Results for ‘Louis Blake Duff’
Editorial Louis Blake Duff
[The Welland Tribune and Telegraph, 20 March 1924]
The Parks Superintendent reports that recently planted trees in Merritt Park have been interfered with, presumably by small boys. This conclusion is arrived at by the fact that the damage was done with a jack-knife.
Apart from showing very bad manners this is an act of wanton destruction. The trees were purchased by the Board of Parks Management and planted as part of their scheme in the beautification of the city, and yet for no apparent reason certain boys have seen fit to tear them up and destroy them.
The parks of Welland are being developed and beautified for the boys. The parks are really theirs.
Boys, you should look after your own parks and see that not a thing is harmed.
[Welland Telegraph, 31 May 1910]
At the Ontario Club banquet in Toronto last week the Hon. Wm. Puglsey referred to the need of better wharfage and mentioned that proper mechanical appliances should be provided with the necessary depth of water to enable vessels of deep draught carrying large cargoes to discharge them rapidly and cheaply. “That means,” Mr. Puglsey went on, “the deepening and enlarging of the Welland Canal. It is a great work, which must be undertaken in the not distant future. Let me say, however, that this country is big and wealthy enough to undertake these two great works just as soon as we have the National Transcontinental Railway completed. In 1913, at the very outside, it will be completed from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and the country will be in a position then to undertake these two important works-the enlarging of the Welland Canal and the building of the Montreal-Ottawa-Georgian Bay Canal.”
[Welland Telegraph, 31 May 1910]
The alderman who declares he will introduce a bylaw to prohibit the sale and use of fireworks in this town will find himself supported by a largely preponderating public opinion. Tuesday night one of the most valuable buildings in the down town section was set on fire by fireworks, and in that a splendid industry was threatened with destruction. A little girl in Welland had her eyes injured with a firecracker on Tuesday morning. On a public holiday the fine spirit loaded with firecrackers makes in unsafe for persons or vehicles to travel on Main Street. Property, of course, is always in danger. In St. Catharines on Victoria Day fireworks frightened a horse so that a man and his wife were thrown through a plate glass window and both had to be removed to the hospital.
There is surely something wrong about a pastime that carries with it exasperating annoyance and serious danger. The people of Welland are probably about ready to deny themselves the use of fire crackers.
[See related EVENT: TWO FIRES STARTED/A Number of Charges Against the Pastime of Shooting off Fireworks]
[The Welland Tribune and Telegraph, 27 July 1922]
Welland is a young city.
“Quite obvious,” most citizens will rejoin.
Yet why do we call the city young? When will it be old? Is the municipality to be in its youth, while the brick of its factories and public buildings reflect the recent touches of the workmen? Is it to be known as old, when these same buildings are darkened with age and weather beaten by the passages of time? Shall we say that London, Paris and Rome are old; that New York, Chicago and Montreal are middle aged; and that such places as Brantford, Niagara Falls, Chatham and Welland are young?
Rather an interesting way to determine the age of a city is suggested in that last issue of the Christian Guardian, where Arthur Barner deals with old age and human beings. He says:
“Old age is a psychological, rather than a physical matter. The division is made in words, “Your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams.” If we can extend the period of vision until we cross the river, we shall never really grow old. The forward look keeps people young, in spite of physical ailment and weight of years.”
What Mr. Barner says of men may well be applied to cities. Welland is not young merely because a few years have passed since its incorporation. It is in its youth because its citizens are planning for the future, because those who are at present guiding its destiny see visions of a larger, more useful community. Just so long as the future generations keep a vision of something better before them, so long will the city stay youthful and vigorous.
May we never grow old!
[The Welland Tribune and Telegraph, 27 June 1922]
The Welland Tribune and Telegraph, Limited
Louis Blake Duff, Editor
One summer day nearly sixty years ago a boy hoeing corn on a Crowland farm, reaching the road end of the row, hung his hoe on the rail fence, leaped over into the highway and set out for the Village of Welland.
Jumping the fence Alexander Griffith took an unceremonious farewell to agriculture and made an unpropitious entrance to town life. He hadn’t any capital except his character and his physique. He died last week a wealthy man and an honored citizen.
When he jumped from the cornfield he landed, as may be guessed, on no bed of roses, but on a flinty road, and flinty it proved to be for many miles and years that lay before him. He learned a trade as harness maker and all he ever learned about it was how to make a good harness. Then with a partner, he bought out a business and we have heard him tell how for the first few winters the firm had only one overcoat to its name. When one partner went out the other had to stay in.
His life is closed now and there are some things one can say about it and should say about it, as due his memory. To add a brighter color or to exaggerate would be particularly out of place. He never tried to appear anything he was not, nor shall we do him the dishonor of giving him any garb but the one he wore. He gained his foothold in a hard school and he never acquired any frills, but he had qualities of character that were pure gold. There are fine things one can truthfully say of him. For instance, no man ever had a doubt as to the absolute truth of anything he ever said. No man ever doubted when he had given his word as to whether or not he would keep it in spirit or in letter. No man can point to his long and varied business life, for he dabbled in many fields, and say this deal or that one verged on the shady side. His ethics were like his speech, straight and clear. He could look to the core of a thing, for shrewd thinking was his second self, and his transactions were in terms of dollars and cents.
He knew men by vote, he knew values, he knew always the essentials of a proposal, and upon his judgment in these he was inexorable. Having entered a proposal his regard was to give full measure and that without quibble or subterfuge. Not a few strugglers owe their start to Alexander Griffith and bless his memory today. He was never a hard taskmaster to the man who wanted to play fair. Insincerity, false sentiment, shilly shallying- these were marks for his relentless irony.
He had but one dissipation, and that came from his love of horses. In his day he owned many famous horses. Races had for him a never failing charm.
In his death there is ended a long chapter in the history of Welland-Welland that he saw grow from a village to a city, the Welland to whose business and growth he contributed so much.
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