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YS muci] know if firm gl ally ig hodght hall e 1) of thd a serve al estaid inforrm: n engin ving the e at thd ¥ owned | conver ie oper , gaslesy : had as SECOND SECTION Page 9 Oakville- Trafalgar Journal Member Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association published Every Thursday Morning In Oakville, Ont, by Oakyille-Trafalgar Publishers, Ltd. 7 DUNN STREET NORTH s. Casey Wood, Jr. Vincent H. Barrey Managing Editor Advertising Manager Bill Cotton, Editorial Assistant PHONE 1298 | Thursday, July 5th, 1951 oakville Stars Again Those who, years ago, started the minor hard- ball program! in town are cashing their chips today in a way they probably never thought of. Principally, these men were concerned with providing Oakville and district youths with a program which would keep them occupied, thus leading to less chance of juven- ile delinquency, and with the character-building factor of sportsmanship constantly stressed at an age when such teaching is most valuable. But as a result of the success of the program, Oakville is receiving public- ity, of a kind that points up once more what a won- derful residential area it is. The Cleveland Indians have just completed a baseball school here, and in August the Philadelphia Phillies will conduct a similar school. Basically these schools are a search for material for the teams, but they also provide all youngsters with a chance to learn more about the game. The schools receive wide publicity, as they are of interest to many people. This puts Oakville, and its program for youth, in the minds of many who might otherwise not know about our town. As any town must absorb a certain amount of bad publicity from time to time, such as accidents or strikes, ete., all good publicity is most valuable. - Oakville is famous, we believe, for its hospital, its arena, and many other advantages . . . and for the kind of people who live here. And the publicity earn- ed by this youth program is certainly such that we should all be pleased. It's nice to see the men who worked so hard to start and maintain the youth base- hall program cashing in for all of us, as a result of their efforts. nyone Else Want To Revolt Had a visitor the other day who took a dim view of the fact that the editor of this newspaper was wearing a T-shirt on Wednesday. Apart from the fact that Wednesday is Press day, and thus one of some- what hectic activity, and also a day on which few people come into the office, we fail to see why such garb shouldn't be adopted by all us males for everyday in the week. Wrapping innumerable lengths of cloth around our bodies in summer time is simply ridiculous. In shorts and a T-shirt we'd all probably think better .. and be much more comfortable. But we've never been very good at one-man crusades, so we don't nropose to become the only male worker in Oakville dressed for efficient summer work. But if there were @ few more who'd like to join us, maybe we could ar- range to burst upon the business world of Oakville one day dressed in summer office garb of shorts and 1 irt. Might bring about a revolt that way. You can't tell. Of course, it might also be a pretty revolt- ing sight, unless all knees concerned were different from ours. J he Two Week Luxury With our feelings about shorts and Yomfort for working men expressed, we now Juxuriate in the thought of our annual holidays, which come into ef- fect the day after we write this. This year the Journal 1s not closing down for a week so the holiday season 5 upon the editor, and again as he did two years ago, our good friend Ken MacTaggart will take over as guest editor. Newer readers will not know the treat in store for them with Ken's crisp views on Oakville and Dis- trict activities occupying = this space--and the pass- ng comment area of this page--but our older read- "rs will remember the two week whirl he gave them a city newsmian's views an local happenings. It ""fIns unnecessary to state that Ken is the Globe and Mails special assignment man . . . and a much travel- led gent in the search of news. He may get some- I about his experiences on the airlift into Berlin material . . . but that'll be in the passing com- section, we hope. The Journal likes to see the ltorials restricted, as much as possible, to local airs. And Ken should have plenty to say about 'eI, as he's a long-time resident here now. ed k So, with our alarm clock shut off for two weeks U least, and a guest editor to meet editorial dead- £1165, We say goodbye for now . . . see you after our bioliday., IT SEEMS T0 ME BY P. W. THOMPSON Belief in human progress has become a widely cherished article of faith, especially in the western world. This belief is of compar- atively recent origin. Two things have combined to foster it, the Darwinian theory of evolution, and the industrial revolution that began with the invention of the steam engine In the eighteenth century. That there is progress, tre- mendous, spectacular progress, in certain departments of hu- man activity, there can be no denying. Evidence of it is all around us. Machinery of various kinds is being made more effic- ient year by year. Manufactur- ing processes are being con- stantly improved, transport and communication speeded up. In- numerable ways are being de- vised for making our lives more easy and comfortable. But it is our theory that, in certain other fields, man has pass- ed the maximum of his achieve- ment. Culturally we make little if any progress, except in ren- dering culture available to great- er numbers of people. Consider, first, architecture... For. sheer beauty, what modern buildings can rival those noble structures that crowned the Acropolis at Athens? Where are the modern churches to match those sublime cathedrals and churches of Eur- ope, into Whose creation went the life-long labors of generations of devoted craftsmen, and whose glories, wrought in imperishable stone, have been a source of in- spiration to millions of people throughout long centuries? And can the most well-planned and hygienic of modern cities equal the charm of medieval Florence or Venice? In the realm of art, we are far behind the Renaissance and the century or so that follow- ed it. How do our most talent ed painters and sculptors com- pare with such giants as Mich: aelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, - Rembrandt? Those old masters possessed a genius that far outshines that of their successors. In music, too, the greatest days would seem. to be over, They >d hardly more than two cen- 5. ach, Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert--to mention only a few of the great- est composers--mever shall the world behold the like of these immortals or the incomparable harmonies of sound which they evoked. Ixponents of new devel- opments in music may talk as they please. Nothing that, anyone may produce will ever surpass the works of those great com- posers of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, And contemporary literature and poetry--how does it com- pare with that of the . past? The present can show clever and competent writers by the thousand. But where is the poet to compare with Shakespeare, where the peers of Homer, Milton, Shelley? Swift, Cervan- tes, Voltaire--where are their modern prototypes. And those thinkers of ancient Aristotle, Plato, Socra- thre a modern whose writings will survive for more than two thousand years, as their's have done? We do not deny that the world, in many ways, is a much better place than it was in the days when Shakespeare wrote his sonnets or Beethoven his sym. phonies. Much that was violent and cruel and squalid has been ban-. ished. People, generally speak ing, are less superstitious, bet- ter informed, healthier. Living conditions, in many parts of the world, are more sanitary. There seems every likelihood that = material progress will continue, that new scientific JUST With FRANK R. WALKER When you read this, the alibis will be floating thick and fast over the 1st of July opening of Bass and Muskie. The familiar "if that line hadnt broken'-- "you should have seen that fish" --"he was the biggest damn fish I ever had on in my life"--"yeah, he got some nice ones but the ones that I lost were about three times as big'--which all adds up to our favourite story of the fisherman who said he "didn't know the weight of the fish but the photograph weighed eleven ounds." I hope that all of you got good fishing over the holiday week- end. We'll spend the weelcend up in the French River, Pickerel River area, more about that later. Here's hoping we don't get skunked. At a time like this guess the best thing to do Is to sort of reminisce happenings of previous Muskellunge seasons. One that strikes vividly into our memory. is the time that a Muskie took. the sweater off Greg Clark, this is a story that has been heard across Ontario many times but nevertheless is true. Greg at that time was accompanied by the late Jimmy Frise. Then there was the time that Mary Lesh from Bradford, Peun. hooked into the biggest muskie we have ever had the pleasure of seeing in Lake Nipissing, had him on for half an hour, and finally got himself, the Muskie and both feet tangled up in the anchor rope, of course that was the end of the fish and I don't think Mary realized how many curse words he actually knew until that hap- pened. Dave Pidgeon of Oakville remembers the time that he turned over the big Muskie in the river running between Round and Belmont Lakes, accompanied by myself and Jim Eraser, who is now head of the Chamber of Commerce in Peterborough. That was a nice fish but we spent all day trying to get it with no luck. OF course this Ist of July will produce many incidenps, some- what similar to those mentioned, if it wasn't for these humorous side lights fishing would lose a tremendous amount of its glam- u our. One little highlight on the trip to Quebec last week that I be- lieve would be interesting was the night that we gave the guide a shot of good honest to gosh Scotch Whiskey and the only thing we had to drink out off was a small shot glass, so after Rosie had taken a drink, looked at the glass, looked at the liquor, "how ole is dat whiskey" and we told him it was somewhere around 15 years. He took another look at the glass and d "God bless de man that made the wiskey and God dam de man dat made de glass." With that I will leaye you now. Good fishing for every- body. triumphs will follow each oth- er in dazzling succession for many generations to come. And it is possible, perhaps, that some new golden age of liter ature, music and art may dawn in which the achievements of the past may be equalled. But this we are inclined to doubt. In the realm of beauty, the pin- nacle of man's attainment has been reached I had occasion recently to drop in at the Memorial' hospital to visit a patient, who happens to be a first cousin of my grand- father, since long deceased. As I am now very close to the age where life is said to begin (over again, that is), this makes grand- pops first cousin something of a Methusela. Tough Old Bird Since T hadn't seen him since early boyhood (mine, of course), 1 expected to find a crotchety old chap who had lost his zest for life! but, like the Wandering Jew, was unable to die, However, it would appear that this old bird was so. tough that Father Time didn't have a sharp enough scythe to cut him down. So he was only in hospital eight days. And what did I see, when I shook hands with him? He was smiling like a basket of chips. "What are you smiling about?" 1 asked. "Surely you're not glad to be ill?" "Not particularly," he said. "But it has it's compensations that more than counterbalance my indisposition." x Too Impersonal What were they? "I didn't like the idea of going into any of the big city hospitals, with their im- personal atmosphere," he replied. "When my son, who lives Here, told me Oakville had the finest little hospital in the province, I agreed to come without demur." (The son incidentally, is a slightly corpulent Division St. os- teopath who turns out, I'm hor- rified to find, to be my sixth cousin on my father's side.) "Matter of fact," grandpop's cousin went on. "I was too ill at the time to think much about it, except that it occurred to me my son was influenced by local pat- riotism. That didn't matter, but I did feel there would be an ad- vantage in my dying where it would be convenient for him to PUFFS FROM THE COTTON GIN attend to my obsequies. And what did I find?" Reluctant To Leave "I. was made very comfortable in a large, airy semi-private room with a congenial patient in the other bed. All conveniences, and an outlook on pleasant greensward that took away any possible feeling of being confined within four grim walls. The staff, from supt. down, all so friendly. No cold institution. Just a happy family--which included the pa- tients. T hate to leave. Like By- ron's prisoner of Chillan. I regain my freedom with a sigh." If he's ever ill again, he told me, he'll be sitting on the door- step waiting to get in. If he can't sit up, he maintained, we'll carry him in. "But I won't die here," he de- clared. "Ill be too happy. As Mary Baker Eddy put it, it: in the mind. There is no matter." Note To Stanley He went on to talk of a num- ber of things, past and present. He even entered into a discussion of caskets, and agreed with my suggestion that plywood was a grossly under-rated commodity with funeral directors. "Not that Ill be needing a coffin" he has- tened to assure .me, with a twinkle. "But as yowll probably be one of my bearers, if you are still able to get around by that time, a plywood box would make! it a lot easier for you. You have my consent to order one, although I imagine science will have de- veloped something better by. then." When I left him, I was feeling a greater deal better than I went in. In fact, I was feeling almost as chipper as he was. It wasn't just a stirring of municipal pride at his high praise of our hospital. It was a mingling of surprise and downright satisfaction in realizing there are still men who find such enormous joy in living in this battered old world. Ecstatically Yours, BILL COTTON it would be well accepted. Padding Conmmert Our. apologies. for: omitting from 'this page last week the address for parcels for the men fighting in Korea. It will be found here this week, and we'd again urge everyone to give a thought to the barrel in the Post . Office, and to sending a parcel on their own. Any of the units would make a suitable recipient for a gift--and we are sure. The only true national unity is that which, like Canadian unity, arises from the needs and desires of the people. Unity foisted on a people from above such as that in the U.S.SR, is not unity but tyranny. The week of June 24th to July 1st, a week in Canada in which we were all asked to give a thought to our unity. Like many of the benefits we enjoy in this great country of ours, unity is too often not given the importance it should receive. Long years spent in school are worth Iittfe unless, during the educational process, young people learn to reason, to think for themselves intelligently and sanely. We believe that the graduating class from the high school this year received a start on this "Thinking for themselves" procedure. We wish them all the luck In the world, and more and more ability to think for them- selves. ; It has been said before, but it's still true as can be. It isn't the buildings or the streets or the industries that make a town. It is the people! And Oakville people are nice peo- ple, which is what makes it such a nice town. Q. B. D. Bessie Cairns has gone on holiday for the summer. but she'll be back on this page in the fall. Taking over her spot for the summer months is another popular columnist, Frank Walker, who knows fish--and where to get 'em--the way we know we'd rather sit down than stand, or lie than sit and be asleep rather than be awake. But wide-awake readers of the Journal who want to do some fishing, had better kee on Just Fishin'. In the meantime, vacation, Bess. p their eyes have a nice summer ee Colborne St. near Century Theatre The TOWNE Coffee Shop Gn the days you can't dine here pick up our specialty to take home . . . BOXED FRIED BUTTER CRISP CHICKEN COLD ROAST DRESSED CHICKEN Phone 1821