Keith Dee, the Director of Membership Services with Community Living – Ontario was the keynote speaker at the 37th Annual General Meeting for Community Living - North Frontenac (CL-NF).

The meeting was held on August 26 at the Sharbot Lake Country Inn and was well attended by CL-NF clients, their families, staff, and community members.

Dee outlined the challenges being faced by Community Living agencies and the people they serve due to what he said has been uncertainties regarding funding commitments from the province.

“We are particularly concerned about two sets of individuals,” Dee said, “young people coming out of the school system at age 20 to find there is no support, and ageing family members who are no longer able to care for their [intellectually disabled] adult children." Dee said that the provincial office has been working hard to convince the province that a long range plan is needed for the agencies and their clients.

On the local level, the annual report included a number of articles about the activities of Community Living members, including the ongoing efforts at the Treasure Trunk and trips to Stars on Ice, the Stewart Park Music Festival, the Brockville Speedway, Parham Fair, and the Bowmanville Zoo.

In his annual report, CL-NF Executive Director Dean Walsh said the intellectually disabled are waiting for an ombudsman's report, which is expected this fall and which will likely result in changes in the sector.

Clarendon Central Public School in Plevna will be celebrating its 50th anniversary on Sat. April 13 from 10 a.m. -4 p.m. Everyone is welcome whether you attended the school or not. For community members who moved into the area in retirement, you might wish to see how the little country school evolved. In the Sixties Decade room there will be a display about the schools that amalgamated prior to the construction of CCPS.

Photos still misssing! Students from the sixties and seventies do you have at least one photo to share? It might not be one taken at school, but one from home when you were school age. The Decade room organizers have worked very hard to put together great displays and we do not want to miss seeing your cute or funny face. Please contact Heather @ 479-5549; Mona @ 479-2868; or Cindy @ 479-2561, if you can loan any photos or items from the 60's and 70's.

The Committee has arranged parking at the back lot of North of 7 for all visitors. A shuttle will take you to the school and return you to your vehicle as needed. Because the school parking lot is so small, we ask that the limited spaces at the school be reserved for those with mobility issues. Parking along the highway is always discouraged for safety reasons.

A memorial wall has been organized by Marily Seitz (479-2855) to remember those former staff and students who passed away. She has collected a photo, years they were at the school and birth and death dates. If you have not been contacted by now about your loved one, please check that Marily has the information.

The fundraiser to cover anniversary expenses is the sale of raffle tickets. Prizes are: Sunbonnet quilt and quilt stand, an oak blanket box, a painting and a sketch. Other items from the committee will be sold as close to cost as possible. These include: a full color yearbook (also available on DVD), coffee mug and anniversary cards.

Please support your local school as it celebrates 50 years of educating children.

In a special service held on September 15, members of the Land O' Lakes Emmanuel United Church remembered and celebrated the many decades they shared together at the Cloyne United Church. The church represents the last of the four properties to be sold by the Land O’ Lakes Emmanuel Pastoral Charge. A decision was made by the congregation in May of 2011 to sell all of their buildings and to relocate to a new, single central site, which at this time is yet to be determined. In December 2011 the Harlowe church was sold, as was the Flinton manse in February 2012, followed by the Flinton Riverside church in June 2012.

Reverend Judith M. Evenden headed up the often very emotional service and she opened with the words, “We are here today to commemorate a church building that has been a place of sanctuary for many, many years. We are here to give thanks to those who built, maintained, renovated and nurtured this place as a place of worship and other activities. We are here to remember, to tell stories and sing songs of praise....and to pray with words and in silence that the many memories of this place will never be forgotten.”

Thirty-eight-year member of the church congregation, Louise Hogg, also spoke and reflected on the church's rich history, which was gleaned partly from the book, “The Oxen and the Axe”, and from the wealth of memories of various members of the congregation. I have included some of that history here.

On December 17, 1872, a one-half acre of land, a parsonage lot, was purchased for $25 from Charles MacDonald by trustees of the Methodist Church. Construction began on the church 11 years later in 1883 when Reverend Howard organized work bees and volunteers cut logs on the north shore of Marble Lake. The logs were then taken to John Perry's water-powered saw mill. On Nov. 8, 1884, a mortgage of $100 was signed by trustees. The next year another eighth of an acre of land was purchased and six years later, on November 20, 1901, a new mortgage of $200 was held by the Methodist Church and given to trustees of the parsonage and to three trustees at Harlowe.

Hogg said that information about the church in the early 1900s was “pretty sketchy” due to the fact that all church records were lost as a result of a lightning strike on the minister’s study. In 1951 one minister was appointed to take care of the churches at Cloyne, Harlowe, Flinton, Northbrook and Kaladar. The minister resided at the Flinton parsonage. Then, in 1965 the Cloyne parsonage was sold and converted into two apartments. In the late 1960s the Kaladar and Cloyne churches were closed and in 1967 the congregations of Cloyne, Northbrook and Kaladar combined to worship at the Northbrook site, which is now the home of their clothing boutique. The Cloyne church did remain open during this time in the summer months only for cottagers, but soon after congregants felt the need for the church to remain open on a regular basis due to the increasing number of congregants in the Cloyne and surrounding area. In 1977 the Northbrook church was closed and the Cloyne church reopened with volunteers redoing the pews, insulating and re-paneling the main sanctuary, lowering its ceiling, re-enforcing and redoing the floors, and building its main floor cabinets. As the number of children attending the church began to increase, an addition was added that included a Sunday school space, a kitchen and washroom facilities, a choir loft and a space for the organist. The addition project was headed up by Stan Patterson and a number of local volunteers also assisted. Later the new stained glass windows were built and installed and a new steel roof was added. An expansion at the front of the church was also added later and the bell tower was improved.

Reverend Hugh Rose, who helped with the summer supply at the church, spoke of his first time attending the church with his wife 49 years ago. He recalled being “welcomed so completely”, especially by Gerald and Bernice Wise and Ora Wickware. He stressed that “This congregation has always had the gift of making people feel so very welcome.” Members of the congregation then had a chance to share some of their personal memories of the church, after which Rev. Evenden played a video she made commemorating the building and its many members.

Special guests who also presided at the service were Michelle Brotherton, president of the Bay of Quinte Conference, and Ruth Wood, chair of the Four Winds Presbytery, who both spoke of the importance of the people who make up the church community, and who wherever they may find themselves, are what make the heart and soul of the church community. Long-time organist at the church, Mary Ann Tryon, also played at the service.

Following the service Reverend Evenden said that the day had been a long time coming. “Somehow though, it still does not feel real yet.” She and her group are actively looking to purchase a new site to worship. In the meantime services will be held weekly on Sundays at the Northbrook Lions Hall at 10 a.m. after September 22 until a new location can be found.

NAEC grad Misty Meeks has been chosen for Marketing Magazine’s prestigious 30 under Thirty list for 2013. Every year the national magazine names “the 30 smartest young thinkers in marketing today”

When Meeks graduated from North Addington Education Centre in 2000, there was little in the way of digital capacity in the region. Cell service and High Speed Internet were not even on the radar for the area, and the concept of online marketing was in the far distant future.

Not so at Centennial College, where Meeks went to study Creative Advertising after leaving NAEC. After graduating from Centennial she went on to an internship as a copywriter at Hamilton-based Wishart, an ad agency that focuses on the public sector. She began moving away from traditional writing and eventually became Wishart’s webmaster.

She left Wishart to take a job with the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) where she helped build up the social networking practice for the society and mentored colleagues from 10 countries around the world.

Working with WSPA enabled Misty Meeks to work towards social and behavioural change.

In 2010, she took a job with Argyle Communications in Toronto, at a time when the agency was “building out its digital practice". Meeks was chosen to lead and grow the digital media team at Argyle.

One of her most successful campaigns thus far at Argyle was a campaign to promote the Crosstown, a transit line across the Eglinton corridor in Toronto. Using an online public meeting approach to achieve 19,000 plus views on Youtube, over 1,000 fans on Facebook, and over 89,000 website visits, the Crosstown campaign won national and international awards.

“Misty has thrived at Argyle because she exemplifies the two most critical things about our corporate culture,” said Argyle President Daniel Tisch, “setting high standards and treating people well.”

Misty Meeks has been promoted to the director level at Argyle, at the age of 29 the youngest ever to attain that position.

Back in Addington Highlands, her parents Sharon and Roger are understandably proud of their daughter’s achievements.

Frontenac County Council agreed last week to proceed with a contract for the construction of an ambulance base in North Frontenac Township. The contract was awarded to Argue Construction for $503,650.

However additional costs, including professional costs of $81,363 and an item listed in a report by Chief of Paramedic Services Paul Charbonneau as “other costs” of $51,686 will bring the total cost to $670,000.

The County has $450,000 budgeted for the project, and agreed to take the extra $220,000 from reserve funds in order to complete the project in the first part of 2014.

Charbonneau told Council that the cost works out to $288 per square foot for the stand alone building, a steep increase from the cost incurred for the construction of the Sydenham ambulance base just three years ago, which came in at $172 per square foot.

“In retrospect, I would say we got a very good deal when we built the Sydenham base,” said Charbonneau.

Part of the overrun stems from the decision that Council made to upgrade the status of the Robertsville base to a stand-alone ambulance base rather than an ambulance post, as had been originally planned. This means that the paramedics who will be providing service out of the base from 6 am to 6 pm daily will start and end their 12-hour shift at Robertsville. If it was only a post at that location the shifts would start and end at the Parham base, which would cut the North Frontenac-based service by the travel time from Parham to Robertsville, which is as much as 90 minutes each day.

Charbonneau also cited land acquisition fees and the cost of environmental assessments as partial reasons for the cost overrun.

However, the purchase price of the lot where the base will be located, which was paid to a private landowner, was only $20,000. That is less than half the $42,000 that the County paid to South Frontenac Township to buy the one acre where the Sydenham base was located.

The Robertsville base was originally slated to be built in Ompah, as part of a joint project with North Frontenac to build an ambulance base/fire hall complex. However that project was abandoned last year because North Frontenac balked at the projected cost.

It is thanks to the efforts of Frontenac Auxiliary OPP Constable Jeremy Saunders that many residents in South and Central Frontenac have become regular supporters of the local food banks. Saunders began the Frontenac OPP “Stuff the Cruiser” food drives in South Frontenac in 2010, and also took over the corresponding event in Central Frontenac that same year. Since then he has helped to raise over $26,500 in food donations for the Southern Frontenac Community Services (SFCS) and the North Frontenac food banks. When he is not working as an OPP auxiliary constable, Saunders works as a shunter/driver for Tim Horton's at their Kingston warehouse, and it was in recognition of his work for the food bank that he was nominated by one of his fellow employees at Tim Horton's for the company’s annual Humanitarian Award.

It was the second year that Saunders was nominated for the award. He and six other finalists were invited to Oakville, Ont., where the winner was announced in a special live broadcast in front of 500 guests at the Meeting Place Conference Center on February 21.

This year Saunders took home the award, which was presented to him by Tim Horton's CEO, Paul House. In his acceptance speech Saunders said that the food drives would not have been such a success without the help of the 12 other members of the Frontenac OPP Auxiliary Unit. When I spoke to him by phone earlier this week, Saunders highlighted what the recognition means to him. “It's really nice to be recognized and the best part of it all is that it will help to increase the awareness of the needs of local area food banks here in South and Central Frontenac.”

Along with the award came a cheque for $5,000, which the award winner is invited to donate to a charity of their choice. Jeremy has decided to share the cheque between the SFCS and North Frontenac food banks and he will be presenting it to them at a later date.

The next Stuff the Cruiser event will take place on Saturday March 23 at the Sydenham and Verona Foodlands from 10am-3pm. Congratulations, Jeremy.

Cloyne and District Historical Society members and guests were treated to an uncommon slice of history at this month’s regular meeting. Musical history, that is.

Joe Grant of Denbigh, who has dedicated much of his musical talents to both the preservation and creation of historical music, performed a number of traditional and original pieces that harkened back to the lumber camp days in the area. Grant, a former French teacher, gained notoriety in the group Tanglefoot, which he formed with two other teachers in the 1970s as a means of “turning Canadian history and folklore into musical entertainment”.

He explained that the name Tanglefoot came from a song about the Don Jail in Toronto, which includes the line “If you want to get into that palace so neat, drink Tanglefoot whiskey and get drunk on the street.”

Grant has long had a passion for the historical music of Canada and was influenced by his parents, who were both musicians, and also by his grandfather, who worked in lumber camps. It was due to an injury on the job that Grant’s grandfather ended up in the cook tent at a camp, where the French cook taught him to play the fiddle.

Joe Grant not only sings but also plays harmonica, guitar and fiddle and he began his presentation with an a capella song, an Iroquois lullaby. He said that though it is not a physical artifact that one can hold in their hands, it still qualifies as a musical artifact since it was made by man. Next he strapped on a fléchée, a woven waist sash commonly worn by French Voyageurs and sang a typical Voyageur song, which he explained was sung “as a way for the paddlers to keep time with each other”. He sang a number of lumber camp songs that described the very difficult work days and conditions there. One song in particular contained a chorus with one of Grant’s favorite lines: “Give the shanty boy whiskey, there's nothing goes wrong.”

Next he played a Hohner harmonica, a common instrument used after the 1850s, and he spoke of a letter written by Abraham Lincoln to the Hohner company saying that one of his (Abe's) greatest pleasures was sitting on his front porch playing his harmonica and smoking sweet hemp.

Joe Grant's grandfather told him how the harmonica would be used to play dance tunes at the camp and Grant demonstrated playing a double reed harmonica, which he learned to play from old timers in the Denbigh area who themselves either played in the lumber camps or learned from their relatives who worked and played them there. Grant played and sang a few of the more racy and comical songs from that time, one called “The Booty Boo”, which tells of a woman making the moves on a lumber jack and another called “Oh No, John No”, which tells of a wife whose husband banishes her to hell. But by the end of the song she comes back to him since she proves more of a hellion that even the inhabitants of that particular place could tolerate.

One member of the audience, Graydon MacCrimmon of Northbrook, joined Grant onstage playing both the harmonica and a very old concertina that had been in his wife's family for years. The two played three songs together, and another member of the audience was so moved that she got up on the floor to perform a step dance. Grant said following his performance that it is the authenticity, the spontaneity of the music that continues to inspire him. “I have always been interested in how things were done in the past. As society continues to evolve and change there is a lot that has been gained but I have always been more intrigued by what exactly it is that we have lost. One thing I think that we have lost is this huge knowledge of world history both in song and poetry.”

Though the group Tanglefoot has officially disbanded, Joe Grant continues to bring his own unique historical music to listeners in three other bands that he is currently playing with: The Pickled Chicken String Band, Highway 41 and Gopher Barocque.