Police seek help in solving weekend attempted murder

One man in custody

WIKWEMIKONG-Charges have been laid in the stabbing of a 29-year-old Wikwemikong male by a 23-year-old male, also of Wikwemikong, on the night of April 14.

Terrence Kyle Mishibinijima has been charged by the Wikwemikong Tribal Police with attempted murder, robbery, use of a dangerous weapon, and breach of probation following the attack which happened at approximately 1:30 am on Saturday night in a vacant field in the Andrew Street area-located in Wikwemikong's new subdivision, near the high school.

The victim suffered numerous stab wounds to the upper abdomen and lower chest and is in serious but stable condition at the Manitoulin Health Centre.

The investigation is currently ongoing.

Police say others were involved in the attack and ask for the public's co-operation in reporting any information to the Wikwemikong Tribal Police at 859-3141, or Crimestoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS.

New marketing options sought by N. Channel Tourism Council

by Alicia McCutcheon

SPANISH-Members of the North Channel Marine Tourism Council (NCMTC) met in Spanish this past weekend for their first spring annual general meeting.

The council, originally set up to represent municipal and private marinas along the North Shore-the area between Killarney and Sault Ste. Marie and including Manitoulin-has in recent years expanded to include land-based tourism as well.

Businesses with an interest in North Channel tourism are now encouraged to join the group, says chair Stan Ferguson, owner and operator of Harbor Vue Marina.

The volunteer-run organization puts out a newsletter three times a year and makes up boater welcome packages that are left at marinas across the North Shore which local businesses can then add to. Last year, in connection with the Ontario Marina Operators Association (OMOA), a promotional DVD of boating in the North Channel was also introduced and distributed.

The main focus of this year's meeting was marketing.

"We've changed the AGM from October to spring to better reflect what we are trying to do," says Mr. Ferguson.

A marketing board comprised of NCMTC members has been researching ways to get the North Channel noticed, not only in the United States, but in southern Georgian Bay as well.

"We are still marketing in the United States but it has become harder because of boarder issues and our high dollar," he says, adding that southern Georgian Bay is a whole new opportunity for the group.

Mr. Ferguson says that there are new tourist publications, such as Discover Georgian Bay, appearing in the area that are geared toward boaters and that the council would like have ties with.

"Often boaters from southern Georgian Bay think the trip to the North Channel is big, long, and scary," he says. "Many boaters think it takes a week just to get to Killarney."

"What we're looking at it is how do we get them to the North Channel and how do we keep them in the North Channel," says the marina operator.

The marine council also discussed the end of the award-winning 'Clean Marine' and 'Clean Boater' program which promoted clean practices when dealing with gas, oil and other marine musts.

"We are encouraging people to get on the case of our politicians to turn this around," he says.

The provincial and federal government had funded the program for 10 years and when the request went out for another $60,000 each for another three years, they were denied.

"Sixty percent of our marinas are Clean Marine certified," says Mr. Ferguson. "They have to meet certain requirements before they receive the certificate."

He explains that the program rates marina with stars, according to how clean they are, and is modeled after the hotel rate system. He says it has made the way both marinas and boaters operate, much cleaner.

The group plans to mount a campaign educating the municipal, provincial, and federal governments on the benefits of the program.

It has also been the trend, as of late, for municipalities to take over the ownership of federally run marinas, especially on the North Shore, which is causing the group some worry.

"We cannot lose any of the marinas," Mr. Ferguson says, citing a recent study done using Lake Simcoe marina. It was found that each slip in the marinas studied brought $5,000 in business to the municipality.

"Our main goal is to keep the North Channel clean, beautiful and up to date. We are the number one freshwater boating area in the world."

Island vet's great-granddaughter, MP St. Denis share Vimy ceremony

by Alicia McCutcheon

ELLIOT LAKE-Katrina Vankessel has a whole new outlook on the First World War and what it is to be a Canadian.

Ms. Vankessel was one of thousands of Canadian students who travelled to France to participate in the services for the 90th anniversary of the battle of Vimy Ridge held last Monday, April 9.

The seventeen-year-old first heard of the Vimy ceremonies through a school announcement at her Elliot Lake High School and after tracking down the teacher in charge, learned she only had three days to register with the Sault Ste. Marie group she would be travelling with.

The granddaughter of Paul and Margaret Cadieux of Mindemoya, Ms. Vankessel also learned of the ceremonies from her grandmother who told her of her great-great-uncle Private John Alexander McLean who fought at Vimy with the 7th battalion, BC regiment, and survived, only to perish at the battle of Lens, France on August 15, 1917. His body was never recovered.

Private McLeod left his home of Inverness Cove, Nova Scotia at the age of 16 to Halifax where he joined the armed forces two years later.

Ms. Vankessel spent nine days touring the areas where her great-great-uncle would have fought 90 years ago, as well as doing the usual tourist routine.

All of the students were supplied with replica army shirts with names representing the fallen soldiers-hers bearing the name of her great-great-uncle.

On April 9, the students gathered on the grounds of Vimy for the rededication of the Vimy monument.

"During the rededication, we all stood behind the grave of a soldier, almost all of which said, 'Known unto God,' meaning that they were unknown," she says.

After the ceremony, all of the young Canadians received a Vimy pilgrimage medal that had four ribbons; each represented the divisions in order of their attack-red, white, blue, and green.

Ms. Vankessel says that they were able to near the infamous ridge, but only could get so close as it was guarded by French police.

"All of my friends were fainting during the ceremonies," she says, adding that nobody could reason why.  "Kids everywhere were passing out."

Next, she says, the thousands of pilgrims gathered around the monument and waited for the Queen to arrive.

"I was surprised to see that she was this cute, little old lady," she laughs.

One student from Manitoba played a violin piece atop the monument while Inuit Canadian singer Susan Aglukark was also present to sing for the crowd.

"It was the music that got you," Ms. Vankessel says. "You could just picture the soldiers who were wanting to come home."

The young woman also searched out her uncle's name on the monument, perhaps the most memorable part of her trip.

"Before, I didn't even know I had an uncle in the war and now he has become so important to me," she says.

She was disappointed to find that his service number-10075159-read 10075150. She hopes to remedy this mistake.

Since learning about Private McLeod, Ms. Vankessel has done much research on him and even has his service papers and his last letter where he asks for chewing and smoking tobacco and tells his family that "if all goes well, I'll write back tomorrow." He died in battle the next day.

"You just don't know if one of those unmarked graves was him or if there's nothing left," she says.

"This was the trip of a lifetime, when you realize what these people have done," she says.

She says that when she came home, she discovered that it was only the friends she made during her trip with whom she could talk to and relate.

"None of my friends could relate-in that you realize what it is the soldiers would have gone through once they returned home from the war," she says. "The friends I made on the trip are really close to my heart."

Ms. Vankessel's great-grandfather Charlie Cadieux is also a veteran, fighting under Canada in WWII and seeing action on D-Day.

"I'm proud of her and all the children that went overseas," he says, noting that he knows first-hand how hard it can be when you return from war.

"It's pretty hard to explain. I was a married man with two children and I hardly knew how to act when I came home," he laments.

"I don't think the young people nowadays know what the soldiers went through."

Mr. Cadieux says he didn't miss one minute of the 90th anniversary ceremonies where his great-grandaughter was in attendance.

"My blood was running pretty red," he says.

"A lot of people still forget that if it hadn't been for the crazy Canucks, we wouldn't have been very safe today."

Out of the 38 soldiers who returned to Mindemoya, where Mr. Cadieux is from,  after the Second World War, only three are left.

"The trip (to Vimy) is something every Canadian should do; you definitely get a greater respect for your country. I'm never slouching during O Canada again."

YouTube Young Gore Bay filmmaker's videos create hometown stir

by Alicia McCutcheon

MANITOULIN-If you are looking for your 15 minutes of fame (or will settle for 10) then the video-sharing website YouTube is the place to be, as almost any teenager can probably attest.

From videos of babies' first steps, to the famous rock group OK GO's coordinated treadmill dance routine, to practical jokes and stunts, one can find just about anything on the site and Islanders are catching on.

Vincent Clarke has suddenly become notorious in Gore Bay for his role in the 'Gore Bay Gang' videos seen on YouTube. Type in the words 'Gore Bay' on the site and the creations of Mr. Clarke and his friends can be seen.

"My friends say, 'I want to do something stupid' and I act as the videographer," Mr. Clarke says. "It's not like we're hurting anyone."

But while he and his friends, and many others, get a good laugh from such playful creations, there are some who find them worrisome.

He says he's heard of parents emailing back and forth regarding the videos and calls them "overly concerned."

He adds that there's a whole 'Jackass' component to his videos that most parents do not understand. 'Jackass' is the MTV hit television show turned movie giant where a group of 20- and 30-somethings-Johnny Knoxville, Bam Margera, Wee Man and others-perform either silly or dangerous stunts or pranks, much to the amusement of an entire generation.

The videographer says he's very surprised by the recent response the five posted videos have caused. One video shows a bus ride home that involves a slapping fight between two young men, where they take turns slapping each other on the cheek and laughing, while another video has Mr. Clarke asking students in the hallway of school silly questions.

Perhaps the two videos that have caused the fuss are of a young man running full speed into an open locker at Manitoulin Secondary and falling backwards onto the ground, and one in which has a fluorescent light bulb is broken over the back of a young man at his urging.

Mr. Clarke says that in the last month he has been called down to the principal's office and told that potential summer employers had called, expressing their concern over the videos and suggesting they may not hire him as a result.

"I can understand why the principal is concerned," he says, adding that he's since taken the two more 'offensive' videos from the site.

He says he's a little confused as to why he's become the centre of attention when he's "not stupid enough to actually do any of the stunts-I just tape them."

"This is a part of our culture," he says. "People enjoy them. And anyway, there's a lot worse than this."

Mr. Clarke and his friends do not just spend their time making Jackass-esque videos, however, and are currently writing scripts for movies and all around "just having fun with the video camera."

The concern employers have over a potential employee's online persona is becoming more prevalent thanks to sites like YouTube, Facebook, and My Space.

According to a deluge of recent articles on the subject, employers may check these sites for names and, according to what they find or don't find, possibly have an effect on whether they are hired are not.

When the Expositor called Debajehmujig artistic director Joe Osawabine, a YouTube aficionado, for a comment on the subject, he admitted he was surfing the video-sharing site at that very moment.

After watching the 'Gore Bay Gang' videos, Mr. Osawabine says it looks to him as though "they're just having fun" and adds, as Mr. Clarke did, there are far worse things posted on YouTube.

He also believes the phenomenon is a "generation" thing and says he spends a lot of time watching videos.

The artistic director has a video on YouTube that involves himself and Greg Odjig performing a mock exorcism. The video has generated 1,762 hits and many comments.

He says it's a good platform to get your work out there, without a producer.

"If we're not making money from it, what does it matter," he asks. "It's about freedom of expression."

EDITORIAL

Prompt and informative response to power outage appreciated

The workers at Hydro One very likely are not the recipients of very many plaudits or commendations.

They should be.

Monday's power outage, involving all of Manitoulin Island and Killarney, is an example, and several things were done very well.

First of all, after the power was out and people were calling Hydro One to find out "how long," they were met with a recorded message that told them, politely, that power should be restored by 3:45 pm on Monday.

That was excellent.

And then, power was restored a full hour ahead of that prediction, which was even better.

We understand that the cause of the outage was the collapse of a two-pole structure west of Sudbury, due to high winds. Pending the repair of that line, Hydro workers were able to switch the supply so that power coming from the Algoma station near Sault Ste. Marie was routed south of Espanola to the Island.

Keep up the good work. Posting a message was brilliant, the response was swift, and we hope this will be the new reality in all these sorts of situations.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Hiking is a more universal, easier sport than fishing

Tourists too in awe of nature's beauty to litter

To the Expositor:

I am an American who has been vacationing on Manitoulin since my grandfather brought me to Manitou Haven back in the late '50s. We came primarily to fish, but to also enjoy the clean air, clear water and the wonderful hospitality of the Chisholm family.

After my grandfather passed away in 1962, I didn't return until my new wife and I honeymooned at Red Lodge for a week in 1973. Then, beginning in 1974 until the mid-1990s, I brought a group (10-15) of fishermen friends each year to Red Lodge and Hideaway Lodge. We fished for a week around Clapperton Island, with the late Roy Newburn as our guide, and the shore lunches are still among the best meals I've ever eaten (even though I do fit into the category that Nurse Belton cited at the public trail meeting in the Northeast Town).

The main reason that the group stopped coming to Manitoulin is that I had trouble convincing my fisherman friends to return after the fish left. Manitoulin still had Turners, Farquhar's Ice Cream, the Chi Cheemaun, Immaculate Conception Church, Bridal Veil Falls, the clear water and air, and friendly folks-but my friends wanted to catch fish, so we began driving further north to take fly-in trips from Wawa. My wife and I still love the Island and come back to Manitoulin every few years (I consider myself a self-appointed honourary Haweater).

I do, however, have a new group of friends that I have introduced to the Bruce Trail. I am bringing Boy Scout Troop 87 (as I have done every other year for the past 10-plus years) to hike the Cypress Lake to Tobermory leg of the Bruce in June this year. Also, a friend and I made the drive up (about six hours) to take a snowshoe hike on the Bruce Trail in February and plan to repeat this (with others) in 2008.

I would not think that there is much doubt that the Bruce Trail is a very large (if not the largest) tourism draw for the peninsula. I have had former boy scouts tell me that they now bring their families and friends up to hike it, who will in turn bring theirs, and so on. I would also think that a fair amount of the Little Current and Manitoulin Island economies are dependent on tourism.

In my town, the rail-to-trail movement has given rise to many new hiking groups-people who would be very interested in hiking the trail that was recently rejected in Little Current.  While it is sometimes tough to get people interested in fishing (especially when there are many fewer fish), hiking is a much more universal, easier sport than fishing, and it has less impact on the environment. While we have hiked the Cup and Saucer before, a new opportunity on the Island would definitely cause our group to return and stay in your motels and eat in your restaurants, as well as shop, and maybe even check to see if the pike have returned to Logan's Bay.

I would strongly suggest that the people of Manitoulin give a much more universal thought to their future. While property owners' rights cannot be ignored, the chance to provide a boost to the tourism industry should also be strongly considered!

And by all means, the elected leaders need to vote for what is best for all of their electorate-not just a vocal majority in attendance at a particular meeting-but I'm sure that they know that.

Now that I'm all heated up, if you could please ship me a Farquhar's ice cream cone.

I will also add that, if your community is like ours, a few inconsiderate local residents are usually the people that abuse the trails-the tourists are too much in awe of their beauty.  The largest problem with our local trail is the property owners using the property at the trail's edge to dump their grass clippings, junk vehicles, etc. When our troop hikes, we always carry empty backpacks just to hold the garbage that we collect on the trails, as we will do in June on the Bruce trip.

Chuck Mann

Ohio

Landowners are only defending their way of life

What do you expect us to do, sit back?

To the Editor:

    I have listened to and read the information regarding the proposed trail for NEMI. The landowners have been made out to be the bad guys in all of this. What did you expect us to do: sit back while "they" manipulated the situation to suit "themselves?" I take immense offence to our tactics being described, in the editorial of April 11, as "communist fear-mongering." We are only defending a way of life we believe in. The proponents of the trail started the situation by using exactly that kind of tactics-secrecy, shove down our throats and do as we want tactics. The first that most people heard of the trail was the "name the trail contest." It was already a done deal with no public input. We only looked at history to prove our point. The problems in southern Ontario with landowners started with one innocent-looking little trail on public land and, via the Internet or by listening to affected people, you can see where it all snowballed to.

    The public meeting was painted in bad light by a headline on a letter to the editor ("Reasonable debate hijacked by angry mob at trail meeting"), which is absolutely ludicrous. Everyone there was on their best behaviour despite how strongly they felt (pro or con) about the situation. Sorry folks, you didn't miss a brawl. It's obvious we are so isolated on the Manitoulin we've never witnessed an angry mob to know what it looks like. As for your story's reference to a lopsided representation at the meeting, it was a public meeting with the invitation to any interested parties being issued by your paper. If you want lopsided, read your reporting of the meeting.

    The landowners have been portrayed as anti-trail. My family have hiked the trails in the area every summer-the Cup and Saucer, the Lewis Trail, the Orr Trail (by the way, one councillor painted such a wonderful picture of the Orr Trail but omitted telling the audience that it has been closed to public use-why?). What I feel we are against is a repeat of what has taken place on the Bruce Pennisula and further south, and no-one has given proof that it won't happen here.

    A foothold is a foothold. Dr. Jeffery and the ski club are honourable people, I'm sure. However, the hidden agenda, real or only perceived, is frightening. I guess if you only own a half-acre plot with your house and work elsewhere it doesn't much matter to you, but for us you are talking our livelihood, our retirement and our legacy.

Ron loves this land we live on and tries hard to farm it in an environmentally friendly way. The small farms on Manitoulin can do this, unlike the factory farms in the south. We only want to be left alone to continue doing what we love. Our life is being impacted by more and more laws and paperwork every day. We don't want someone else telling us what we can or cannot do on land that we have faithfully paid our taxes on for the better part of 42 years. If you want hiking trails build them on your own private properties-keep them off public road allowances.

    Just to close, a comment to Linda Belton. If she thought a lot of the members of the audience did not look physically fit, it is not because of a lack of exercise, but the perils of their jobs (long hours, that cow that turns on you, that tree that went the wrong way, falls), trying to produce commodities or services to make your life more comfortable. This is something you will never understand. Maybe you will when all the valuable growing land is producing corn for ethanol to fuel your fancy cars and not to fill your bellies (even farmers know where the dollars are), or you have to eat imported food accidentally laced with rat poison because their food inspection laws fall far short of those we work under in Canada, but it will be too late. The small farms of the country which have been a constant backbone of the industry will all be gone.

Mr. Editor, it has long been my belief that the troubles of this world are fuelled by the media, and I think you are a prime example.

Judy Wood

Green Bay

Isles coach Ted Nolan congratulated for good season

Garden River rightfully proud of favourite son

To the Expositor:

I would like to send in a cheering acknowledgement to coach Ted Nolan of Garden River First Nation on his accomplishment, with the help of his assistant coaches, for the turnaround of the New York Islanders. While the NHL Isles may not go far in this year's playoffs, it will be a good measuring stick of what kind of help they may need for next year and help build toward a Stanley Cup winning team. The community of Garden River-Ketagahnseebeeng is no doubt happy for their favourite son and rightly so. Chi miigwetch Ted for lifting up us all with perseverance and focus.

Eugene Manitowabi

Wikwemikong