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Acton Free Press Wed December 1975 Tragic accident a lesson The horrible accident at the Mill St track impresses on us all the need for constant caution when driving Many people talking about the tragedy admit they sneak over the tracks them selves Theyre rethinking that kind of dangerous practice now though The trains come very very fast And theyre very big Its no contest There have been a couple of other fatal accidents in Acton over the many years the trains have come through One victim was a pedestrian Each one makes all the other people show more awareness and concern each time they reach a track Editorial Page Your opinion on garbage People who are seriously con cerned about garbage disposal can do something concrete about it now In last weeks Free Press Hal- ton Region included a brochure called Solid Waste News Other Halton papers carried it as well Regional chairman Allan Mas- son chose this way to pass on to all the people of the county informa tion about the longrange solid waste plan He explains Halton produces 500 tons of garbage every single day On the back page there is a cou pon for citizens to fill in giving their personal opinions The questionnaire is worded in a way that will cause the respondent to think carefully first Its a little more complicated than a form where you can tick off yes or no Despite this its your chance to speak out In the past Acton sites had been suggested for huge new dumps We are not too far away to be involved A few extra forms are available at the Free Press if you would like one Hey how about us Its hard to imagine council would seriously consider a third arena for Georgetown without a lot of study However it was mention ed at a recent council meeting by councillor Mike Armstrong Georgetown has just nicely opened its second arena called the Gordon Memorial arena How three ice surfaces in Georgetown could be utilized fully would have to be proven Acton has its new arena roof renovations and is now due for a new public address system Havent heard a whisper of a sug gestion Acton might have another arena Its not too farsighted Our population in Acton alone is about 7000 and the district is filling up fast Georgetowns population is about 18000 On the mail and gifts Houses are decorated with lights and tinsel at this time of year and magazines and TV screens are decorated with beauti ful liquor and beer ads And speaking of beauty what do you think of the Christmas stamps put out by our revered post office this year Again they are daubs supposedly drawn by children depicting winter scenes in an awk ward and garish manner Wait till some Christinas stamps come in from overseas courtesy of our post office again Lets just compare Wondering what to give that person who has absolutely every thing And that just has to be a man Heres a fine suggestion And all you have to do is cut it out of the Free Press Its an indispensable item For years people have been saying Ill do it as soon as I get around tuit Right So cut this out and wrap it up as a gift He can keep it handy and wont have any trouble getting all those little jobs done around the house for he will finally have gotten a round The Free Press staff was pleased when the post office staff decided to put letters to Santa in our box Weve got special dealings with the North Pole and the mail will get through all right The mails finally came through and with it another column from Wendy Thomson one of our favorite people Fans of her column The Painted Box will be anxious to hear how they fared on their trip west and how things are now Read on There is talk of more inter- church activity in town next year That would make a new New Years resolution for church people Look back not ahead The National Commander of The Salvation Army in Canada Commissioner Arnold Brown says Canadians ought to spend less time looking forward to this coming Christmas and more time looking back to the first Christmas If they did he is certain that the lifechanging message of the Christian churches would be seen to be totally relevant to modern mans situation What is vitally needed Com missioner Brown asserts is not environmental improvements higher income and more refined standards of living desirable as in some instances they may be The chief need is for internal rather than external improvement It is people who need changing The significance of Christs birth is too often lost in the plethora of food and drink cards and presents that comprise our com mercially stimulated Celebration of Christmas Not says the Com missioner that we should feel guilty about being sentimental at Christmas The sending of cards and the giving of gifts so often involving a real sacrifice of time and money keep friendships in repair and intoxicate children with happiness Christ would not be con temptuous of this But with a seriously increasing prison population with violence multiplying at a horrifying rate and with alcoholism and the non medical use of drugs sapping the national strength to cite only a few of the nations social ills the real message of Christmas is obviously needed Perhaps instead of peering forward to Venus people should take time to look back to that Christmas star SANTAS ELVES THEY ARE NOT but Ken Hodgson and Ken Hurren of Acton Hydro are helping the town prepare for the festive occasion by decorating Main Street light standards with Christ mas fixtures Their work can be seen high above the MainMill Street intersection and along both mam streets Several lights were out Monday due to a brief power failure in the west end of town And cousins by the dozens That line from an old nursery rhyme or something seemed lobe the theme when tle Thomson clan held a family reunion at the old home stead on a beautiful day in October There was a lot or kissing and hugging were an emotional family I was bussed and squeezed by a lot of middleaged lad ies and up for It by heartily bussing and squeezing a number of extremely bus sable and nieces and daugh ters of nephews and various other attrac tive young hussies drifting about Most people have been sucked in atone time or another to a family reunion It can be a ghastly experience or a Joyful one This one fell into the latter category There was no mourning for the dead only a great sense of being alive and the pleasure of knowing that people of all shapes and ages were blood kin all sprung from the fertile loins of one Walter Thomson an Irishman of Scottish extrac tion away back there in the 19th century Walter was prolific and his sons were no slouches either One of them Mountain Jack Thomson a sometime scourge of the Ottawa Valley during the great lumbering days had about children by his first wife and when she died married her sis ter and produced another large family Another William after whom I was named sired 10 children And there was the last of them my uncle Ivan ing around like a 30yearold welcoming all of us with something close to tears of joy In his eyes Hes as handsome as always slim as a boy blue eyes sparkling wit bubbling striding about as though hed never heard of art frit is A man of many talents a con who plants tra lovingly a traveler whose next letter might be from New Zealand an artist In working with wood a deep lover of nature and people and a concerned and loving parti arch of the clan It is my casual boast and my brothers and sisters grudging concession that I take after him I wish I did He remar ried at and has a threeyearold grand son Figure that one out No way can I match that He showed me the room in the old brick homestead a fine house on a steep bluff overlooking the Ottawa River the bed rooms in which my grandmother bore the 10 children No wonder she died at an age when most modern women are just getting their second wind or their second band He showed me a picture of his family at the dining table At the head my grand father white hair and huge curly beard On one side four strapping sons and an empty place set for Emerson a maverick who was in the Klondyke when the photo was taken How would you like to try to feed a mob like that in these days Youd be bankrupt in a week Another picture showed my Uncle Ivan as the sole surviving member of the Shaw Pontiles taken in the days when hockey was deadly serious but played for fun and Shawville used to journey by sleigh to take on the stalwarts of Renfrew and Pembroke Perhaps sadly there was no living to be made for huge families on the barren land of Calumet Island and the tribe dispersed of the boys joining the great exodus to The West the El Dorado of those days They were honest hardworking good- looking people But it wasnt enough They established themselves and Sugar and Spice by smiley worked like slaves to build something Then came the Depression And they suffered Boy how they suf fered All of Canada took It in the neck but tin prairie farmers took it in the neck and in the guts and In various other parts of the anatomy Most of my uncles went through The Great War Many of their sons went through World War Some didnt come back Things picked up Some of them even made a decent living before they died Their children are moderately well off middleclass people witH worm hearts and no pretensions Bui theyre fiercely proud of being Thomsons And dont ever try to spell it with a We have with the poor white trash Thompsons with a And there we were cousins by the doz ens on the lawn of the yearold home stead looking out over the Ottawa River where Grandfather had been a slide- master in the lumbering days and Moun tain Jack his brother had been a scrap per known throughout the Valley for his fists and feet in the days when cops were few and far between and a man was a man or else A gang had flown in from Saskatoon Others had come from the States It took me 15 hours driving to get there and back And I would have missed it for the world I hope some of the young ones got the sense of pride and family that I did There wasnt a millionaire present There wasn a famous person present But there they were salt of the earth clous witty lot and I was glad to be one of I hem Social footnote to Westerners My first cousin Jack Thomson and his wife Louise of Saskatoon were not respective ly in their underwear and nightgown as they were lost time I met them a couple of years ago in Germany OUR READERS WRITE Its all rather shocking According to reports in the press Mrs Judy Alexander chairperson of the Board of Education has expressed shock at the contents of a letter addressed to the Hon Thomas Wells in which I protested the destructive philosophy behind the socalled values education program Apparently her shock Is not the result of a realization of the validity of my critique of that philo sophy and its promoters but rather at the parents who have dared unmask the program for what it is a monstrous and devious attack on the moral foundations of society Mrs Alexander didnt express shock when that values education philosophy thrust four Gay Libbers unannounced Grade 12 health class in where they made their pitch to the students for the acceptance of their lifestyle as normal She wasnt shocked that the teachers responsible for that outrageous Incident stressed to the protesting parent that they DO NOT TEACH MORALS in the classroom She wasnt shocked that the Director of Education slandered the char- points in direct statements made to the press at the time of the incident She fa not shocked that to this day there not been ihe suggestion of an apology from the Board of Education for these Incidents cither to the parents directly Involved or to the aroused public which rallied nearly 1000 strong to protest Mrs Alexander is not shocked by the arrogance of the social revolutionaries in our classrooms who are forcing our chil dren to read literature of such a disgusting and degrading character that it is able in the public press She is not shocked over the revelation that a family life film being used without Board knowledge or approval for four years in the regional high schools is of such a nature that an OaKville psychiatrist who makes his living counselling five or six high school students dally expressed his Judg ment that it was unfit for high school stu dents under any conceivable stances She was not shocked that Playboy was port of a Grade communications course in this region This is the porno graphic material which an Ottawa inquest Into the tragedy and horror of a high school rape and murder incident ruled last week should be banned from the newsstands of that city In Mrs Alexanders liberated view If the professional says It should be in the course of studies shell see to it that it stays in the classrooms of the Halton school system So here we have the incredible spec tacle of the elected representative of the parents and taxpayers finally being so dis tressed by the disturbances created by this philosophical monster which has come to dominate our school system and which is now being attractively packaged to be pre sented to the public as values educa Mrs Alexander is so dis turbed that she has come out in the press to express her shock WHO DARED TO UNMASK THE MONSTER that is And that IS shocking Sincerely Dear Sir I attended a A R A meeting Dec and was very disappointed with poor attendance The Ontario Ombudsman was the guest speaker This very important man took time out from his busy schedule to sneak to the residents of this area and they didnt have the courtesy to come and near what he had to say I hope wben they have problems they will know whet to do Fortunately the Mayor our council members and the press turned up I enjoyed Mr Moloneys Informative talk and hope he will someday come back and speak to us again Mare Letters On Page B3 The Free Press Back Issues 20 years ago Taken from the Issue of the Free Press December 155 A turkey dinner preceded the last meeting of the musk Study group for this year J Jany Records carol singing and games were included in the program of Blow and Mrs On Friday evening the Fifth Line neighbors of Mr and Mrs William Burgess met at the home or their daughter and law Mr and Mrs H McEacb- em to honor them on the occasion of their wedding anniversary Actons Juilor D hockey team is to play its first game on Sunday afternoon in Milton Opposition Is to be a juvenile team from Burlington A surprise for both the girls concerned and their parents was the capping cere mony held at St Josephs hospital last week Marilyn Marks and Henderson of Acton were among the group of 31 student nurses who received although they had not expected them until the new year Two collisions in this area recently caused upwards of No injuries were suffered in cither of the two head on crashes Last Friday cars collided on a hill west of Acton on No causing over total damage Drivers of the cars were Betty Dennis of Acton and Fred of Toronto A head on collision at a curve on the Acton Sunday caused a total of damage Drivers of the vehicles involved were Jack Varcoe and Mack Smith 50 years ago Taken from the litue of the Free Press Thursday December 10 IS2S Last Friday evening Mr and Mrs Holmes very hospitably entertained the members of the staff at the Canadian National Railway station and their wives at their beautiful home Bower Ave The occasion was the seventieth birth day of Mr Holmes Mr Holmes has been agent of the railway company here for years His railway experience dates back to 1571 when he became railway operator at station This makes a contin uous record of years with the same rail way and on the same division It is an interesting fact that Mr Holmes followed the electrical wizard Thomas A Edison who in was operator at The Crewsons Comers Sunday School planning their annual Christmas enter tainment A moments reflection would convince anyone of the unseemliness of smoking a cigar or the choicest weed during council meeting In the election of Councillor Amos Mason to the position of Acton has been fortunate in securing a successful businessman who has much pride in his home town His beautiful home the residence of the Hon David Henderson is a very desirable executive mansion Mr passed away at the homestead In at the ripe old age of For some time he had been feel ing the burden of years He was a native of Christmas trees are now being selected by fathers and big brothers 100 years ago Taken from the Issue of the Free Press of Thursday December 2 1B73 Miltonstorcscloseat730 What there to prevent Acton following suit The letter we published last week from Mr Matthews concerning the hangerson at the post office store appears to have had some His customers will no doubt be glad to know that they may now enter without being compelled to run the gauntlet of masculine smokestacks The cattle fair today was not very well attended and the cattle on the ground were too lean to attract the attention of drovers The Social and Literary entertainment given in the Temperance Hall by the Young Peoples Literary Society last Monday evening was a decided success in every particular Esqucslng council met at Stewarttown Nov 12th The sum of was granted for relief Two men were readmitted to the poor house for the winter Five dollars were granted for the purchase of blankets for a pauper All names were given Married in Acton on the first Mr James McLam to Miss Elizabeth Milne both of Acton A coffee social will be held at the resi dence of Mr Charles Cameron sen in aid of St Alban church parsonage fund The Suez Canal purchase continued to attract great attention In Europe Small crowd for Ombudsman THE ACTON FREE PRESS PHONE Business and Office w mm t1iMM Copyright