FIRST AID . . . First Kinnaird Boy Scouts (above) ca;

tured the junior boys' first aid title at the 36th annual
West Kootenay Mine Rescue and First Aid Meet Satur-
day in Nelson. Team members included (right to left)
Robert Graziotto, Mark Jacobs, Steve Jerome and

by the Workers’ Compensation Board, St. John Am-
bulance and the ministry of mines, energy and
petroleum resources, — Al Middleton photos.

Mine rescue — first aid

BC Timber second place "

By CasNews Staff

BC Timber’s Celgar first
aid squad captured a second
place in the 36th annual West
Kootenay Mine Rescue and
First Aid Meet over the
weekend in Nelson.

The Cominco Trail first aid
team took top spot. Castlegar

Ambulance won the novice

award, while Castlegar resi-
dent Steve Jmieff of the
Celgar team took the Gus
Porcher Memorial Award for
best first aid attendance not
on a winning team.

The First Kinnaird Boy
Scouts captured the junior
boys’ first aid title in their
first year in the event, while
St. Michael's School is run-
ner-up. The Beaver Valley

Splinters won the junior girls
title with Montrose Girls in
second place.

Stanley ies Senior

anic with his portable equip-
ment had’ just repaired a
split-rim tire.

At lakeside, a wharf

Secondary Rockey Senior
First Aid team captured the
three-member St. John Am-
bulance division.

The Sullivan Mine crews
from Cominco Kimberley
captured the top two spots in
the mine rescue competition.

The first aid’ competition
called for the teams to handle
three different “victims” who
were supposedly at the con-
struction site of Henry's
Sawmill on Kootenay Lake.
The scene had a backhoe
operator and two helpers
laying culverts while a mech-

Food basket
Pork, tomatoes
both increase

The Canadian Press

Events in distant places
affected the pocketbooks of
Canadian shoppers in May as
pork and tomatoe prices rose
and sugar fell.

In a survey of food prices
by The Canadian Press, pork
rose between one and 76
cents in the 12 cities sur-
veyed, while tomatoes were
up in 10 cities.

Jim Rollings, sales mana-
ger of the Ontario Pork
Producers Marketing Board,
said pork prices were higher
because Canadian pork is
part of a world market, so
that whatever happens else-
where has.an effect.

Exports from Denmark, &
major pork producing coun-
try, were cut off in North
America and Japan because
of an outbreak in Denmark of
foot-and-mouth disease, Rol-
lings said.

That opened up the Japan-
ese market to Canadian ex-
ports as well as reducing
supply, so prices rose, he
said.

Round steak roast also cost
more in most cities surveyed.
Dennis McGivern, market
analyst for the Canadian
Cattlemen’s Association, said
there was a short-term short-
age of beef at the same time

as a seasonal increase in
demand,
SUGAR COST LESS
Sugar prices decreased in
seven cities, with Ottawa
shoppers benefiting from the
biggest cut — the price
dropped 97 cents to 92 cents
for a two-kilogram bag.
Mel Davidson, spokesman
for the Canadian Sugar Insti-
tute, said latest estimates
show a 98-million-tonne sup:
ply of sugar worldwide, while
consumer demand is for
about 91 million tonnes.
That lowers the price of
sugar, he said, adding that
prices are lower in some
areas as stores put sugar on
special for the berry season.
Shoppers in Saint John,
N.B., has the greatest price
increase in the nine cities

where the price of tomatoes .

rose, paying $1.40 more a
pound,

Nick Luciano, produce
broker for F. G. Lister and
Co. Ltd. at the Ontario Food
Terminal, said heavy rain in
Florida has reduced the
quality of tomatoes available
for shipping.

Potatoes cost more in
seven cities, but that can be
expected at this time of year
as supplies dwindle, Luciano
said. “They're really not
overpriced.”

NOTICE

Electrolux Canada wishes to
notify their friends that-in or-
der to better serve the West
Kootenays they will be moving
their office from Trail to
Castlegar effective 31 May 82.

The new address will be 611
Columbia Ave. (Oglow Bldg.)
Phone 365-8431.

was a
group of tugs.

The first patient, was one of
the backhoe helpers who was
struck on the side of the head
while trying to “guide an
unsecured culvert into place.

The second patient was the
mechanic who was struck by
the exploding split-rim tire
while inflating it. And the

third patient was the wharf -

attendant who was last seen
dispatching the tugs and was
found floating in the water.

All three accidents were ~

taken from actual first aid
cases.

DISCOVERY

Discover the savings
on-hundreds of items, including:
Fashion and accessories
.for men, women and children.
Fumiture and other things
for bed, bath and kitchen.
Sporting goods, hardware
and much more!

Trail, B.C.

Dr. William Lewis Wright

d to create

praesent

‘
He was not a local pioncer. He wasn't famous or

In p Sf | have
some feeling of the history of this

He led no great armies nor garnered any military

y
presenting people who were iis ploneers, reflected
the times in which they lived, were prime movers in
the events of those times, or acted as a fulcrum about
which events turned to the present end. The man
about whom | write today fits none of these
categories, | write of him b must; t

it He built no or
nor did he destroy any person or thing. Indeed, he lived
quietly and peacibly with his neighbors all of his long life and
in all probability was little known beyond his own small
community and his college where he taught for 40 years.
heless, he was a VSP (Very Special Person) and I

admire him and what he stood for,

As always, any further information on the subject i

and will be ack

would like to give him his due while his memory is still in the
minds of those of us who were proud and honored to call him
‘friend,’ for he left us and the world richer for his having
been amonst us, and poorer by his death.

“He was a
wonderful
accompanist,
but he was also
a perfectionist
and when you
worked with

him he was
satisfied with
nothing but
the best.”

WILLIAM
LEWIS WRIGHT, PhD

poner sr ne ane Bel

CASTLEGAR NEWS, June 2, 1982

JOHN CHARTERS’

Reflections &
Recollections

ge
ia
ze

Boke

His:name was William Lewis Wright PhD. — Nova
Scotian by birth, professor of music by vocation, a beloved
and honored resident of the small community of Robson for
80 years, and a gentleman in every sense of the word.

He was an excellent pianist and organist and his
ambition had been to perform on the concert stage. To this
end he had studied in Germany under the world famous
concert pianist Goldowski. But when he realized that he
would never be quite good enough to achieve his ambition,
he took his doctoral degree in music at Dalhousi i

from encouraging others in the pursuit of theirs. He loved
to talk to children and to help them with an endless patience,
with their present problems, their ambitions for the future.
He was generous too with the fruits of his orchard, in
the sharing of his catch from early morning fishing
expeditions along the river bank, and particularly with his
time and his music. He was the organist for both the United
and Baptist services at the Robson Memorial church and he-
and Mrs. Bob Waldie, a singer, frequently performed at local

4and taught piano at Brandon College from 1907 to 1947. He

had the ion of being an ding teacher. It was
here also that he met and married Mrs. Wright, (Annie
Evans) a doctoral graduate in English from the University of
Chicago and a teacher in Brandon College where his brother
in-law, Dr. John R.C. Evans, was principal.

The Wrights and Evans had bought property in Robson
from a Mr. Horne, an early settler in the area, and during
the 80s would spend their summer holidays there with Dr.
McDermott, a baptist minister and a former principal of
Brandon College, who had retired to Robson.

In the late spring of 1947 the Wrights in their turn
retired and made Robson their permanent home, occupying
the property next to Mr. and Mrs, Bob Waldie. It was in the
winter of this same year that I first made the acquaintance
of Dr. Wright. It happened in this wise:

Ihad been walking home from schoo} in the deep winter
evening to upper Robson where I lived next to the Johnny
Androsoffs when I noticed an elderly man struggling with a
long ladder in the deep snow. He was attempting — without
too much success — to place it high on the side of a tall
house. I introduced myself and offered my help. He in turn
informed me that he was Dr. Charles Wright and said —
with a wry chuckle — “that his wife was out and that he had
forgotten his house key.” He was, ing to

gs. As Dr. Wright said, “We did a lot of weddings.”
“He was a wonderful accompanist,” recalls Mrs. Waldie,
“but he was also a perfectionist and when you worked with
him he was satisfied with nothing but the best.”
His other great love and stay in life was the Masonic
Lodge. He had been one of the initiators and prime movers
of the lodge in this area, attained the coveted level of a

* Thirty-third Degree Mason and was Worshipful master in

1961-52,

The Wrights greatly enjoyed the gracious life and Mrs.
Wright had acquired a fine collection of chinaware to
complement it. After her death he did an unusual — but for
him a typical thing when he was invited to dinner. He would
present the hostess with a cup and saucer from that
collection. It was a symbolic gesture to a life style that for
him had gone, but to us, the recipients, was a valued
memento of a gallant and gracious gentleman.

He also presented a memorial window to the Robson

1 Church, It is d to Mrs. Wright and Dr.
Evans who both died in 1959. The inscription reads “They
gave freely to their best.”

Dr. Wright died in 1971 at the age of 94, after a brief
illness — with his standards and all his faculties still intact
and quite prepared to live on. He is buried with his wife in
little Robson cemetery. But he left us a legacy which we by
indolence, neglect and by ignorance have almost lost. It is

gain entry through an unlocked upper storey window.

This alone should have alerted me to the fact that he,
like me, was a newcomer, for few people in those days of
innocence locked their doors. In any case we had the ladder
in place ina jiffy and a few moments later I was through the
window, down the stairs and opening the front door. For the
rest of his days Dr. Wright, eyes i always

the inder that in an age of ‘built-in-obsolesence’ and the
‘good-enough’ philsophy that there were (and doubtless are)
people who believe that there is only one standard of
workmanship — the very best: that there is one standard of
achievement — one notch above what you would have
believed yourself capable of.

He was a living reminder in an age when social conduct
is dat its lowest common denominator, and the term

introduced me as “his friend the second storey burglar.’ I in
turn was charmed from the moment we met.

Tall, slim and finely featured with pure white hair and
mustache and always faultlessly dressed, he looked like a
professor of music. When he went for a walk — which he did
every day — he wore a broad brimmed fedora hat tilted at a
slightly jaunty angle and carried a dress cane. All this gave
him the of a ‘who
would have been completely at his ease in the turn of the
century cafes of Paris and Berlin — a kind of Canadian
Maurice Chevalier. Certainly it brought to vivid life his
stories of life as a student in the highly cultivated and
militaristic Germany of Kaisar Wilhelm I, whom he regarded

‘gentleman’ is courtesy title only, that these terms had living
meaning. Ina time of much advice and little example he was
aconstant reminder that to dream is the right of every child,
to help him to achieve his dreams ia the responsibility of
mature adults,

“Jt you had A ability he expected A plus,” fellow Mason
Jim Lamont recalls." You either loved the ‘Doc’ or you
couldn't stand him —there was no in between. But you
always respected him. There was no second best in his
vocab Ag
Mrs. Waldie has the last word: “He was such a good
friend, a fine scholar, a beautiful musician, courtly and
gracious in manner — a perfect gentleman.”

as a slightly ridiculous egomaniac.
It is the mark of the man that he was able to accept his

For what better reasons should a man be remembered?
The addition to that memorial window now reads

and without to set

own limit
aside his own dreams, and as a lifelong teacher never tired

ly William Lewis Wright: “To live in the hearts

we leave behind is not to die.”

YUKON FIDDLER... Joe Loutchan lays “Big John
MacNeil” by the riverboat “Klondike” in White-
horse, Yukon. The famed northern musician has

‘Joe Loutchan

played as far.south as Anaheim, California, and at
Alert — the most northerly permanent human
habitation in the world and most points in between.
. —Canadian Government Office of Tourism Photo.

By TONY SLOAN

It’s a summer day in
Whitehorse, Yukon and
the white paint on the his-
toric old riverbcat S.S.
Klondike gleams in the
glare of the noonday sun,
It's retired now and sits
high and dry on the banks
of the Yukon River.

It's the same -river
where, 80 years ago, the
huge wood-burning steam-
er plied between White-
horse and Dawson City
—journey’s end for the
world famous Klondike
Gold Rush of 1898.

A husky gent, work-
tanned and with his, shirt
sleeves rolled up, lays a
violin case on the pedes-
trian dock, takes out the
fiddle and leans against a
mooring post for a back-
rest.

He checks the instru-
ment’s tuning with a pluck
or two on the strings,
draws a stroke with the
bow and then, with a grin
of approval, launches into

the foot-tapping rhythms ©

of “Big John McNeil.”

An elderly couple stop
and smile hesitantly and
node their heads to the
lilting music.

“Who is that man?”
another outsider (summer
visitor) is heard to ask a
passerby who had waved
at the musician in recog-
nition.

“That's Joe Loutchan,”
the man replied proudly,

“the best damn fiddler in’

all of the Yukon and then
some.”

Born in Winnipeg, Man-
itoba, Loutchan moved
north to the Yukon 20
years ago.

Back in the 1950s, he
played in the first licensed
bar legally allowed to have
live entertainment in Man-
itoba. The owner tipped
each member of the band
$100 at the end of the
week,

“That was a lot of money
in those days,” Joe recalls,
“so for the next two years

Fiddling around in Whitehorse,

we played prairie hotels . .
we lived on beer, garlic
sausage and dust.”

A stint with radio sta-
tion CKSB in St. Boniface,
Manitoba, was another
early career credit.

Loutehan's stories about.
the circumstances and
places he has played are, to
some extent, an indication
of the recreational acti-
vities and attractions avail-
able to the Yukon visitor
today.

He is the ized pied

Yukon

years ago. He was swing-
ing into the saddle when a
starting car engine spook-
ed his horse.

The horse bolted and Joe
was carried along but was
eventually thrown to the
ground, Both his -wrists
were broken. He practised
for two years before he
was satisfied he was able
to play as well as before.

A more recent accident
involving a four-wheel-
drive vehicle left him with
hed in a

piper of the Sourdough
Rendezvous held in White-

- horse each year in Febru-

ary. This week of mid-
winter fun and games in-
eludes just about every-
thing from dances, ban-
quets, dog team races,
flour packing and squaw
wrestling to fiddle con-
tests.

Loutchan usually renews
his right to the title by
winning the fiddlers’ con-
test against all comers and
then proceeds to entertain
throughout the lounge and
nightclub circuit in White-
horse.

One year, so he wouldn't
have to stop playing, he
was transported on the
front fender of a Model T
Ford between bars. When
the vintage Ford's radiator
boiled over, beer was
added to restore its cool.

As a big game outfitter,
Joe has played fiddle on
horseback when on the
trail and to entertain hunt-
ers in camp or around the
fire at night.

When. working as a
campground supervisor for
a $20 km (220 mile) stretch
along the Yukon River, he
frequently treats campers
to an impromptu and mel-
odic serenade. It's an aid to
rest and respose for south-
ern visitors who have
trouble sleeping during the
unusually bright, Yukon
summer nights.

Physical injuries from a
tragic accident almost
ended his playing career 10

thumb. He was unable to
play for an entire winter.

He played in a cockpit of
a Hercules transport air-
craft high in the lonely
darkness of an arctic win-
ter night. When the Yukon
River remained open in
1870, he played fiddle in
the bow of a canoe when
they staged a mid-winter
race.

Loutchan has played
throughout Alaska and as
far south as Anaheim, Cal-
ifornia, but his most rem-
erable audience was at
Alert.

Alert is a combined mil-
itary and meteorological
base on the northern tip of
North America and is
claimed to be the most
northerly permanent set-
tlement in the world.

“There were about 200
men at Alert doing a six-

* month stint back about

1975. Our group included
the can-can girls from the
Frantic Follies here in
Whitehorse and talk about
an appreciative audience
.». those guys almost went
ape.”

Mention of the Frantic
Follies — a hilarious gay
90s revue based in White-
horse every summer — re-
minds one that the Yukon
is not all hiking, canoeing,
river rafting, conducted
riverboat tours, fishing,
hunting, camping, moun-
tain climbing, wildlife and
nature photography tours.

Whitehorse, due per-
haps in part to its geo-

nest.

_the Yukon through music

.

graphical isolation, is a
surprisingly cosmopolitan
city for its size (16,000
population).

A tour of the MacBride
Museum during the day is
a step back in time to the
days of the Gold Rush. The
scene sets the mood for the
visitor to enjoy nighttime
gourmet dining at such
restaurants as The Golden
Garter, Mohte Carlo or
The Cellar to mention just
three_of Whitehorse's fi-

If you have a mind to
work up a real appetite
during the day, the hiking
trails around Whitehorse
will fill the bill.

The spanking new
Whitehorse Ski Club chalet
is both a perfectly located
and posh base of opera-
tions for the west side
trails but it’s the Grey
Mountain Hiking Trail on
the other side of town that
really gets the nod.

A road winds up and up
but whether you climb or
drive, the view from the
summit ridge is worth
every ounce of effort. This
is a 24 km (15 mile) trek
that can be done in a day.

And Joe Loutchan? . . .
when last seen, he was
playing “Boil That Cab-
bage Down” on the steps
below the Peace Tower
and the Parliament Build-
ings in Canada’s capital —
Ottawa.

he was joined on the
same occasion by Yukon
balladeer Hank Karr who
sang his own hauntingly
beautiful composition
“Paddle Wheeler.”

While these two fine ar-
tists portray the spell of

and song, why not treat
yourself to the real thing
and spend a few days in
and around Whitehorse
this summer?

For more information on
Canadian vacations contact
the Canadian Government
Office of Tourism, Ottawa,
Canada K1A OH6,