It was the best of Times
The town was aflutter this week after the New York Times published an online profile of the city, lauding it as a little Norway with a sovereign wealth fund and running through local history for readers.
That led to a spike in civic pride, as well as more than a few questions of how and why the Gas City caught the attention of the global media outlet.
Craig S. Smith covers Canada for the Times wire service and dispatched himself from New York to southern Alberta for a visit this week to nail down the particulars. He formerly headed the Times office in Beijing, but spent summers as a child on his grandparents’ ranch in Montana, so landscape is not totally foreign.
Smith spent a few days in town discussing local poverty reduction and visiting a few of the more unique local institutions — so expect a couple more features to roll out at some point.
The rest of the story
Keen newspaper readers — and what can we say other than
News readers are keen — played a key role in returning two First World War medals to their rightful owner this week.
Local police had been searching for relatives of an “L.B. Middleton” since two British Navy medals were discovered during an arrest in December.
It should be noted that within two hours of receiving the media notice the News had gladly forwarded Middleton’s 1964 obituary to investigators. They were already in the process of contacting relatives when an obituary for Middleton’s son, Alistair, appeared in Thursday morning’s edition for readers to discover.
Louis Middleton, as noted in this column last summer, was one of five local brothers who served in the Great War, along with Jim, Alex, Edward and Allan Middleton.
Louis was a naval reservist living in Scotland when the conflict broke out. He emigrated here in 1923, later to become the elevator superintendent for Ogilvie Mills.
All’s well that ends well.
More Media
Taber’s newest radio station — a community-run, non-commercial station with Christian content — is now up and running. That station’s name is ... 89.5 FM “The Beet” ... and we’re not making this up.
Hockey talk
Show details for a Hometown Hockey broadcast that will emanate from Medicine Hat are still under wraps, though some details and a schedule are included on Page A3 of today’s edition.
In terms of local features that will be interwoven into the March 5 national broadcast, mum is still the word from Rogers.
One can bet however, that the recently and quickly announced retirement of Tom Lysiak’s No. 9 jersey at the Medicine Hat Tigers Feb. 25 game will fill up some time on the March 5 broadcast. He made a ton of memories for fans in Medicine Hat.
Not to put a pall on the proceedings, but ... I guess it means that retiring Trevor Linden’s No. 9 is still some time off?
Other games
The makers of Monopoly are drumming up more free publicity for themselves after announcing that the Thimble, a standard game-piece since the 1930s, was rejected by voters having their say on an upcoming edition.
I guess we’ll find out how many thimble advocates there are out there.
Remember a few years back when Medicine Hat made a big push for votes when the gamemaker was looking for new street names for a Canadian version? At that time Hasbro sent the
News a cease and desist letter when we pictured then alderman John Hamill in a top hat — he and Uncle Moneybags bear a striking resemblance.
A look ahead
Council will sit on Tuesday next week due to the Family Day long weekend, when they will look to approve borrowing ahead of the 2017 road construction season.
100 years ago
Reporting on the Alberta high school debating championship had reached fevered pitch by February 15, 1917, the News of the day announced.
A magnificent third-leg result by Medicine Hat’s team reversed a deficit to Calgary’s Crescent Heights Collegiate, “bringing the Rutherford Cup perceptively closer to Medicine Hat.”
Local orators Miss Muriel McLaren and Mr. James Sanderson won out the argument of railway nationalization “having heaped up a supply of irrefutable facts.”
Only Vegreville, in the finals, stood in the way.
The billet committee of the newly formed Stampede board announced 3,000 beds had been secured. At the same meeting, discussion revolved around securing excursion trains from Empress, Swift Current, Calgary, Lethbridge and Lamont.