6 - Sunday, March 24, 1985 - North Shore News Editorial Page News Viewpoint At the inquest? est Van council’s hae to a propane tank at a local service sta- tion raises a wider issue than the specific case itself. Vehicle owners are being encouraged these days to convert to cleaner, cheaper gas fuels, The limiting factor so far is the restricted number of outlets selling those fuels. But a good many service siation operators are doubtless interested in adding such a facility. New safety factors, however, obviously arise because, unlike gasoline, propane leak- ing from a storage tank can result in the highly volatile gas entering adjacent buildings. In -the present application the proposed 9,000 litre tank would be within about 30 ft of an apartment complex. Fears have been expressed that leaking propane could be sucked into the building's air in- takes and descend to pilot lights in the fur- nace room, causing a catastrophic explosion. The pravincial gas safety inspector has approved the installation, apparently on the grounds that such an occurence is virtually impossible. But council argues that the potential for injuries, death and destruction makes even the most minimal risk unaccep- table. Clearly needed at this stage, in fairness to everyone concerned (including service sta- tions and their customers), is an overali POLICY on the siting of gas fuel tanks in residential areas -- based cn an exhaustive technical evaluation of all the possibilities. Piecemeal judgements in individual situa- tions by a single inspector might not prove good enough at the inquest. Wrong again! ate groups will have to find a new symbol. A Cranbrook artist says their present one is actually. ‘‘an honored part of just about every culture’. It decorated Rudyerd Kipling’s books, appeared on a 1931 Newfoundland stamp and is the name of an Ontario town — where rehabilitation of the sign will begin at an Easter conference of the International Friends of the Swastika. Soiry, spray-can painters! ME VORCE OF RENIN ao WEY YancouNER Display Advertising 980-0511 Classified Advertising 986-6222 Newsroom 985-2131 Circulation ' 986-1337 Subscriptions 985-2131 1139 Lonsdale Ave., North Vancouver, B.C. V7M 2H4 Publisher Peter Speck Marketing Director Operations Manager Robert Graham Bera Hilhard Advertising Director - Sales Circulation Director Dave Jenneson Bill McGown Editor-in-Chiel Noel Wright Production Director Advertising Director Ches Jonngon + Administration Mike Goodsell Classified Manager Val Stephenson Photography Manager Terry Peters North Shore News, founded in 1969 45 an in dent SupunDan newspaper and qualtied unger Schedete IN, Part ttt FF apo EOS ihe Excise Tax Act. 1 Oublished each Wednesday Fagey and Sunday ty North Snore Free Press td aod aisinbutee to eve ot on the Horn Shore Second Class Mail Racistratian Number 286% Entire contents ++ 1985 North Shore Free Press Lid. All rights reserved. Subscnptions, North and West Vancouver, $25 pet year Mailing tates avaiable on request No fesponsibitty acceptec for unsotcted munenai anetudies manuscupls and nicturas wiics snould pe accumpanied by a Stamped addressed envelope Member of the B.C. Press Council u 55,770 caverage. Wednesaay Firday & Sumaayy SN'a THIS PAPER [IS RECYCLABLE " EAVEN is said to be the place where . enduring = marriages are made. For one North Van couple Kirkcaldy, Scotland, runs it a close second. That's where David Stephenson grew up, and met and wooed his bride Catherine. The wedding itself took place in nearby Edinburgh--on March 26, 1920. Three years later they sail- ed. for Canada. First stop, for the next six years, was Winnipeg, which didn’t agree with Catherine’s health. But after an extended visit to a sister in Vancouver, she returned to the Prairies a new woman and that decided them. They packed their belongings, moved to North Van (‘tin 1929 you could have shot a gun along Marine Drive and hit no one!’’) and have been here ever since, An accountant by profes- sion, David worked for a number of private firms un- til 1941. In that year he joined the federal civil ser- vice, was given a platoon of 21 inspectors and entrusted with the task of setting up from scratch the newly laun- ched unemployment in- surance scheme in B.C. and the Yukon. He remained regional UIC director for the area until his retirement in 1962. But David has another claim to fame which one suspects is even more impor- tant to him. At 86 he’s probably the world’s oldest living Boy Scout. He’s been continuously active in the Scout movement for 76 years, including more than 25 as‘Scoutmaster with the 7th St. John's Troop. Last weekend, at the annual meeting of the Regional Scouts association, he was presented with a special 32- year service award. Mean- while, not to be outdone, Catherine has the distinction of having been a founder of Pro-Rec on the North Shore--one of the first sunday brunch pholo submitted SIX AND A HALF DECADES after Kirkcaldy .« for Catherine aid David Stephenson the next magic number is 70. NEWS photo lan Smith ADS THAT HELPED fill the food hampers ... Ruth Stout (1) and Ida Paddock (r) collect from News classified manager Val Stephenson. keep-fit programs for women, based on exercises to music. Their elder son, Norman, died in World War Two while serving with the air force. Their younger son, Bill, also a wartime air force man and father of their three grandchildren, lives at Naramatta. When the fami- ly, together with friends from near and far, gathered yesterday at the Stephen- sons’ neat, immaculately kept home on West 15th, they were celebrating more than just 65 years of mar- riage, impressive though that figure is. They were honoring the pretty obvious love affair of two remarkably fit-looking octogenarians who still hold hands and look tenderly into one another's cyes the way they did in Kirkcaldy nearly two-thirds of a century ago. Maybe it’s something in the Scottish air ... THE DAFFODIL WARRIORS ... Betty-Jean Wyatt (third from left}, head of West Van's year-round cancer office, and volunteer staff who include Margaret Bulling, Dorothy Sealey, Sheila Humphries, Garf Alexander, Marie Cochrane, Arthur Dick and Dorothea Gensch, DAFFODIL) MONTH.--and the annual fundraising cam- paign of the Canadian Cancer Society--is just a week away. In West Van, since Jast fall, the Society’s work now goes on year- round at its office open each Tuesday and Thursday in the former Pauline Johnson school. There, the volunteer staff organized by Betty- Jean Wyatt offers on-the- ‘spot help with patient ser- vices (including eimotional and financial support for victims and their families) and education in the preven- tion and early detection of | the disease. But during April they urgently need extra volunteers to canvass homes and apartments for dona- tions. If you can spare a couple of hours next month {0 join the fight against The Killer, call them at 925-1952. Or in North Van, where the same help is needed, phone 985-8585. xs ko SCRATCHPAD: Geiting- To-Know-You Dept. In Len- ingrad tonight are West Van Secondary socials teachers Barry Lindahl and Shirley Mortell, with 32 of their Grade 10-12 students on a nine-day visit to Russia.. Later they'll take the train to Moscow and then break their homeward journey with five days in London. Stay tured for the travellers’ tales ... Three. happy ladies the other. week were Ruth Stout of the West Van Santa Claus Fund, Ida Paddock of the ‘North Van Christmas Bureau and News classified manager Val Stephenson-- -who . presented them with cheques totalling $846, pro- ceeds of the paper's Christmas greeting ads fun- draiser ... Helping judge Collingwood’s 1985 public speaking competition proved one tough job. The oratory of all nine Grade 7-8 finalists at the North Shore’s new private school was im- pressive, with the title even- tually gcing to Debra Price, followed by joint runners-up Kal Milley and Samantha Geer .... Vancouver Centre MLA Emery Barnes is call- ing for the Premier's Sports Awards to be rededicated to North Van's late superstar sprinter Harry Jerome who, after a brilliant 14-year track career unequalled by any other Canadian, devoted himself to make life better for. young people ... IF you’re a descendant (or think you are) of the brothers or. sister of Welshman Robert Edwards, born about 1730, who bought up a mighty valuable chunk of Manhattan Island, author Robert Cartmell (P.O.Box 57, Station K, Toronto M4P 2G1) would love to hear from you. He's doing a book on Edwards, some of whose heirs were believed to be in Narth Van in’ the 1920s Easter weekend is coming up--and coming up with it, alas, will be the traffic accidents, Don't forget to mark on your calendar the special pre-Easter blood donor clinie next Friday, March 29, 2 to & pam. in the North MOD, Park Roval. * * * WRIGHT OR WRONG: Best way to discaver vaur real friends is to make a fool of yourself, They're the anes who'll let you forget it.