A Peterborough police officer is being praised for a recent act of kindness beyond his normal police duties.

According to a Facebook post by the Peterborough Police Service on Thursday (August 11), the officer had been conducting a well-being check on a 76-year-old resident.

“During the conversation the officer learned the resident had just had a medical procedure and was distraught they weren’t able to cut their lawn,” the post reads.

“Without hesitation, the officer took five minutes and was able to cut the lawn for the resident, who was very grateful for the assistance and compassion.”

The Facebook post has since received over 1,800 positive reactions as well as many glowing comments.

“There are so many acts of kindness and good news stories the police do that are never talked about,” reads one comment.

Although the post did not identify the officer at his request, in the comments the officer’s mother identified him as Constable Brandon Bigelow, who joined the service in 2018.

Following a trend with hospitals across Ontario, Ross Memorial Hospital in Lindsay is urging area residents to consider alternative options for non-urgent care due to pressures on the hospital.

“Ross Memorial Hospital is impressing upon the local community the severity of the challenges the hospital is facing today due to high patient volumes and a second COVID-19 outbreak,” the hospital states in a media release on Thursday (August 11).

The statement came on the same day the Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit declared a COVID-19 outbreak in the hospital’s medical middle unit on Thursday. Last Friday (August 5), the health unit also declared a COVID-19 outbreak in the hospital’s medical north unit.

The hospital is asking patients with less urgent conditions to consider alternate options for care such as their primary health care provider, pharmacist, after-hours clinic, virtual care, or calling Telehealth Ontario at 1-866-797-0000.

“After-hours clinics can often treat non-urgent and minor illnesses and ailments, such as earaches, sore throats or prescription refills,” the hospital states, adding that health care professionals at the hospital “are working around the clock to treat patients as quickly as possible while continuing to administer exceptional care.”

Last Thursday (August 4), Peterborough Regional Health Centre also asked area residents with non-urgent care needs to seek alternative options rather than coming to the emergency department, stating that high patient volumes and staffing shortages were creating “significant pressure” at the hospital.

Mary Simon, Canada’s first Indigenous governor general, has granted viceregal patronage to Peterborough’s Canadian Canoe Museum, the museum announced on Wednesday (August 10).

The governor general grants patronage to national organizations that demonstrate outstanding contributions to society by supporting and promoting Canadian values, diversity, inclusion, culture, and knowledge.

The Canadian Canoe Museum, which is currently constructing a new home on the waterfront at Little Lake in Peterborough, has the world’s largest collection of canoes, kayaks, and paddled watercraft.

As part of its process to design and develop exhibits at the new facility, the museum has invited Indigenous peoples to share their stories in their own voices. The museum is reconnecting the watercraft to their Indigenous communities of origin, and has developed a collaborative relations process to work together to care for the canoes and share the cultural histories and stories held within the collection.

“We believe that, as sites of cultural and historical preservation, museums play a key role in shaping our understanding of our past and collective future,” says the museum’s executive director Carolyn Hyslop in a media release. “Indigenous peoples around the world designed, built, and used the first canoes and kayaks.”

“These vessels retain their enduring connection to Indigenous cultures across Canada and are powerful living embodiments of knowledge, languages, and beliefs. Through the collaborative relations process, we are working with communities to share these stories, perspectives, languages, and voices throughout the new exhibits and museum.”

Michi Saagiig Anishnaabemowin (the local Anishnaabemowin dialect) will be included on exterior and interior signage in the new museum, along with English and French, with additional Indigenous languages to be featured in exhibits relating to specific watercraft.

The museum has also commissioned new canoe and kayak builds from Inuit and First Nations communities and builders to fill gaps in the museum’s collection and to allow for a greater diversity of stories to be shared and to preserve and pass down traditional knowledge to younger generations.

As Canada’s first Indigenous governor general, Mary Simon has focused her efforts on reconciliation. Victoria Grant, chair of the museum’s board and a member of Temagami First Nation, says the canoe is an important part of the reconciliation process.

“Together, we need to learn, understand, and acknowledge our shared history,” Grant states. “We can’t do that without first knowing and understanding the impact of the canoe in Canada’s story, from those very early times when the first visitors came to our shores. The Canadian Canoe Museum provides us with an opportunity to learn, to feel, to smell, and to see the canoe in its diversity and diversity and endurance.”

Viceregal patronage does not mean the governor general will be involved in the museum’s governance or its fundraising efforts, and does not guarantee the governor general’s involvement in or attendance at events held by the museum.

The new Canadian Canoe Museum is expected to open in the summer of 2023.

By definition, a jam session is “a relatively informal musical event, process or activity where musicians, typically instrumentalists, play improvised solos, and vamp over tunes, drones, songs and chord progressions.”

True enough, but there is one word missing — a descriptor that really sums up the attraction of the musical jams that have been held for several years now at, from all outward appearances, a very ordinary run-of-the-mill barn near Norwood that housed the extraordinary.

“This is really organic … it’s alive and it just kind of morphs with who’s here and the vibe that they’re bringing in,” says Catherine McGrath, one of a number of people who braved the sweltering heat on Sunday (August 7) to take in the final music jam at Andy and Linda Tough’s barn on their 85-acre now-for-sale slice of rural heaven.

“It hits some spots that a paid venue just doesn’t get the opportunity to,” McGrath added. “There are no egos here. It’s ‘Come on up and play with me.’ I’m not a musician but, if I was, I feel I would completely appreciate that feeling of the joy of music and of playing with other artists at whatever level they’re at.”

For the Toughs, putting the pieces in place for a shared musical experience has been a mission of sorts since they hosted, in 2009 and 2010, Band of Brothers, a barn-held live music-based fundraiser for Soldier On, a Canadian Armed Forces program that helps injured veterans and serving members.

After that, recalls Linda, “We did the private jams and it just blew up from there. Word got around and people just started coming.”

During the pandemic, when people couldn’t come, no problem: the Toughs brought the barn atmosphere to them via three seasons of Live! At The Barn, sponsored in part by kawarthaNOW.

Andy — an audio and video recording engineer who, with Linda, owns RMS Events, a company that specializes in multimedia production and presentation for a range of clients — recorded and produced live off-the-floor performances by 18 acts, each multi-camera segment professionally edited and made available for public viewing on his YouTube channel.

For musicians starved of the opportunity to play live during the pandemic, the sessions were nothing short of a lifeline. Among those recorded, and very much at the forefront at Sunday’s final jam, were Rick and Gailie Young, a duo long well known for their covers of pretty well any British Invasion period song you can name.

“Our friend Mike Reynolds said ‘You’ve got to go to the barn, you’ve got to go to the barn,’ so Rick and I checked it out and fell in love with it,” recalled Gailie who, when asked what the appeal was, quickly said “Linda and Andy … and then the barn.”

“There it’s a job,” said Gailie, referring to her and Rick’s regular gigs at The Black Horse Pub in downtown Peterborough. “Here it’s for fun. Anybody can get up and jam and sing. Nobody gets upset. It’s breaking my heart that this could be the last jam. I’m hoping they (the Toughs) don’t sell. I told them that. It’s a sad day. I could cry.”

Singer-songwriter Wylie Harold is a 10-year veteran of barn jams who was also recorded by Andy for a Live! At The Barn episode.

“It’s everything — it’s the people, it’s the ambience, it’s the unhurried style,” Harold said of the barn jam’s big selling points. “You sign up and you don’t have to wait three hours to go on.”

“I wrote a song called I Dig Barn Jam Music,” added Harold, who performed the tune at Sunday night’s barn jam. “I couldn’t remember all the words. I just finished it as I was going out the door this (Sunday) morning. I wanted to contribute that as a gift to the barn, but it was hard to put into one song what this place is all about. I’m sad to see it go — it’s a magical place — but I wish them (the Toughs) well.”

Tami J Wilde, another longtime singer and songwriter who has been a barn jam regular, wasn’t going to miss this last dance for anything.

“Today is a bittersweet moment,” said Wilde, who also taped a Live! At The Barn episode with Andy at the controls. “This is the last concert here. You’re so used to it being here and they (the Toughs) have always been very supportive (of local musicians).”

“Once I knew the barn jams were going on, I did whatever it took to get here. It’s probably been four or five summers now. It’s a nostalgic place with a lot of beautiful people and really talented musicians. This is the kind of place that I like to play at.”

But there’s another aspect of the Toughs’ barn beyond the music and the ambience that held an equal attraction for whoever came through its doors — the stuff. Lots and lots of stuff that Andy, a self-admitted pack rat, acquired over the years and just held onto.

The end result was a feast for the eyes: a three-dimensional hodge-podge of vintage music instruments, posters, and art-deco furnishings. It would be easy to say everything but the kitchen sink could be found in the barn except for one small thing — there is a kitchen sink.

On Sunday, the Toughs put the many of the items they hadn’t already got rid of up for silent auction.

“All the stuff hanging from the ceiling, an old Wurlitzer organ, jukeboxes … it’s been a fun kind of place to go to, kind of magical, a great place to hang out,” assessed musician Richard Simpkins, who sat in with a number of other musicians Sunday and is no stranger to live music pub patrons over the years.

Andy, who noted a segment for the reality TV show Canadian Pickers was shot at the barn, reflected on his many acquisitions over the years.

“You know what they say: if you’re a collector, you fill the volume you have available,” he said. “I have a 40 by 60 foot barn with three levels and it got real full. Then I bought RMS Events and brought all that gear in. Half of the stuff I’m not using anymore. We’re out of the DJ business now. When we do find a buyer for the place, we’ll have another auction and more stuff will go.”

Beyond the music jams and it being home to a number of unique collectibles, the barn holds another special significance for the Toughs.

It was there, close to 12 years ago, that they married. If that wasn’t enough to being a sentimental tear to their eyes, Sunday’s surprise arrival of their son from Nova Scotia did the trick.

“What I’m most happy about right now is all of these musicians have been out there gigging again and people have been out there supporting them,” Andy noted. “That’s what it’s all about.”

McGrath, who attended the final jam with her partner Guye Vondette, can certainly attest to that. She has been a regular at many live music events over the years. On September 10, she’ll be in mix big time as Vondette again hosts Guyestock, a nine-act live music showcase held outside their East City home that will be very jam-like.

“I love being here — I’m a groupie,” admits McGrath with unabashed pride. “I certainly wish Andy and Linda well but this will be missed. There’ll be a void for musicians and those who came out to experience this. We may never see anything like this again.”

That Sunday’s last hurrah at the barn happened at all is another story altogether.

On May 21, when the derecho storm ripped its way across southern Ontario, the Toughs found half of the massive barn roof in pieces on their property. That forced them to remove their property listing until repairs could be made. They were, allowing Sunday’s final jam to be held.

The nomination period to run for as a candidate for Peterborough city council or as a school board trustee in the fall municipal election closes at 2 p.m. next Friday (August 19).

Elected positions in the City of Peterborough include the mayor, two councillors for each of the five wards in the city (Otonabee, Monaghan, Town, Ashburnham, and Northcrest), and trustees for each of the school boards serving the city.

As of Monday, August 15, the following candidates have declared their nominations:

• Mayor of Peterborough – Stephen Wright, Henry Clarke, and Jeff Leal
• Councillor for Otonabee Ward 1 – Lesley Parnell, Kevin Duguay, and Chanté White
• Councillor for Monaghan Ward 2 – Jeff Westlake, Matt Crowley, Charmaine Magumbe, Lyle Saunders, Don Vassiliadis, and Tom Wigglesworth
• Councillor for Town Ward 3 – Dean Pappas, Alex Bierk, Brian Christoph, Joy Lachica, and Vickie Ann Karikas
• Councillor for Ashburnham Ward 4 – Gary Baldwin, Keith Riel, and Andrew MacGregor
• Councillor for Northcrest Ward 5 – Dave Haacke, Carlotta James, Andrew Beamer, Shauna Kingston, Aldo Andreoli, and Karen Grant
• Trustee for Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board – Wayne Bonner and Steve Russell
• Trustee for Peterborough, Victoria, Northumberland and Clarington Catholic District School Board – Loretta Durst

There are currently no declared candidates for trustee for Conseil Scolaire Viamonde or for Conseil Scolaire Catholique Mon Avenir.

To file nomination papers, candidates are required to make an appointment with the City Clerk’s Office at City Hall ( 500 George St. N., Peterborough) by emailing election2022@peterborough.ca. Candidate packages and resources are available online at peterborough.ca/vote.

The municipal election takes place on Monday, October 24th, with voting locations open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Residents can confirm they are registered to vote by visiting www.voterlookup.ca. Eligible voters on the voters list will receive a voter notification card in the mail in early October telling them where they may vote.

Online voting will be available from October 1 until 8 p.m. on October 24, and in-person voting will be available on both Election Day and through advanced polls.

Advanced polls will be held from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the three Saturdays before election day (October 8, 15, and 22 at Healthy Planet Arena (911 Monaghan Rd.) for Ward 1, Westdale United Church (1509 Sherbrooke St.) for Ward 2, Peterborough Public Library (345 Aylmer St. N.) for Ward 3, Lions Club (347 Burnham St.) for Ward 4, and Northview Community Church (1000 Fairbairn St.) for Ward 5.

An advance voting location with enhanced accessibility features will be held from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. from Monday, October 17th to Friday, October 21st at Peterborough City Hall (500 George St. N.).