Month: September 2016

By Jim Hagarty
I was driving by a factory in my town tonight when I saw this beautiful 1957 Ford Fairlane in the parking lot. Like seeing deer in the woods.

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By Jim Hagarty
1989

I guess it’s inevitable that once in a while, people’s surnames will relate in some amusing way to their occupations. In fact, I’ve noticed a lot of such cases lately so I started keeping track. Here’s my list so far. More to come when I have them.

John Field is a farm management specialist who I hear is outstanding in his (don’t embarrass me by making me say it). Garry Lean is an organic farmer who promotes safer meat products, but that’s a thin connection, isn’t it? When John Tory first realized what his name was, he could see no future for himself except as the Conservative Party organizer he is, Conversatives liking to refer to themselves as Tories. And Dale Willows climbed to the top of the Guelph-based environmental group Tree Watch and when asked if he’d like to be president of the organization, replied, “I wood.” And he is.

James Coyne was Bank of Canada governor years ago until he was flipped out of the job. George Pond, of Simcoe, is a naturalist and as I understand it, quite a deep man. I wish him well. Raleigh Buckmaster, of Iowa, is a deer rancher. And Joe Pushcart just sort of shoved his way into the job of junkman in Plainsville, Connecticut.

The Quebec cabinet minister who resigned over the province’s French-only sign law last year is named Richard French, or should that be Richard Francois? Barry Player is a Winnipeg guitar player, or at least he picks away at it. And Anne London is a reporter with The London Free Press. Rumor has it she’s worked at other big city newspapers under, various assumed names including Anne Hamilton, Anne Windsor and Anne Toronto. A rising Star.

Mary Beth Peacock is with the Ontario Humane Society so be kind to her and don’t ruffle her feathers and Peggy Green is the leader of a 4-H landscaping club so thumbs up to her too. Andre Bureau is a chief federal bureaucrat with the Canadian Radio Television and Telecommunications Commission but good luck trying to telecommunicate with him.

For some reason, a lot of doctors have names bearing a bit of irony in light of their profession although doctors Illman, Deadman, Aikenhead, Payne and Death (pronounced Deeth) never suffered for business because of their monikers, as far as I know. Either has the Trench funeral home in Listowel or the Box funeral home in Parkhill. A friend of mine regularly hires Flood Plumbing from New Hamburg and is happy with the work they do. Ann Bald does a good hairdressing business in Sebringville, I’ve heard.

Kitchener lawyers Stewart Dollar and Richard Buck both know how to make a living. Dr. W.E. Nurse, a Kitchener obstetrician, is both a doctor and a Nurse so he’s a real team player though confusion sometimes ensues whenever Dr. Nurse is paged over the public address system in the hospital.
Car shot? Call Schott Auto Service in Waterloo or in that same city, try Wheeler Motors. Another dealer.

Next Easter, get your blooming flowers at the Bloomingdale Garden Centre and for cards to mark the occasion, contact Bunny Sicard, public relations co-ordinator for Hallmark greeting cards, Easter promotions. Whatever your request, she’ll hop right to it.

By Jim Hagarty
Renowned Terrible Limericker

Hats off to Percy the gnat.
He is one pretty awesome cool cat.
He has lots of bucks
And owns his own tux.
I am guessing you didn’t know that.

By Jim Hagarty
2016

The other night, six retired journalists, including me, went to the racetrack. We do this spring and fall, twice a year. Our journalism careers were all played out in different places, mostly weekly and daily newspapers, a bit of TV and radio broadcast. We were all pretty good at our craft. And when the six of us wound up teaching together at the same local college, I hope I am not bragging to say that the quality of the journalism program there took a significant leap.

We started going to the racetrack a few years ago because one of our former students, who most of us taught, sort of runs the place now, and we all like her. She is a genuine sparkplug and she seems to like us. She’s always slipping us free “betting bucks” which we usually proceed to lose right away.

We all put $20 on the table and bet till it’s gone. This week, we did pretty well and we all got our $20 back. Usually, there are only a few coins left on the table after we’ve blown the bundle. But one night we did win $800 which was a thrill.

We don’t talk about our journalism careers or the college much any more, thank God, but we are all still very interested in anything to do with news and news media. If you were forced to listen to our conversation for more than an hour, you might be looking to dash out onto the racetrack in the hope that a horse would run you down. But we think we are interesting and that’s all that counts.

I hate to report that we do too much moanin’ and groanin’ about what we seem to have decided is the poor state of journalism today, especially when it comes to newspapers that serve towns and small cities in our area. If we had been sitting around a table in 1900, instead of 2016, we probably would have been badmouthing that newfangled horseless carriage with the motor in the front. We would long for the days when horses ruled supreme and make all sorts of predictions about how the automobile would never catch on.

I am afraid to say I moan and groan with the loudest of them, but I am secretly not as pessimistic about the future of journalism as they appear to be. This doesn’t earn me any hero badges; I just think mankind is not doomed. My faith in the younger generations coming along may be misplaced but I don’t think so. There are a lot of good things happening in the world, including in the world of journalism. The Internet has allowed for the explosion of “citizen journalism” and I see great potential in that. People who are not tied to any corporation and don’t have to worry about keeping advertisers happy are free to stick their nose into all sorts of monkey business. Yes, they are mostly non-professionals and yes, they get things wrong sometimes, but there is a fearlessness there that I admire.

Journalists do not belong in the entertainment business. We have one job only and that is to seek the truth and tell the world about it.

One of my proudest moments in this business came one night when I was eating alone in a restaurant. A policeman came in, made a phone call from a pay phone at the back where I could see him, and jotted down something on a notepad that was always there by the phone. He ripped off the top page. After he left, I went over and took the page that had been under the one he wrote on. Here’s some high-tech sleuthing for you: I got a pencil and shaded in the imprint the policeman’s pen had made. Plain as day was revealed a phone number.

I phoned that number the next day and ended up with the biggest story I had had till then. The authorities involved in the story were furious with me but if a journalist goes through his career without ruffling a few feathers, he might want to leave the chicken coop for all the good he is probably doing.

The thing about freedom of the press is, it is a pillar of our society. When it is degraded somehow, our communities suffer.

In perilous times, the role of the journalist is vital.

Times such as these, for example.

By Jim Hagarty
2006

There it sat in the neighbour’s driveway. A fine-looking racing bike: All blue with blue fenders. The seat was a bit chewed up but everything else looked fine. Especially the pricetag.

Ten dollars.

The thought, “How could I go wrong?” ran through my head. The fact was, I couldn’t. So I ran home, raided the penny jar and came up with a fistful of coins. I deposited them in the seller’s grateful hands, mounted the best bargain I’d run into in a long time, and rode off towards home.

I only fell off the blasted thing twice – the second time almost hitting my garage door in the process. The first time, on the sidewalk heading home, had I fallen to my right (and into the street) instead of my left (and onto a lawn) I might still be in traction or worse.

When we want to remind ourselves that we’re up to a challenge, we almost always compare it to riding a bike: Once you learn how, you never forget. A theory, I think, that has never been challenged. Even riding a bike is not always just like riding a bike.

Maybe it has something to do, however, with the way you learned to ride. I well remember that day in our farm laneway when my father ran along beside me with his hand on my bike seat till he let go and I was off on my first solo flight. I might still be going, perhaps, had it not been for the fact that a big John Deere harvester jumped out in front of me. Up and over the handlebars I soared and into the guts of the machine which were designed to cut up corn, not kids.

I had learned to ride my bike, all right, but I hadn’t learned to turn. Or stop.

Fifty years later, much the same feelings arose in me as my steel garage door came racing down the driveway towards me. I put the bike away, determined to sell it at the next opportunity. Its wheels were too big and, as I am equipped with notoriously short legs (my ancestors were leprechauns), I just couldn’t fit onto it.

But a Higher Power must have wanted to see me sitting atop a two-wheeler because last week, a bit farther up my street, I hit the jackpot. Another bike, even finer-looking than the first. Silver fenders. Chain guard. Old-style handlebars – not those silly, curved racing ones. Handbrakes that really work. And the best part – a total of three speeds which, even at that, are two more than I need but about 18 fewer than most bikes nowadays.

It also had an almost-new big, fat seat, the better to carry not-so-new big, fat seats.

This time, I got smart and asked the owner if I could take it for a ride before buying it. He agreed, not knowing whether or not he would ever see me or his vehicle again. A few yards down the road, I knew this was the one. Forty dollars came flying out of my pocket like they had wings on and I rode my purchase home.

My family all came out to see Dad tour up and down in front of the house on his new classic bike. The pressure’s been on me for some time to get with the program. Finally, I had made it, without a big cash outlay, to boot.

I didn’t do it for fitness, though it probably won’t hurt in that department, assuming I don’t get run down by an 18-wheeler. I did it for the family. I’ve missed out on too much the past few years as kids and Mom have cycled up and down, all over town.

But after the kids were in bed the night I bought it, I took my bike to a nearby parking lot and practised a few old techniques. Little by little, things started to come back to me. And a couple of nights later, after I finished cutting the lawn, I found myself wanting to go for a ride. Not to please anyone else but me. It was great.

The wind whipping by my ears, the earth moving under my feet. And not a John Deere harvester in sight.