart ft is truly a peoples park only without too many people a good place to spend a summer afternoon Families hover around barbecues that of aromas Theres plenty of room for everybody and no one disrupts your afternoon of rest and sunshine There are plenty of things to occupy the children at Actons park supervised swimming a baseball diamond swings and of course fishing Children lined the banks waiting Tor a catch The beach had its share of children building sandcastles running girls and people lazing In the sun Weve been to Kelso Conservation area a couple of times but we like Acton the best said Mrs Yvonne Payette of Hamilton The other areas are too crowded Its rdce and quiet here says her husband The Payettes have been coming to Acton every Sunday during the summers for 10 years They like many other outoftown users say they cant find anything else like it in the area Like other park users they voice concern that soon too many people will discover the park and threaten the small lake with pollution A few users bring canoes and the odd local citizen runs his motor boat but the lake generally stays the preserve of the swans geese and ducks Actons park is a large peninsula in the middle of the lake With fishing off the rocks on one side and swimming off Ihe beach on the other Few parks can boast of this quiet harmony between active recreation and quiet relaxation Quiet moments on the shore arent disrupted by the merriment of picnickers above If can forget an Acton subdivision exists further to the could pretend youre in northern Ontario Unless you insist on bringing your car inside the park it costs nothing to use the facilities Most places charge you a couple of bucks says Ken Mah of Acton This park offers clean water and few people for nothing he says His children were avidly fishing by the shoreline Ill eat any fish caught from here says Herb Kinkle of a user This is like having a cottage on your doorstep he says But like other residents he worries about how long the park will remain the way it is their qualifications If the Board ordered them to return to school a week early this year there is no reason to suppose they could not order them to return two weeks before school opening the next year On the other hand we think there should be a period of preparation for opening day so that classes can get Into their full swing as soon as possible Most teachers probably do prepare for school opening several days Robert Little school principal G says his teachers are preparing for opening day several days ahead and he does not have to twist any arms Most of them arc eager to be fully prepared for the opening of school he says There is just no way a teacher can come in cold and expect to be ready for the Influx of students They know it We know it We presume the pattern in Acton schools would be repeated throughout the county Any teacher worth his or her salt would be fully prepared for school opening Consequently any recommendation from the Board of Education Priorities and Expenditure Committee ordering all teachers to report early for staff meetings would seem to be un necessary and an of authority bound to fray touchy teacher- board relations However If the Board has evidence teachers are not cooperating then they should be stepped on individually and with the full weight of authority to see professional altitudes are adopted Government will miss McKeough one of the bright lights in Premier Davis cabinet Is out He resigned Thursday after it was alleged he approved the subdivision of land owned by a company he had a financial Interest in when he was Minister of Municipal Affairs In December 1969 Leaders of the opposition at Queens Park declared that his involvement In South Chatham Estates constituted a direct conflict of interest obviously resigned to stop further fissures from developing In the integrity of the cabinet McKeough has obviously done nothing wrong and Liberal leader Robert Nixon says It has never been suggested that Mr McKeough has in any way been guilty of dishonesty His decision to resign substantiates his reputation for integrity Mr McKcoughs indirect approval of the Chatham subdivison in follows too closely on the heels of the disclosure that AttorneyGeneral Dalton Bales had bought land in Markham township at a time when the Government was considering fostering expansion east of Toronto The AttorneyGeneral was not allowed to resign but Mr must if the Davis Government is to retain its credulity with the electorate Darcy McKeough Is the victim of circumstances It Is unfortunate that it has to be one of the and strongwilled young politicians in the province who steps down The Government will miss him especially on the crucial issues of Regional government However Mr McKeough is right when he wrote that what is at stake is the integrity of the system It is more important that any political more important than any individual In politics It is our system of government and the peoples belief in this system that is most important he wrote In his resignation speech Mr has retained his integrity but the province is going to be poorer as a result Reporters impressions of Acton park One of those new African nations is kicking all the Indians out of the country This Is an emotional and political rather than a national decision African blacks hate these Asian Indians because the latter are better educated and on the whole much wealthier than the natives The reason for this is that the Indians are smart work hard and in back ward countries usually wind up in control of much of the economy Trouble la with these Indians In Africa that nobody wants them Many of them have British passports as their grandfathers Sent to Africa when the territory was under British rule to build railroads Theyre clinging to these passports like lifebelts but it isnt doing them much good Britain doesnt wont them It has enough racial strife on its hands already after admitting thousands of Pakistanis Indians and West Indians after the war There have been race riots white against coloured India their homeland doesnt want them It already has more refugees than It can handle Canada has been approached and as usual dithers We could do a lot worse than accept a sizeable chunk of these people without a home They are Industrious peaceable and capable They wouldnt be coming here as penniless immigrants Most of them are fairly well off Many of them have skills and professions we need I dont know much about Indians I have some Canadian Indian friends but the only Asian Indians I have known well were four chaps with whom I learned to fly Spitfires in England longer ago than I care to remember Perhaps they werent representative because they were all from welltodo families and all spoke good English But they certainly a crosssection of that class and gave me a good idea of why there is so much strife in India Bill Smiley j Youd think that four youths who had come all the way from India for advanced training would have been pretty close thrown into the midst of alt those Poles British Australians Canadians and a dozen other species of whites On the contrary they could barely stand one another There was Krishna Smallish very handsome flashing black eyes that could almost literally flame when he was angry He spoke such precise and fluent English that the rest of usfeel like hicks He was a Christian Then there was Ahmed A lanky kid of about sleepyeyed slowmoving a big grin and not much to soy He was a Moslem And little Koori He was pigeon chested weighed about 115 had huge mournful black eyes and was in a perpetual state of terror when flying He should never have been there One day he and I were sent up to practice dog fighting in our Spits I knew he didnt like flying but not until that day just how deep was his fear Every time Id take a pass at him and go like a machine gun hed veer wildly off about a mile and call wildly dont come so close He was a Hindu And then there was the Inimitable Singh Thandl Flashing white teeth chuckling eyes magnificent sdk turbans under which he bundled his hair which came down to his tailbone Curly black beard FasUdlousasa model Kepi his beard curly by tying a around his jaw at night and knotting it on top of his head was a Sikh another religion heard from Rut he was a pretty lousy Sikh re not supposed drink smoke cut their and a lot of other things He didnt smoke or cut his hair but he could put away about twelve pints of beer in an evening and except for a little giggling be none the worse Hut he had his hangovers He was a When he particularly bad head hed just stay in bed When the CO tried to give htm a blast for hlsabsence hed roll his eyes at the ignorance of these infidels and say politely Sorry sir today is holy day for Sikhs Cannot fly on holy day The baffled O had no answer as these Indian boys had to be well treated Singh would have nothing to do with the other Indians and Joined a convivial little group with Van a Belgian a Norwegian couple of Australians and Jack and myself Canadians With the beard the turban and the silver tongue he attracted like flies He loved flying as Koori hated it Never the time I shared a room with him in on a weekend leave About 11am we started to pull ourselves together He got up groaning holding his head and tottered about in his shorts his Ureal muss of hair hanging down to his He didnt wear a turban to bed There was a knock at the door one of us grunted Come in and the maid entered to clean the room At least she almost entered She took one look her mouth fell open then she screamed and ran Despite his head Singh nearly threw up from lautfhing so hard bet Smilee she thought you were shacked up with the bearded lady from the circus Singh was killed in Burma Back Issues of The Free Press 20 years ago Taken from the issue of the Free Press of September 18 Winning clowns in the childrens clown contest Saturday at the Roxy Theatre were Mary Lou Creighton Johnny Blair and Billy Greer who received prizes from nattily attired Ernie Coles who also dressed for the publicity of The Greatest Show on Earth that played that week At the council meeting authorization was granted to remove the top of the tower on the town hall because of its rotten condition The present pointed tower will be replaced with a flat roof and a new wheel will be Installed to operate the bell if necessary The present wheel is weatherbeaten to a rotten condition The town hall was built about 1681 Dublin WI quilt which won county and area awards Is now entered In the provincial quilt competition Prizes were awarded by the Womens Institute at limehouse Gardens Fair judged by Mr Among the Junior winners were Billy San ford David Joe Brown Dannie Curry Turner Thomasine Sutton Peter Glynn Trudy Scott John Brown exstudents Ruth Brown Neil Benton Kathleen Kirkpatrick On September 11 Margaret Brown and McCullough were married at Knox manse After a reception at the Royal Hotel in Guelph the couple left on a trip to the west coast years ago Taken from the Issue of the Free Press of Thursday September The CN E was as magnificent as its attendance a million and a third The outstanding feature of the closing day was a mammoth choir of at the grandstand and the Highlanders Band Beardmore and Co had a splendid exhibit Acton real estate reached high water mark last week when the unproved foot lot on Mill St between the Wonderland theatre and Miss Florence Murrays residence was purchased by Miss Murray from Councillor Frank tor a toot Tie High and Public schools staff has been organized for the coming year as follows High School Miss principal Miss James assistant Miss James was principal of continua tion school last year Public School Miss Bennett principal and Misses Daisy Muriel B Armstrong Nellie Anderson Anderson and Bessie Gardiner New hardwood floor is to be laid in the auditorium of the town hall at a cost of Mr Worden secured the contract One evening last week a number of growing lads who were preparing for a com roast in the quarries went foraging at a neighboring farm and lo and behold ran upon a cache of gallon jugs of liquor Needless to say the farmer had absolutely no knowledge that they were there years ago Taken from the issue of the Free Press I Thursday September II US Much interest is manifested in the re opening of the Methodist church after extensive improvements It is authoritatively stated that services were held in this vicinity by Methodist preachers Revs Ezra and Adams as early as 1828 nearly years ago but Acton was first made a regular appointment on a circuit in 1834 The late Rev Lewis Warner was the first settled pastor Acton was then on the Nelson and the parsonage was at HannahsviUe The circuit then included all of county and appointments outside its bounds It took the minister two weeks preaching every evening and three times on Sunday to cover his or out- In this vicinity Acton service was Tuesday evening The date of Actons elevation to the importance of a MethooU appointment for regular Sunday services was from which date the churchs anniversaries are computed The late Rev Rice was the first pastor The services were in homes and the and the first church was erected in 1831 which still stands at the comer of Church and John It is presently the place of worship of the Disciples The present church edifice was built in 18754 Mrs E Hilts has completed new house at Ballinafad and will move Into It week