From the police blotter
During an ordinary month in 1955, the following cases had been tried and fines and sentences passed in Hope Police Court.
• Five persons charged with exceeding the speed limit were fined a total of $138.00.
• Eight First Nation members were fined a total of $137 for being intoxicated.
• Six persons charged with supplying liquor to First Nation members were fined a total of $510. 50.
• One First Nation member was charged for manufacturing home-brew and was fined a total of $13 and 55 bottles of home-brew confiscated. Three First Nation members charged with being in possession of liquor were fined a total of $51.
• Two firms for overloading axles were fined a total of $62.
• One person operating a motor vehicle without license plates was fined a total of $28.
• Four firms overloading trucks were fined a total of $109 and one case was dismissed.
• Four persons intoxicated in a public place were fined a total of $66.
Two persons who failed to stop at Flood weigh scale were fined a total of $16.
• One person operating a motor vehicle contrary to driver’s license restrictions was fined a total of $30.50.
• One person for violating a village traffic bylaw was fined a total of $30.50.
• One person for violating a Village traffic bylaw was fined a total of $8.
• One person for interfering with a registered trap line (poaching) was fined a total of $131.
• The same person for failing to have a trapper’s license was fined another $28.
• Two juveniles were charged with breaking and entering the Kettle Valley station, and theft of Board of Trade offices and damage to Barker’s car lot. One was placed on probation for one year and the other was sent to the Industrial school.
Good chance of life on planets say scientists
Although Mars is considered to be the only planet within our solar system capable of supporting life, according to the newest evidence, uncovered by science, there may be millions of other planets outside of our solar system. Any one of them, says the February Reader’s Digest, might be inhabited by beings something like ourselves.
Only a few simple organisms can exist long at a temperature as high as the boiling point of water, or under 10 below zero, says the article.
To support any form of life similar to man, the atmosphere must contain oxygen and be free from lethal quantities of substances such as ammonia. Scientists now agree that no planet of our system, except possibly Mars, meets these conditions.
Mercury, far smaller than Earth, has lost nearly all the atmosphere needed for life. Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, all much bigger than Earth, have poisonous atmospheres which rule out life. Pluto is too cold. And Venus, although surrounded by clouds which might mean water, almost certainly has a temperature above the boiling point and it is likely that cyclones and tornados rage continually over the whole surface.
On Mars, however, temperatures are more like our own and there is good evidence of vegetation and moisture.
Life on Mars is entirely possible, but the newest evidence indicates that it is “some form of of primitive plant life.” But outside our solar system, which though huge in itself, is merely a speck in the uncharted spaces of the universe — many modern astronomers believe there may be many millions of other planets with their own solar systems. And any one of them might support highly developed forms of life.
“We cannot resist the conclusion,” states a famous British astronomer, “that life, though rare, is scattered throughout the universe wherever the conditions are favourable to it.
Traditionalists
Traditionalists, so called, in Canadian education will be heartened to find a prominent businessman squarely on their side. This is Mr. A.J.E. Child, vice-president and secretary-treasurer of Canada packers. Twenty-four years with that company, Mr. Child has seen many technically-able men fail to reach executive positions “because of a deficiency in educational background and a lack of breadth of outlook.”
Specialized business and technical knowledge, he thinks, is best acquired after a man has started work. Before that, his time is better spent acquiring a basic education along the cultural lines, e.g. Honor Arts, Classics, English, History, Commerce, and Mathematics. Canada Packers welcomes graduates in such courses to its accounting and administrative staff.
Most important in present-day business is a man’s ability to express himself clearly and accurately. Says Mr. Child: “There are too few men who can write a letter or report with ease, with imaginative language, with appeal to the reader, and with no mistakes. The many who can not put forth his ideas and because of inability to express himself on paper is very seriously handicapped.
The university man who has been exposed to a goodly amount of our literature, and perhaps to the grammatical and word-root practice of other languages, is in no such position.”
Many businessmen will agree. A properly educated man can go further in a business which he enters knowing nothing about it than one who has trained for it at the expense of his education.
If schools and universities would concentrate on producing people thoroughly grounded in the traditional subjects, business and industry would teach them whatever else they needed to know.
