Editorially speaking...
Further to my comments last week re: the recycling of building materials, in particular first-growth fir lumber, via controlled demolition rather than by pulverizing it with machines and adding it to the landfills:
There was a letter to the editor of the Times Colonist from a professional builder who argued that you can’t drive a nail into seasoned (he used the term, atrophied) wood even if you drilled a hole.
I can’t match my carpentry experience to his by any means, but I can say this—that I built a shop/office, house addition and part of a barn with salvaged lumber, both fir and cedar.
And I don’t recall ever having trouble nailing them in place.
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I admire historical societies and museums that are pro-active in trying to raise public awareness of their existence and of our rich and colourful past. Here’s an interesting nugget recently posted on Facebook by the Shawnigan Lake Museum:
“Austrian-born Otto Netzer bought the large island on the northwest side of Long Island. He built a large house and lived year-round on the island commonly referred to as Netzer’s Island.
“Mr. Netzer had a red boat with a 14hp motor which was one of the fastest boats on the lake in the 30s. He apparently only knew one speed—full throttle.
“He was responsible for putting out the first navigational markers on the danger areas of the lake. He would remove them each winter and repair and repaint any that needed work and have the markers restored before the following summer.
“He was considered a real gentleman and a good neighbour who was always willing to help.”
Cool!
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These Extension miners can thank Maureen Young, for one, for devoting years of her life to keeping their memories alive.
As noted in the promo for next week’s Chronicle, the Nanaimo-Ladysmith School Board is about to rename Coal Tyee Elementary School. I have mixed thoughts about that but not about last week’s ceremony to place a plaque at Extension’s Miner Community Park.
This was to honour longtime Regional District of Nanaimo director for South Wellington, Maureen Young. I had several dealings with Maureen over the years, most of them related to various aspects of the area’s coal mining history, in particular the lengthy campaign to save the Morden Colliery head frame from inevitable collapse.
I found Maureen to be, personally, charming, and, professionally, ever helpful and eager to serve her community and to preserve our history. The mini-historical park at Extension, situated right beside the entrance to the No. 2-3 Mine, is a lasting tribute, not just to the miners of old but to Maureen herself. (A perfect fit for Maureen who was born in Nanaimo but grew up in Extension.)
I must confess that I thought Maureen had let me down a year ago when I asked her to take up the cause of erecting a memorial to the victims of the 1951 Mount Benson plane crash. At first she’d expressed enthusiasm then she stopped answering my emails, and I became irritated to the point I took another direction.
I didn’t know that she was terminally ill and I kick myself now for doubting her.
Bless you, Maureen Young, for all your dedicated years to your community. We need more people like you.
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Also on a sombre note, the Vancouver Province noted a grim milepost last week, the 37th anniversary of what’s known as the Air India crash (Flight 182) that claimed 329 lives and is ranked as Canada’s worst terrorism attack.
I note it here because of its unfortunate link to the Cowichan Valley, home of Sikh terrorist and bomb-maker Inderjit Singh Reyat.
In my book Capital Crime I described having first met him in a Duncan auto electrical parts store in the mid-1970s. Then again, several times while he was awaiting trial, at Cowichan Valley garage sales with his two young sons in tow.
The boys were impeccably dressed in suits, of all things (for garage sales), he was tall, well-built and striking in his saffron-coloured turban. Even back when I bought auto parts from where he worked, he caught my attention, not just for his appearance but for his intense gaze; his eyes literally burned right through you.
By the time of our chance meetings on the garage sale circuit, he was the subject of international news and I knew I was looking at a man who was formally accused of the murder of two airport baggage handlers in Japan.
And strongly suspected of having built the bomb that blew up Air India Flight 182 over the Atlantic Ocean on June 23, 1985, killing its passengers and crew members.
How utterly sad.
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