The Green Party is the first national party to name a candidate to attempt to unseat 5-time incumbent Conservative Lanark Frontenac Kingston MP, Scott Reid, in the coming federal election.

The candidate is Stephen Kotze, who operates In Balance, an accounting company specialising in small business and not-for profit corporations out of his home in the tiny hamlet of Elphin. He has a long history in social and environmental activism.

Kotze was one of three Lanark County residents vying for the nomination, and won the nomination in the first round of counting the ranked ballots, at a meeting last Thursday (April 11), at McMartin House in Perth.

The other nominees were Doug Barr, a Tay Valley Township musician and advocate of sustainable living, and Kelvin Hodges, a resident of Perth who owns and runs a solar energy and storage business.

In a telephone interview this week, Kotze said that the other two candidates gave very strong presentations at the meeting.

“They were both very good candidates. I did not feel that confident coming into the vote.”

Kotze was born in South Africa, where his parents were prominent anti-apartheid activists. He moved to Europe when he was a young man and eventually made his way to The Farm, an intentional community in Tennessee.

With his wife Rosemary, he moved to the Elphin-McDonald’s Corners area in the early 1980’s to work at Plenty Canada. The Kotzes worked on a project in Lesotho, a country surrounded by South Africa, in the mid 1980’s.

In 1994, Stephen became a Canadian citizen. He worked at the Canadian Environmental Network in the mid 1990’s, eventually serving as the Executive Director. He established In Balance in 1998. The Kotzes have 7 children and two grandchildren.

In a telephone interview this week, he said that the Green Party is ready to take a larger role in Canadian politics.

“[Party leader] Elizabeth May has done an incredible job, but she can’t do it all on her own. We need more Green Party members in parliament to help influence policy.”

As to his motivation to seek the party nomination this time around, he pointed to the urgency surrounding climate change.

“We are in a crisis, people realise that and they also realise that our leaders are not responding appropriately,” he said. “The Liberals are floundering. Trudeau has signed the Paris accord, saying thathe takes climate change seriously, but not really, in my opinion, doing very much.”

As a long-time Lanark County resident, Kotze is certainly aware of how entrenched the Conservative Party is in the riding, but sees an opening this time around.

“There are a lot of people who don’t support the Conservatives in this riding, and I want to give them a voice. Scott Reid does a good job representing his constituency but not representing all of the people in this riding. It’s time to get people into power who will represent the broader public.”

He also argues that the greening of the Canadian economy does not mean the end to economic prosperity.

“As Greens, we don’t want our economy to lose jobs just because we are getting rid of fossil fuels. We are interested in maintaining a strong economy. There are things we can do that are concrete and are based in reality. Other countries have led the way in this area, and we need to make changes in order to catch up.”

(Editor’s note – Stephen Kotze provides accounting services for the Frontenac News)

Jim Gilmour tried to retire after closing up his meat shop in Belleville in 2010. But a couple of years later his son Nick approached him to help him when he wanted to open Gilmour’s Meats on Highway 38 in Harrowsmith.

Jim’s been working with his son ever since. They were optimistic that Harrowsmith would be a good location for Gilmour’s, which carries groceries, pre-made meals, local baked goods, and has a popular lunch counter in addition to a full meat shop.

“The rapid growth of the business from the day we opened up, was a surprise to us,” said Nick, when interviewed at the shop last week.

Early last year, the Gilmour’s began working on a new project, a store to be located in a new plaza that will be located on a property they purchased just metres to the north of where Gilmour’s is currently located.

Plans for the new location have developed over time, and Nick says that he is confident that it will be something that “fits well with the local area” as it brings in brand something that will be a step up for food retailing in Frontenac County.

If planning the new location was not enough, a new venture has cropped up for the Gilmour family. In Belleville, where Jim still lives, an opportunity to purchase an existing plaza and open a new location for Gilmour’s presented itself. They jumped on it.

With the new location and the building project on the go, and a busy store getting ready for another summer season, Nick and Jim needed some more help.

That’s where Jordan Gilmour came in. Jordan is Jim’s son and Nick’s older brother. He has been living in Cambridge and working as an engineer for years. He has been involved in project management, among other things, working for a large engineering firm in the golden horseshoe.

“I was ready to move back here and take on a new opportunity,” said Jordan last week, just a few days after moving to Harrowsmith with his wife, Jackie, and their sons Eric and Brock.

Before going to University, Jordan trained in the butcher shop with his dad, and the chance to bring his business and management skills back to the family business, and bring his own family to live in a rural Frontenac setting, was something he could not pass up.

“With the three of us, we can run the two butcher shops and work on the construction project. It gives us the opportunity to build the business as a family, which is the way we have always done things,” said Nick.

“We’ve only been living here for a few days, and we’ve already seen that this is a great community,” said Jordan of the move to Harrowsmith. “The boys started school on Monday and were made very welcome, and through all of the contacts with people that Nick has made through the store, we have been able to connect with all of the services we needed to move in and set up our house.”

“We are going to bring something to Harrowsmith that has never been here before,” said Nick, about the new store project. I don’t want to get into details until everything is finalised, but I can say that it will be a big change for Harrowsmith.”

With all of this happening, it looks like Jim, who just turned 68 last week, won’t be retiring in earnest for a while yet.

Harold Perry, who died last week, was born at Ardoch. He left for Toronto as a teenager but returned to Ardoch as an adult, and lived the rest of his life on Canoe Path Lane, on a section of the Mississippi River that is called Mud Lake.

He experienced discrimination because of his Algonquin heritage when he was young, in Ardoch and in Toronto.

Nonetheless, he embraced the teachings and connection to the land that he learned as a child. He also developed a very strong and unwavering set of political understandings that have influenced indigenous activists locally and across the province in profound ways. He also was a master canoe builder and country music guitarist. He was proudly inducted into the Land O’Lakes Traditional Music Hall of Fame in 2016.

Harold also helped to manage a patch of wild rice, that was transported to Mud Lake by his mother from Rice Lake near Peterborough. And that patch of rice was responsible for a chain of events that changed Harold’s life and many others, and helped spark the re-birth of Indigenous culture in Frontenac and Lanark Counties and beyond.

In the late 1970’s, the province of Ontario granted a license to a rice harvesting company to collect the rice from Mud Lake. Harold was a well-established builder, woodworker, martial arts instructor, and musician at the time, headed towards retirement age, when he saw that the rice patch that he had been stewarding for most of his life was about to be harvested.

He approached North Frontenac Community Services, which had a community legal worker on staff at the time (a position that eventually led to the formation of its own agency – Rural Legal Services.)

That worker was Bob Lovelace, who spent most of his time representing clients of the Oso Township welfare office, who were having trouble accessing funds from the township.

When Harold and Bob met, both of their lives changed.

“I knew from when I was a kid that I was part Indian,” Lovelace said when contacted this week at his home on Canoe Lake.

“I was mainly focussed, at that that time, on the local welfare system. Harold came to see me one day about what he could do about the rice.

Harold and Bob and a host of other community members worked on what were dubbed locally as the ‘rice wars’ for a couple of seasons and eventually the company was forced to withdraw.

The entire episode sparked a bit of a renaissance in Aboriginal culture in the region.

“Local people kept their culture to themselves before that. They kept it within their extended families, but at that time they started to feel they no longer wanted to be ashamed of their identity, they wanted to come together in public.”

A number of cultural and political groups developed throughout the 1980’s in the Ardoch and Sharbot Lake areas, and Harold and Bob formed a friendship and political alliance.

Lovelace, who is a university lecturer at Queen’s, a community educator and political activist, said “I like to tell my students that Harold Perry taught me everything I know about aboriginal culture and politics.”

In the 1980’s, Harold became a central figure in another legal battle, over hunting rights for non-status people of Aboriginal heritage.

“He thought it was important to establish hunting rights, and he said he thought it would take longer than his lifetime to do it, but we had to make a start. It was a shorter fight than he thought.”

It turned out that it was Harold himself who supplied the test case, when he was arrested for shooting a duck without first obtaining a hunting license.

Harold fought the case on his inherent right to hunt as an aboriginal person, and won. The case was later overturned in an appeal court, based on some of the comments that the judge made during the trial, but the government of Ontario has never re-visited the issue, being content to establish harvesting agreements with First Nations to this day rather than challenging Aboriginal hunting rights.

In the late 1980’s the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation and Allies (AAFNA - later renamed the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation) had been formed, and Harold was elected as Chief through a vote of the family heads council.

AAFNA was approached by Kirby Whiteduck from Golden Lake (now know as Pikwakanagan First Nation) to join in the Algonquin land claim process, and they agreed to participate.

“After about a year Harold realised that the non-status communities were only going to be used and he encouraged the family heads council to have AAFNA step back from the process, and they agreed.”

AAFNA, and Harold, became harsh critics of the land claim process, never yielding in his opinion that it would lead only to the diminution of Aboriginal rights. This led to more than a little bitterness within the local community that is still echoed to this day.

The Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nation, based now on White Lake, and the Snimikobi Algonquin First Nation (based in Eganville) remained within the process, and AAFNA has remained opposed.

In 2007, a uranium exploration company began doing testing on Crotch Lake, using an old mine at Robertsville as an access point from Hwy. 509. Crotch Lake and the region surrounding it are the traditional territory for both AAFNA and the Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nations.

In spite of the schism between the two groups, who share territory and family connections, the two First Nations worked together and occupied the site, saying they would not permit drilling on their ancestral territory. It was an uneasy alliance that frayed pretty quickly, but the occupation held for several months.

“Harold, Doreen Davis (Chief of the Shabot Obaadjiwan) the Badour and St. Pierre families deserve credit for putting that coalition together,” said Lovelace, “even if it was tough.”

After the occupation ended, a court case, launched by the exploration company, culminated in a Superior Court Judge in Kingston demanding that the community representatives who ended up facing charges of trespassing, commit to staying away from the site.

In the end there were three who resisted making that declaration, which was a matter of principle more than practicality since by that time the site was back in the hands of the company and access was blocked.

The three were Harold Perry, Bob Lovelace, and Paula Sherman, all Chiefs or former Chiefs of AAFNA.

“Harold was 78 at the time, and I knew from working in the prisons that he was not in good enough health to go to prison, so we talked him into making the declaration,” Lovelace recalls. Lovelace was the only one who ended up in jail, until he was released on appeal several months later.

The company ended up leaving and the land is no longer eligible for staking, and is part of the lands earmarked in the land claim, for transfer to the Algonquins.

Harold Perry lived on at his home in Ardoch with his wife Elsie until last week.

He was an unassuming, even a shy man, but a ferocious political fighter for the rights of non-status Indigenous people, and whether they agreed or disagreed with him, no one can deny the impact he has had on Indigenous politics in this region, and beyond.

Inviting the world to your home and business may not be everyone’s idea of a good thing to do, but after the past four years, George Conboy pretty much takes it all in stride.

Last weekend, visitors from all over made the trek north on 509 to Bell Line Road for the annual Maple Weekend, put on by the Ontario Maple Syrup Producers Association.

Along with his wife, Darlene, and a host of offspring and grandchildren, Conboy runs Conboy Maple. Down Bell Line a piece, Mel and Joyce Conboy run Oso Sweet Maple. They’ve all been doing it for generations.

And they seem to honestly enjoy showing people how it’s done.

“I look forward to it,” Conboy said. “It’s hectic, but it’s good for business — sales.

“I’m glad I got rid of all the snow (around the sugar shack) and put down some extra gravel (for parking etc).”

Every year is different, he said. And like any farming-related activity, they’re at the mercy of Mother Nature.

“We didn’t have much warm weather until last week,” he said. “But the syrup is excellent quality this year, all light.

“It may not be an exceptional year but I think it’s a good year (and) we’re still looking at a few more good runs, for sure.”

Conboy said they started tapping the last week in February and were done a week later.

“That’s more normal,” he said. “The last couple of Februarys have been colder.”

But really, what determines a year’s maple syrup production tends to be the summer before.

“The experts told us that with defoliation, there’d be a low sugar content,” he said. “They were wrong.

“You need lots of sunshine and sufficient rain (in the summer) so that that the trees produce more sugar.

“The year before last, it was wet and the sugar content was down to about 1 per cent.”

And while area public works managers may be bemoaning the freeze-thaw cycle’s affects on their roads, it’s just what the maple syrup producers need in late winter.

“As far as southwestern Ontario, the season’s over,” he said. “But here, we might just get a couple of weeks yet.”

Conboy said that maple syrup has become more popular in recent years.

“Maybe it’s because it’s a healthier sugar than the refined sugars,” he said. “But it’s also local and people seem to like the experience of coming out to the sugar shack.

“The media and everybody seem to be on board with it.”

And he’s OK with it becoming a popular hobby. People making their own doesn’t seem to affect his business and he sees it as a positive.

“The hobbyists are keeping the equipment dealers in business by buying evaporators and gear,” he said. “But once they find out how much work is involved . . .”

But hobbyist or just a fan of maple syrup, maple weekend brings people out.

“It’s been at least as good as or better than last year,” said Darlene. “We’re seeing a lot of new faces.”

Dave and Shawn McCullough both learned to play music in their parents’ kitchen growing up.

Now, many years later, they’re starting to appreciate playing with each other and are trying to find more time for just that.

Dave is 54 (“that’s 102 in dog years,” says Shawn) and Shawn is 47. It’s taken awhile for them to get back together as both have had other musical pursuits. (Dave plays bass with Red Rose Express; Shawn plays with everybody.) But they’ve joined with drummer Bill Parsons to become the house band on Wednesday Wing Night Open Mic at The Cove in Westport.

“Officially, we started playing together around ’92,” said Shawn. “We played together off and on but in the last couple of years, we’ve been playing more together.

“We have fun and laugh at each other when one of us makes a mistake.

“Probably nobody notices but us.”

“It’s just heaven now that he’s grown up,” said Dave. “There’s nothing like blood — the harmonies, the mistakes.”

As with many musicians, both grew up trying out many instruments. Dave started off with mandolin, guitar, banjo, before settling in on the bass.

Shawn found his instrument a littler earlier.

“When he was little, all you had to do was give him a guitar,” said Dave. “He wouldn’t bother you for hours.”

It’s a little bit of a different experience for the elder McCullough playing with his brother in a trio.

Well known as a solid bottom-ender, Dave said the pressure is off to a certain extent because Shawn does a lot of the singing.

“With Red Rose Express, we have three lead instruments but a lot more of the singing falls to me,” he said. “Now, most people may not know this but singing while you’re playing bass is tougher than singing while strumming a guitar.

“You have to think differently.

“Also, it’s easier to get tight in a three-piece.”

But there also seems to be one of those intangibles going on when the brothers play together.

They’re very different.

Shawn plays 200-300 dates a year. Dave has a day job (with Ontario Parks).

Shawn can be as flashy as it gets. Dave plays a more laid-back, rhythm-section style.

“I can get flashy, I just usually don’t,” Dave said. “And there’s no need to get flashy when you play with somebody like him.”

Ken Arney does not expect Central Frontenac Township to pull out the large culvert that they put in to allow water from Dead Creek to pass under the Henderson Road a few metres from his home, just because the culvert and the rocks that are holding it in place are jutting onto his property.

He would like to get paid some compensation for the land that has effectively been taken by the township, and he would also like the township to re-install the fence that was pulled down in order to do the work. But mostly he would like some acknowledgement that the township should have shown him some more respect.

“I never heard anything from before they started, not until I began seeing equipment arriving in the last week of November. Then, I saw that the survey stake that marked the border between mine and my neighbours property had been buried, and that the fence marking the border between his property and the township property was gone. That’s when I started asking questions.”

“When I asked the workers what was going on, they told me that they would remove any of the material that was on my property,” said Arney, in an interview at this house this week.

Arney said that he called Central Frontenac Mayor Frances Smith the next day on Saturday, December 1st.

Frances Smith does not recall exactly what she told Arney on the phone on December 1st.

“I would have told him then what I told him when he came to council last month. If we did anything wrong, we will make it right,” she said in a phone interview this week.

The old culvert was removed and the new one installed a few days later, just before freeze up. By Friday, December 7, barely a week before arriving, construction crews were gone.

“What was left is a culvert that is wider and a lot longer than the one that was replaced. I have a copy of the permit they got from Quinte conservation, which says the new culvert will be 15 feet longer, but what is there is much longer than that. The permit also says that a sediment screen should be in place until the site has stabilised and there is no screening in place,” said Arney.

The construction took place after Greer Galloway, an engineering firm working for Central Frontenac, obtained a development permit from Quinte Conservation. The permit was granted on the basis of a report on the project prepared by Greer Galloway and submitted to Quinte Conservation, along with a “construction sequence and dewatering plan” that was submitted by Crains Construction.

The permit sets out six conditions, one being that a 27.5 metre long culvert will be replaced by a 31.5 metre long culvert. It also says that “sediment and erosion controls must be properly installed to isolate the work site from the watercourse and must remain in place until the site has stabilised.”

Quinte Conservation may or may not have visited the site before approving the permit. One of the notes attached to the permit says “Quinte Conservation inspects, some, but not all permits.”

When construction was complete, Ken Arney was not happy with the outcome. He called his local councillors, and eventually all members of council, and asked them to come look at the situation. He went before, and presented his concerns in February.

“They did not apologise. I got the feeling that they thought I was making trouble,” he said about the meeting.

He also said that while council is committed to buying the piece of land that they have effectively appropriated, they are not planning to build a new fence to replace the one that was removed.

He refers to a document he obtained from the public works department of the township, titled “notes on 2138 Henderson Road” which says, in part, “we can also investigate the possibilities of providing services in lieu of payment … (ie. repairing of fence or entrance improvements … )”

France Smith said that it is her understanding that Crains construction is going to replace the fence, and that a surveyor is going to be determining how much land is involved and the township will then purchase it.

“But none of this can happen in the winter,” she said. “We told him that. As I said, if we do anything wrong, we fix it.”

She also said that is it her understanding that Ken Arney was seeking a survey of his whole property as part of the resolution.

“We see no reason to do that, we will only survey what we need to survey,” she said.

Ken Arney is not quite ready to put the matter behind him.

“I think a lot of people messed up; Quinte, Greer Galloway, Crains and the township. Someone should look at this. The culvert is longer than they said it would be, and the sediment is leaching into the creek,” he said.

Darrel Gerus has been running his contracting business, D&G Total Home Improvements, out of Arden, for the past ten years, but he has been working in the area for about 20 years,

“D & G is a varied construction business. From general construction, yard landscaping and maintenance, to site preparation. We do everything,” said Darrell, in an interview from his home near Arden.

Aside from working on construction jobs throughout Central Frontenac and beyond, Darrel, and his company, have been participating with the Friends of Arden in promoting the services and community activities in Arden and the surrounding lakes.

And the Frontenac CFDC has been with him along the way, providing loans for equipment purchases when necessary, including a loan which enabled D&G to purchase a full-sized truck recently to add to the inventory of equipment that keeps D&G crews busy throughout the construction season.

“For a contractor, a reliable truck is a must.! Being able to get to a job site in all weather conditions, be it pulling a trailer with supplies or a backhoe certainly benefits my company.

“The CFDC has been really helpful. Sue Theriault at the office has been our contact and she’s been great to work with, as have the business officers in the office that we have dealt with over the years,” he said.

With D&G, Darrel is committed to maintaining quality workmanship for all the jobs that the company takes on, and he runs a four-member crew in the construction season each year, employing a mixture of experienced carpenters and younger workers.

“We are always looking for young workers who want to make a start in the construction business. There are lots of opportunities in the market in the skilled trades, including carpentry, and one of the great things about running a company like D&G is that we can provide training in a number of different work environments.

”With the contacts that D&G has developed over the years, Darrel has been moving more into the role of a General Contractor.

“It’s taken me ten years to assemble a group of excellent, very professional, sub-contractors to work with. For new home construction, for example, we can sub-out jobs like the electrical and the plumbing and roofing, and, with our own crew and equipment, it all adds up to a good way to build a house on schedule and with all the proper warranties and insurance in place for customers,” he said.

Having worked with a series of building inspectors over the years, Darrel says that what he appreciates is consistency and clarity from the department.

“They’ve generally been pretty good to work with over the years,” he said. “It’s all part of the process. For us it goes along with being fully licensed and fully insured. We like to keep everything above board.”

Transparency is key for Darrel, which is why he brings copies of all of his documentation with him the first time he meets with a client to look at or quote on a job.

“Anyone with a hammer and a pick-up truck can call themselves a contractor, but that does not mean that the customer will get what they expect at the end of the day. In our case, we take everything into account when we quote on a job, and that includes making a profit.

“What I like about the construction business is that it is a creative way to make a living, it is profitable, and the customer gets a good product that they can enjoy for a long time,” he said.

Beyond that, Darrel also has a favourite kind of job.

“I personally love doing fences and decking,” he said.

“Even though there isn’t that much call for fencing in our region, we have all the equipment to do any kind of fence, even chain link fencing for commercial applications. But we do a lot of decks, of all shapes and sizes.”

To contact D&G, phone 613-583-0146 or email

Clayton Conboy grew up helping his Mom and Dad, Joyce and Mel, make maple syrup each spring. It was a labour-intensive effort, tromping out to the bush, gathering sap from holding tanks around their farm property on Bell Line road, which is off the 509 north of Sharbot Lake, and hauling it to the evaporator to be boiled down into syrup.

Clayton is now 31, and works in Ottawa, but he looks forward to coming home during syrup season. The family syrup operation, which is called Oso Sweet, a play on the former name of the township where their farm is located, has developed significantly over the years.

All of the sap now flows from the bush into a central shed, thanks to a vacuum system. It goes through preliminary filtering, and is then pumped into a 2,800 gallon stainless steel tank that is housed in a new building. The sap then passes into a reverse osmosis machine, where, through the use of air pressure and microfiltration, the sugar content of the sap is tripled. The Conboys bring their sap to 7.5% sugar before sending off it to the wood fired evaporator where it is transformed to maple syrup, precisely 67% sugar. Even elements such as the barometric reading are taken into account. The finished syrup is filtered, graded as golden, amber, or dark and then bottled for sale.

“The best syrup is made from the freshest sap, and with all that we’ve done over the years, when the sap is running well, we can process it into syrup pretty quickly,” said Mel Conboy, in an interview at the farm last Friday, a cool early spring day when the trees “weren’t really hurting themselves to run that much” as Clayton Conboy put it.

The other advantage of the technology that the Conboys have put in place over the last ten years or so, is that instead of boiling well into the night when the sap is running hard, they can be finished and becleaned up by supper time.

“I’m 68,” said Mel, “I don’t need to work until midnight anymore.”

Putting in the reverse osmosis machine cut the boiling time for syrup significantly, saving on wood and lessening the environmental impact of syrup production. But it was not just a matter of buying a machine. It required the construction of a new heated building, which took time and money. When the Conboy’s were ready to make the purchase, they applied for, and received, an Eastern Ontario Development Program grant.

With the cost of the reverse osmosis machine, the building and hydro upgrades, we were very appreciative of the grant that we received from the Frontenac CFDC. It helped fund a project that we had long dreamed of, covering about 10% of the cost. That was a big help,” said Joyce Conboy.

The Conboys are planning still more upgrades, in a constant effort to create an efficient operation that produces consistent, high quality maple syrup.

They purchased a new finish filter machine this year, and in the long term would like to build on to the new building to house their evaporator and bring their entire production into one space. As well, as they increase their capacity to process sap into syrup, they are looking at expanding by tapping some more of their maple. They are already producing as much syrup out of 1,600 taps as they used to produce from 3,000, and by expanding they can start to make more syrup than ever before. But nothing is simple. Even with automation, syrup season is a busy time of year at the Conboy farm. Lined need to be checked, the sugar bush monitored, and the technology has to work in harmony, one malfunction and the entire system is challenged. And the wood for the evaporator doesn’t cut, split, and dry itself.

“We love this time of year. It’s like a breath of fresh air and the end result is uniquely Canadian,” said Joyce.

Oso sweet syrup is available at the farm gate at 2379 Bell Line Road, and in Ottawa through Clayton’s home store. Check their website Ososweetmaple.ca. They are participating in Maple Weekend on April 6 and 7 as well, one of two Frontenac County locations, which are both located on the Bell Line Road.

The Bedford District Historical Society invited the public to the Bedford District Historical Research Centre (aka Glendower Hall) last Saturday as they’ve done for the past seven years or so.

President Glen Stinson said the archives have experienced “significant growth from year to year” but what they really need is some bodies to help out with the archiving process.

“People do volunteer family pictures and we’ve just received eight family trees,” Stinson said. “And while we appreciate the pictures and documents, what we’d really like are copies.

“We’re more interested in the information than the actual document.”

They do try and laminate as much as possible and Stinson encourages everyone to have their family documents laminated for preservation.

But . . .

“Like every organization, we need more bodies,” said Coun. Pat Barr, also a Society member. “Many are interested but when it comes to the nitty-gritty . . .”

One of the more interesting displays at this year’s gathering came from Steven Manders, who wrote The First Spike, a history of railways in the area.

While he’s always interested in railway information and can spin a good yarn on the subject (his theories on the connections between the K & P Railway and K & P iron mines come to mind), he’s recently become interested in how it all relates to logging in the area.

“You see this horseshoe?” he says, pointing to an old, rusted and corroded horseshoe that’s kinda small. “This didn’t come from a Clydesdale.

“It’s (probably) from a Canadian horse, a smaller breed that was tough enough to withstand Canadian winters.”

Manders said the breed could be set loose in the winter and actually fend quite well for themselves.

“They couldn’t bring in enough hay and oats to feed them so they’d just browse for themselves,” he said.

And that made them perfect for logging, which was huge in this area, he said.

“In the 1800s, more than half of the able-bodied men were working in the lumber industry in the summer,” he said. “You can’t work the fields in the winter.

“If they could bring a horse with them to the logging camp, they got more money so a lot of them had these horses.”

Al Rankin doesn’t settle for good when he knows he can achieve great.

Sitting in his historic limestone house nestled inconspicuously on a country road north of Kingston, Al speaks passionately about the music he showcases in his Inverary home and to the broader community..

“My whole thing is, I don’t want good music here, I want great music,” says the retired drama teacher as a pellet stove hums softly in the background.

Talking from a tastefully decorated living room, Al, 68, is a well-known member of the Canadian music scene. He is the artistic director of three local groups that bring music to public theatres, school auditoriums and his private home.

Not far from his armchair is a curtain hung in a doorway to stop heat from escaping the rooms used by his family. Outside the curtain is a sunken showroom with a stage called The Rankin Gallery; home to eight house concerts a year by musicians on tour.

Lined with old church pews where hundreds of the best musicians in the world have played, the room feels like a significant part of Canadian history. It is a charming space that fits 65.

“There’s an incredible number of musicians out there trying to make a living and the only way to make money is to perform live concerts,” says Al about the purpose of the space. “It’s tough for them.”

Picking up where he leaves off, Al’s partner Brenda Lyon notes, “This way, they can come here and play a concert and make a thousand dollars. They get a free place to stay and a warm dinner and breakfast. They’re just so appreciative. It’s a good feeling.”

Gesturing to the walls where dozens of posters are displayed of bands that have played in The Rankin Gallery, the couple is clearly proud of the music performed in their home and the musicians they room and board. Personal messages of gratitude are scrawled across the posters from bands such as the Good Lovelies and solo acts such as Serena Ryder and Rose Cousins.

Some of the musicians who have played at the gallery have travelled from as far away as Serbia, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Europe. Most are from Canada and the United States.

For a house on a quiet country road in Frontenac County, it feels like the heart of the global music scene.

“We get a wide-range of musicians coming to The Rankin Gallery concerts” says Al with pride.

“His biggest job is saying no because everyone on tour wants to stay here,” adds Brenda, 67. “We get 1,500 requests a year.”

“We do end up saying no to a lot of people,” responds Al who doesn’t invite musicians to perform in his home; rather, they ask him.

“It’s a lot of work,” adds Brenda about the organization, promotion and hospitality required for each show. “But it’s great when the concert is going.”

Asked why they open their home to the musicians and the public, Brenda answers kindly, “We’re supporting a lot of Canadian musicians. It is unbelievable how hard they work and how hard it is to make a living. We’re trying to encourage them.”

“It’s great for the community,” adds Al. “A lot of people who come to our house concert wouldn’t attend a concert at a larger venue in town. They love the closeness to the performers. It’s a whole different experience for members of the audience.”

Asked to pay a nominal admission fee of $20 to support the musicians, guests travel from as far away as Trenton, Smith’s Falls and Westport. Within 12 hours of a show’s notice, they are always sold out.

“It’s not just for our neighbours,” says Al about the memorable performances in his home. “It’s sort of a secret. A secret a lot of people know about.”

“When people come here, they know it’s going to be great because Al is very picky about who he brings here,” says Brenda.

“We’ve never had any problems with the concerts or people coming to the house, even when we let them wander upstairs,” she says gratefully. “It doesn’t bother us at all. It feels a bit like a community hall most of the time which is fine.”

“Of course, we don’t have any cutlery left,” adds Al with a laugh.

In addition to hosting house concerts, Al and Brenda also bring musical acts to the area through their company, Rankin Productions. The work involves booking a headline act (such as Pete Seeger, Leon Redbone, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Judy Collins and Arlo Guthrie), renting a theatre, selling the tickets and arranging the band’s hotel rooms.

“We only do that a couple times a year,” says Al about the bigger shows.

Al and Brenda are also involved in a volunteer organization called Live Wire which arranges six musical shows annually in Kingston and supports musicians performing in local schools.

Referring to all of the performers they have met over the years, Brenda says with a smile, “It’s like we have 100 sons and daughters now.”

Happy to host and support the best performers in the world, Al notes, “It’s unfortunate that we’re saying no to some incredible people. We just can’t fit them all in.”

To see upcoming shows by Live Wire, please go to www.livewiremusicseries.ca  To learn more about Al Rankin’s shows, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 613-353-6650.