Page SECTION A ft IE HERALD Thursday December tin The landmark draws visitors from near and far sharing in the newfound pride of North Halton Schneiders hasomething for a sweet tooth By CHRIS Herald Staff A Urge group of Grade students from Georgetown Centennial school riveted with fa cl nation confection chef BUI Girts did things to candy none of them had ever seen done before The air inside Schnei Reliable Sweet a landmark somewhat of a national oddity tingled with an accumulation of smells that day several varieties of mint chocolate roasted peanuts spice and the essence of this and Wat had combined to produce an almost intoxicating At that particular mo ment Mr Given was lng a Schneider candy called Chicken Eon- He gathered minutes earlier a pool of molten candy into a manageable hall by working it on a marble surface But It was the next step which held the students attention The ball of candy still about 200 de grees Fahrenheit In temp erature was slung onto an ordinary hook As Mr Given stretched It out and slang It back on the hook several times the clear brown lava metamorph osed attaining a rich golden lustre like pounded brass When the pulling pro cess was over a similar process with candles made from white sugar produces the white lustre of candy canes the hot ball was polished In a timehonored and way described in the trade as bumming The ball was draped with a cloth and Mr Given slid his tide along Its squashed length until luc candy achieved the desired sheen Considerably flattened by this unusual process the candy moved to the next a lap In which a core of freshly roasted peanuts was rolled Into it With all the exposed seams sealed hut Mr Given moved the cylinder of Chicken Bone weighing about pounds to a long tab HEAT LAMP With the help of a heat lamp and two assistants Mr Given stretched out cords over ten feet long One of the assistants ran a special wheel up the length of each cord result was several long cords of Chicken Bone broken like link sausages Schneider s makes about 200 different kinds of candles at the Rockwood factory located right on Giant candy canes In band Schneider Reliable Sweets owner Pal lands In of the company be purchased about four and half yean ago his first plunge Into the confectionary market Schneider has been candy making landmark in for over years churning out a remarkable variety of delicious homemade flavor sweets which can be found In some of the finest confectionary stores la Canada Mr recently opened up the front port of the factory Into a merchandising outlet where passers by can stop to purchase factory freih treats Highway Not all are made at the same time Certain seasons like Christmas and Easter bring Out demands for special candy While the Schneiders name remains on the storefront the factory actually belongs to a young businessman nam Pat who took over the operation from Frank Schneider five years ago Frank and his brother Clarence who passed away about a year ago maintained the store when founder their father Harold died In the 1950s Harold Schneider moved into the building to make candies In the late 1940s Mr said explain ing that he came upon the store quite by good fortune while looking for ware house space for another business Eventually he bought the entire operation and went into business for himself a candy making greenhorn who had to leam fast to ensure that Schneider stayed afloat LONG BEFORE The building itself always borne the Schnci name and had a rather colorful history long before the first Schneider reliable sweet was gobbled It a concrete structure one of the first hi the area Mr speculated when The Herald visited recently Early in the cen residents were familiar with the concrete hose on which it sits as the foundation for the community outdoor skating rink flooded by a few thousand gallons of the nearby Grand River If visitors look carefully they can see faint sign painted on front of the build bet weep the sec and third floors It informs us by best reck on of its faded on that a chap named Smith bu It the I rst two stories of the building and ran a tire retreading there In the 1920s The balloon tires made he business obsolete batteries were tared there but in the midst of the depression the building was vacated Senior citizens can re call how during the Big Band Era and World War the third floor of the was known as the Para Park ballroom and Its primary use until the Schneider family took over was entertain Harold Schneider started his candy making bus in Brampton event ually moved It to in the old Legion build and settled In where it con tinues to flourish Mr Hearne is excited about prospects for new business offered to mem bers the North Tourism Association We ve done some pretty fantastic things as an association he said and none of it would have happened without Steve Dawk ns of Acton Hide House NHTAs ex director LARGE STORES Thanks to the ion were getlng people out from more varied areas we re getting good exposure Mr Hearne said Schneiders main mar is In Ontario but because of its uniqueness as a small candy factory making its products large ly by hand orders arrive from across Canada One can Schneiders can dies and chocolates In larger retail stores but they generally supply smaller specialty shops In addition passers by can stop and purchase right at the factory while ewing the candy making operation through a large plalc glass window In the factory outlet A Schnel der outlet has also open n What we have here is a product Mr maintained We supply specialty shops and fill a gap in that Intermediate market Soon after he took over Mr Hearne realised that it was almost Impossible for the company to compete with highly mechanized high volume confection era He began to finetune his markets The nature of the busi is to have seasonal sales peaks and valleys Mr noted adding that he trying to Iron out some of that oscillation by promoting the factory as a tourist spot selling Ice cream in the Bummer and building an awareness of Schneider s products The factory outlet right here has been a complete and utter success he said Business has been great SOFT CANDIES The number of employ ees at Schneider varies according to production but on the average people have regular work there Mr Given has become Schneider hard candy expert while soft candles especially fudges are the Poverty overwhelming Local Ys delegates to Peru return home to sleepless nights ByAMPEDERIAN Herald Staff Writer Interest rates are GO per cent at the banks and there per cent inflation rate This the Bank of Canada a outlook for our national economy In IMS It the hard reality of life in Lima Peru Returned Dec from a trip to Urn Cheryl and Irene Fairies of Hills were affected by 16day stay In that South American country The poverty over whelming Mrs Fairies said It a unbelievable Mrs Creed saying she could never go to lima as a tourist You would come away unable to sleep at night because so badly that you doing to help them she said THREE YEARS The two Georgetown women went down to Peru to evaluate the project In Lima The project is sponsored every year by the George town through its Jogathon In May they left Nov is three others represent log the spon sorship of the Owen Sound Cam bridge and Georgetown Vs Mrs Fairies is chair man of the International development committee of the Georgetown and the vicechairman the board of Erectors Mrs the past president of the board and a member of the International the families sqMtliag on the outskirts of Lima Peru are a mix Indian and Spanbb They come from the countryside and start building home for themselves of straw milling Then It becomes a wooden and It they can afford buy seme Became It never rains lima the people can get away without ceilings Photo by Cheryl Llghtowler It was three years since It gotten too big for bide looking for better the last Canadian only four to sponsor ties ion evaluated the Mrs Fairies said May The people who project The two women Join like the there are like my paid for their trips them Windsor here except they have no selves with some govern- The Hamilton was sewage no water no funding part of the team until this electricity high year when financial diffi cullies forced it to back out for 1983 She said International sponsorship became less of a priority for them and that such priorities vary from to Last year the George town Y gave K to wards the operation of the Lima With a 1983 budget of the Lima Y depends heavily on the financial backing that comes to It from Germany Sweden and CSS ploy and they live in houses the size my living room Mrs Light said They l Ike our welfare people Mrs Fairies added noting j Canadian poor though ln have niuch higher Canada Mrs Peru Mrs standards of living are era said the Canadian and Mrs Fairies spent i dean International Develop- about ten days In Lima With no rain or snow to Agency barrios the shanty towns necessary matches Canadian dona that spring up overnight ma homes in the to the as squatters come Into the are merely made of toPeruJhreeJoooe big city from the country burlap or brown paper walls The floor is mud and a three toot wide stream of raw sewage winds its way past the homes IN BARRIOS To try to solve some of the problems brought about because of the heavy migrations Into the city the Y has started up community programs sending Its four staff Into the barrios to teach basic health core Lice and diseases are rampant especially tuberculosis and Yspon sored visits to the shanty residents have a ripple effect Knowledge gets passed on from one to the next with women being trained as health care workers to go among their own The tries to mobilise people to self help Mrs said It gives them knowledge It the only way to reach the people living in the barrios she said TEACH SKILLS The Is also trying to teach skills which can land the barrio residents jobs in the city At the the women are taught to sew Since they have no electricity In their homes they come to use the machines at the Y anticipating a Job in the textiles industry A new program of making shoes has also begun Mrs Fairies said Impressed by the advancement and the enthusiasm of ihe Lima in its massive undertok Mrs Fairies said she definitely supports the continuation of the prog Third in a series of trans planted British Columbia confectioner Mike Zaiser His creamy Premium fudges are famous among Schneiders regular visit Chocolate moulding is done upstairs In a large Warehouselike portion of the building The nutty sweet smell of chocolate has permeated the walls after decades of candy making and will likely always be a part of the building history Rows of plastic moulds of sUes and shapes too extensive to list line one side of the floor dwarfing a comparatively small machine which keeps the chocolate at the right tern and Is hub of he mould filling opera t ion At one time Mr recalls the chocolate moulds were filled by hand in a rather slow and inefficient manner Mech has taken over In the form of a compression hose and cen trifuge device but an em ployee Is still required to fill each mould with the hose and clamp the com pleted moulds on the trifuge to make sure that the chocolate fills every contour Automation has helped production Mr acknowledged but it has t reached a point where it takes away from Schnei der old fashioned per charm In fact much of the success in recent years can be attributed to the workers and their sense of the corporate family he agreed There is no question about he closeness of these people Mr said One of he main points we stress here is that we have to work as a group Making candy can be a particularly tricky job one must almost have a physehlc feci for the recipe to ensure that the combination of flavoring and heat out a product that s as familiar now as It was years ago Chocolate Mr Hearne said can be particularly tricky In order to make perfect candy chocolate must be tempered acorn bination of heat adjust to prevent the fin and cooled product from obtaining a dry white flakiness Schneider factory out let In Is open to every day except Sunday ness hours Sunday arc noon to p Candy maker BUI Given works with a 15pound chunk till hot and Chicken Bone a house treat at Schneider Sweets la Rockwood MomenU earlier the candy was poured on a working table As it cooled It gathered Into a ball and as Mr Given the candy on and off a hook It will begin to take on a golden flossy process known as pulling Hers Id photo by Chris Aagaard Video boom hits town competition no worry ByANIPEDERlAN Herald Staff Writer Three new video stores opened up In Hills this month t worried about the competition A video store can only handle so many people Video Flicks owner Mike Marks said His shop opened officially Dec 17 in Halton Hills There s a big demand in this area enough for all three stores The owner of the Street Video Stat Ion shop agreed Money Is supposed to be tight but people seem to be spending it regard less Barb said Video Station open cd in Georgetown Dec 1 I think this was a good time of year to open the business It was over a year go that the first video shop opened In Halton Hills and Video is now local In the George ton Mar and Its owners t worried about the new competition They re wellestablished in town Their business Is doing so well they opened an other on Acton Mill Street Dec The video bug Is catch Shops renting video tapes and the expensive and Video Home System machines- are finding more and more of their customers investing In their own equipment and Joining the video clubs simply to borrow from their library of films SPRING UP There are over Video Station shops In Ontario Mrs said with most of them in Toronto and suburbs An can company started in California Video Station now has 500 franchises in Canada and the she said They re springing up really last Mrs eson said You can use your membership at any of the franchises One customer I have said he used it in Florida It was only a year ago that Mrs and her husband Vlnce bought their own video machine from Milton Video Stat Ion We were in there all the time getting movies and In October this year my husband was asked How would you like to open a Video Station Mrs said The Milton store was getting customers from Hills and felt there was a need for another video shop in the north I think with the rural areas to draw from there should be enough busi With ten per cent of Hills residents owning their own video machines at present Video Flicks owner mike Marks and wife Sue anticipate their new shop In the Hills to do well More and more people are Investing In machine and Mr Mark compares the growing Interest In video to when color televisions came out At first few people could afford to buy color TVs Now everyone has one Mr Marks sees the same thing for the future of video Herald photo for all the stores in Halton Hills she said SAMESIZF Milton is about the same size in population and it has three video shops and they re all kick Mrs said comparing Located in the former store at isoA Guelph St the new Video Station has undergone some redecorating to be come a vidfo store Mrs Patcheson said they liked ihe Street location because there lots of traffic pass lng their shop making It highly visible Also the location provides parking right near the store so customers don l have to walk far with the heavy machines Most people here have he machine so we have to expand in that direction Mrs said The Georgetown Video Station has ISO tapes so for in Its collect Ion with films In both VHS and Beta V deo Is the up and coming thing I vc heard a lot of people complain ing about Pay TV people wilh cottages up north who only get two TV channels For them video is the answer Mrs said It much mot comfort able to sit home and watch your TV screen Its much cheaper than going to the show tally if you have a family and you don have lo stand in line Video Buttons are springing op all over Canada and Already there are M0 franchises aod Georgetown got one of Its own this month Ron by Barb and her husband Vlnce Georgetown Video Station on Street has a collection of 1W tape and growing Herald photo Films are usually in video shops six months after they play in the cinemas unless thoy re a dud in which case they re on the video shelves in a couple of months Mrs said Tapes sell from to each Few individuals buy them unless they re real movie buffs she said For our first week In business I m really pleased Mrs said irthlslsanlndlcat Ion of the way things will go it going be realty good During their first week of business they had films booked for Christ mas Up In the Hills plaza the new Video Flicks store is also a franchise Owner Mike Marks explained there are 17 Video Flicks stores In Toronto Mlsslssauga Brampton Strcetsvllle and Milton He owns the with his brother Paul To operate successful a video store needs client Mr Marks said Right now about ten per cent of Hills residents have video machines Of a population that means people have their own equipment In turn that means population can support four stores he calculated Mr Marks anticipates the ten per cent to grow to per cent in the next few Mr Marks finds the plaia a good location with people stopping by and looking in bis win dows