The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

4 The Castor Review November, 1981 Crossed purposes It is unfortunate that two important, community-minded Russell organizations have decided to continue their competition for the New Year's Eve dance-goers. Unfortunate because the Russell Curling Club and the Recreation Association cannot both emerge financial winners. There just aren't enough revellers to go around. These are worthwhile organizations and both contribute a great deal to the community. The decision to hold coincidental dances began last year and places village residents in an untenable position -- support one and disappoint the other. A few years ago it was possible to welcome in the New Year with friends in Russell -- but now there's a strong possibility those friends will be up (or down) the street. It's a downright uncomfortable situation for a lot of folks. ' Couldn't this be worked out? How about agreeing to alternate years? Or perhaps one group could be given another prime party-going date. We think it's time a truce was called. All in the interest of pull- ing the community together -- instead of apart. Sounds like a good New Year's Eve resolution. A woeful budget Perhaps Canadians expected too much from the Budget. That may explain the universal wave of disappointment when it ap- peared. Disappointment arising from the budget's failure to consider the farmer, the homeowner or the small businessman. About the only people to benefit from the Budget were the banks, the moneylenders and the rich. In fact the budget translated into fiscal terms the Prime Minister's warning when _ he spoke to the party faithful in Toronto not long ago: "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer." That's what the budget was all about. For farmers, there was a five percent reduction in loan interest rates at the Farm Credit Corporation. That is all very well, but all farmers are not eligible to go to the corporation in any case, this still leaves too high an interest rate on loans through a government agency that is leading the people's money to the people. Farm loans by the government ought to be interest-free and the government's grudging concession to the needs of farmers will not win much support in that area. As for homeowners, plagued by usurious interest, all they got was a stinging slap in the face. We are told that help is available for those in dire straits. Nobody knows what is meant by that phrase. It remains undefined. Surely, someone who has commit- ted financial resources to purchasing a home and is informed that their mortgage payments are doubled or tripled, is in dire straits. The government apparently feels that straits are not dire until a person is on the street, barefoot in the snow, with family and pets in tow. ; This is a measure of the gap between the present government and the people. It is apparent that men cushioned from the sharp edge of reality by cabinet minister's salaries over far too many years men who take one jet aircraft each to go to the same place, cannot be expected to feel for those who are in deep and desperate need because of the government's inability to manage the economy, or even let it alone to manage itself. O Castor, soon you the winter. Then we'll skate on ya. will be slowed by cold, cold winter...and stop for Illustration: Shirley Van Dusen. Bruno Beefs Don't our interests rate? Here it is -- the scoop of the year: "Banks to offer 16 per cent mortgages". That was the headline on a recent valley edition of the Ottawa Citizen. Sounds good. At least in com- parison with rates which have been climbing steadily for the past few months. However, if you read on, it is bound to bring you to the conclusion that not only are these so-called leaders of our society dreamers but have, to some degree, a streak of imbecility. : To further instill in you the gravity of the interest-rate situation I only need to go back a few weeks when the oil-pricing agreement was reached and the news that "we have it good here'"' was shoved down our throats like so much slop. The Liberal attitude of see-no- - evil, hear-no-evil has brought us to these circumstances. The philosophy of the Liberal govern- ment has been to promise anything and deliver nothing and has caused Canada and Canadians enough anxiety. If we, the voting public, don't demand the resignation of these well-meaning, but ignorant, peo- ple... we can kiss our nation -- which we have for so short a time loved and cherished -- good-bye. As will be seen elsewhere in this issue, the Castor was better served in transportation half a century or a century ago than now. In the early days there was a stage line, and after that a bus line. There was the New York Central which used to come puff- ing into town every day bringing newspapers and mail from the outside world and _ providing transportation and _ shipping facilities for Russell citizens. A favourite outing was to go in- to town for the day on the N.Y.C. and return at evening; or, go down to Montreal and come back that night. The stage line is gone -- even from people's memories. The New York Central vanished 30 years The Gastor Review ago, leaving only the deserted right-of-way like the ghost of a Roman road built by -Caesar's legions. During the great Russell Fire, some 60 years ago, the New York Central rushed a pumper out from Ottawa and saved the town. These vanished amenities of a bygone day are a source of nostalgia today at a time when it costs between $4 and $6 to get to Ottawa and back, depending on the number of cylinders in your engine. : It was the automobile which brought about the change in our way of life; changes so widespread and penetrating that even now, that the car bears all the signs of obsolescence, we have not quite managed to grasp. --Gastor Earl , fe tabloid published ten times each year by the Castor Publishing The Castor Review is an Company, Russell, Ontario. Mailing address is: Box 359, Russell, Ont. KOA 3B0. Telephone: 445-3345. Second class mail registration No. 4218 ISSN 0707--4956. Editor: Dennis McGann Those flea-bitten furballs Dang blast those ornery, bushy- tailed, fat-headed, flea-bitten fur- balls! No, I ain't talkin' about whoever devised the latest federal budget. I'm talkin' abdut the dang black squirrels robbin' my bird feeder blind. What they don't eat, they scatter all over kingdom come. There's two of them, scurryin' up and down the-big maple I hung the feeder on. I think they live up in a hole high in that tree. Anyhow, they sure are actin' like they own it. No amount of yellin' at them -- and, by cracky, I'm good at that -- will scare them off. They just ignore me and dig deeper into the bird seed. The only thing that chases them for a bit is my ferocious: dog Bingo when I sic him on them. But it's only a few minutes before they're right back at 'er. My big problem is I'm of mixed minds about the whole thing. On the one hand, I want to save the 'seed for the birds without no fat thieves to bother with. On the other hand, that is -- I suppose squirrels have to eat too. Even them that looks like they should be on a diet. " Maybe. I'll get One of them feeders at the end of a metal post the squirrels can't climb. Or maybe I'll put up with them until they go to sleep somewhere for the winter. I just hope it ain't in my attic. It's so late it seems like tomorrow to us here...something happened between Russell and our printer in Smiths Falls and so we're here with eyes a droopin', sticking down pictures on pages... if things are a little crooked this time round, that's the excuse... We're going to make a full run at getting out another paper before all the hectic times of Christmas... if anybody ever reads this space, we'd appreciate information in the next few weeks so we can get rid of these intolerably late work nights... New faces this time around include Joel Nordestrom who's adopted the paper as his commitment and is now in charge of designing the fancy ads you see in this issue... Greg Rokosh, who seemed to have written just about half of this,issue, also toiled into the wee hours with us on paste-up...as did these other dedicated and half- crazy souls: Connie Belanger (who swears only intermittently), Elkie Bietz (who didn't swear at all), Jude McGann (who swears she doesn't know how), Tom Van Dusen (both of them), lan Darragh, our intrepid photographer and our editor... : Advertising Sales: Theresa Griffith: 445-2820, Emerald Miller: 445-5362 Office Manager: Jude McGann: 445-3108 The person who runs about getting the Review into stores in Brian Graham...yeah Brian...and a special thanks to Diane Santilli who collects all the little pieces of information dropped off at the store -- with a warm smile, right Diane? And the gang who represent the ol' bottom line, without whom there'd be a Castor, but no Review: Marc Belanger on news (445-3252); Jack McLaren on Sports (445-2131); Garey Ris also on sports Margot McCallum (Cupboards) 445-5365; Dorothy Marquette, Visiting and Happenings (445-2168); Greg Rokosh, Recreation (445-2874), and Barbara Overall who's working to keep Greely in the news. Our thanks to Phill Potter for handling all the photo processing -- in good spirits. The great blue heron is gone away. And so are we, for another few weeks...gd'nite. * Next deadline: | Next issue: |Next meeting: December 2nd |December 11th/December 2nd Revisiting the ol' stagecoach The automobile, for example, destroyed the hot baths at Carlsbad Springs. The springs are there and the ghosts of the old, deserted hotels. .The bath-houses once lay in a heap of ruined boards; now, even the boards are gone, Carlsbad Springs used to be a nice, one-day and return train ex- cursion from Ottawa or Mon- treal. The auto reduced that to an _ hour. It was-hardly worthwhile. Once they got all gassed up and ready to go, people wanted to go farther afield, Detroit, or Atlantic City. That spelled the end of Carlsbad. Now that autos are too expen- sive to drive and there is talk of going back to the horse and- buggy, the pony express and the rural stage line, it seems that we might begin to adjust ourselves to changes in a reverse direction.' It isn't likely that we'll see reinstatement of the old stage line in the Castor, or a new version of the Pony Express (although that might speed up the mail). Perhaps_ what we'll have in future will -be a machine running on a cushion of air and using the old New York Central right-of-way. In any case, -- because it is part of the frantic age we live in, there can be no return to the easy, contented ways of years gone by when a person could buy a leisurely, six-course lunch amid fine surroundings, with ex- cellent service for a few bucks, get a shave and a hot-towel treatment for about the same amount, go anywhere in America on a lux- uriously appointed railway train, with all the amenities, stay in a fine hotel and be treated like somebody who mattered, rather than an unwanted piece of bag- gage as is the case today.