As we filed down the loading ramp toward the flight, there was one face in the group of passengers around me that looked familiar. Was he a TV host? Maybe a sports personality? Possibly a politician? As passengers began stowing their bags overhead, I realized he wasn’t any of those guesses I’d made on the ramp. Then, it hit me as I sat down beside him.
“You’re John Ralston Saul, aren’t you?” I said.
He nodded, smiled and said, “Or, as some call me, Mr. Adrienne Clarkson.” (more…)
He didn’t look much like a pioneer. But J. Frank Willis sure was. Dressed in tall boots, a long coat and scarf, wearing a fedora – typical of the 1930s – he was a reporter. Hearing news of a coal-mine rescue underway in a remote corner of Nova Scotia, he made his way to a place called Moose River.
There, he found the only available land telephone line and got permission to broadcast from the mouth of the mine. Miners were trapped 50 metres underground and their would-be rescuers had been digging for days to reach them. Willis held his primitive microphone in front of one of the rescuers.
“Here, ladies and gentlemen, is the captain of the rescue team from Stellerton, Nova Scotia,” Willis said.
“Hello Stellerton,” the captain said. “We’re getting’ along fine. We’ll have those men up in a couple of hours.” (more…)
It was getting late on Saturday afternoon. The chief dignitary at our event, the lieutenant governor of Ontario, had moved on to her next appointment. Most of the remaining dignitaries had left too. Only the volunteers were left cleaning up and chatting with us hangers-on. Suddenly a car pulled up and a couple emerged.
“Has the event already happened?” the woman asked. “Have they unveiled the sculpture?”
“The sculpture of Maud?” I repeated. “Yes, they have.”
“We’ve come a long way,” she said.
“Don’t worry. Just about everybody’s gone,” I said. “But the sculpture’s not going anywhere. She’s just waiting for you.” (more…)