Pioneer Village Harvest Festival: A Delightful Trip Back In Time
By: Ewa Chwojko-Srawley Our American friends did not invent Thanksgiving; it began in Canada! In 1578 Sir Martin Frobisher, an English explorer, celebrated the first Thanksgiving in Newfoundland. The Georgina Historical Society has been keeping the tradition alive for over forty years at the Georgina Pioneer Village with their Harvest Festival. On September 14–the day of the Harvest Moon–visitors were...
39 Years Later: Terry Fox still inspires us
By: Deb Robert A young man traverses the highway, striding with an unwieldy double step and hop. His right leg, crippled by cancer and now a mere stump, is attached to a prosthesis fitted with a battered Adidas shoe. It was 1980 when Terry Fox shook a nation awake. With his sweeping Marathon of Hope to end cancer, Terry ran...
GFCC Pilot Project: A Feral Cat’s Best Friend
By: Tina Novotny Feral and stray cats used to be a significant problem in Georgina, but over the last few years a group of volunteers have worked hard to improve their lives. Eva McDowell started the Georgina Feral Cat Committee (GFCC) in the fall of 2015 and proudly says that one of the first colonies she and her volunteers targeted for “Trap, Neuter, Return” had no...
Georgina Civic Centre: Not Giving Up The Ghost Yet!
By: Tanya Edwards Take four people with the same spooky hobby, and what do you get? COPi, Central Ontario Paranormal Investigations. Glenn and Wendy Laycock along with Paul and Tina Jackson formed COPi over a cup of coffee and their passion for the paranormal in 2017. They haven’t stopped investigating the spiritual world since. Recently Mayor Margaret Quirk invited COPi to...
From Blue Box to Art!
By: Ewa Chwojko-Srawley Think twice before you put out your recyclables in the blue box. You might be able to create an artwork with it and win a prize! Yes, art and recycling go hand in hand. All over the world, galleries big and small are opening their doors for such innovation and creativity, and Jackie Diasio, a volunteer at...
Girl Guides of Canada Comes To Pefferlaw
By: Tanya Edwards With a new motto "Everything she wants to be," and a new mission "To be a catalyst for girls empowering girls," Girl Guides of Canada hopes to empower thousands of girls to become future leaders and doers in their communities. Now, thanks to the efforts of Ricci-Lynn McDermott, Pefferlaw is about to get its first Girl Guides unit:...
Field-To-Table: City slicker visits Georgina’s working farms.
By: Tina Novotny If you are an urbanite like me who likes to channel their inner farmer, then a local country fair isn’t going to cut it. I need something more; a deep dive into what it’s like to live and work on a real farm. The problem is there aren't many real farms in Toronto. And, even if there were, the farmers would...
Catherine Babick: Georgina Artist, Champion of the Arts
By: Ewa Chwojko-Srawley Catherine Babick introduced Georgina to the arts. She moved to Georgina from Toronto as an 8th-grader. Georgina schools offered no art programmes, there were hardly any artistic activities, she recalls. Her first action: start the Georgina Studio Tour and the Georgina School of Art. Her next: she embarked on a major project to establish an Arts...
The Painted Perch Festival: Fun, Fish and Frivolity at the Point
By: Mike Anderson The Painted Perch Festival, which began as a novel idea eight years ago, is now the highlight of the summer for Jackson’s Point. “It's the best festival that we throw in the Point,” says Steve Jacobson, chair of the Jackson’s Point BIA. “We do it on the same weekend as the Sutton Fair because we can capitalize on the...
Canada’s Andreescu wins Rogers Cup after Williams retires due to injury
TORONTO — As soon as Bianca Andreescu heard that Serena Williams was retiring from their Rogers Cup final, she went to her opponent’s bench, took a knee, and started consoling the veteran tennis player. Lost in that moment of empathy was the fact that Andreescu had just become the first Canadian to win the tournament in 50 years. “I started tearing up...
