Gerald Flood is senile

I don't intend to take on the roll of Media Police, but I have to point this out, since I've wrote about Gordon Bell before:

In a section of the Saturday Free Press ironically called Feed Your Intellect, Gerald Flood writes a heart-warming Gordon Sinclair-ish piece about an unsung hero in the fight to claim a parcel of land as green space for Gordon Bell high school. One problem: he's completely full of crap.

IT was a hot day in August 2008 that I first opened an e-mail from Eagles and Doves, the nom de Internet of Nancy Chippendale.

I like how this is starting: hot summer day, mysterious lady with a alias ... let me turn down the lights and pour myself a drink. Ok, I'm ready. Go on ....

She explained that the closing of a car dealership next to Gordon Bell had created an opportunity to convert the 2.5 acre car lot into a sports field, something Gordon Bell had never had and would never have if this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity slipped away.

The conversion of the lot to a field of play was so obviously a good idea that it seemed impossible that it would not happen. Except for one small snag -- Canada Post was eying the property to build a new depot. I told Nancy that it was a great idea but I could not run it until she determined the status of the property.

She came back crestfallen. Canada Post was not eyeing the property, it was buying it.

Dang ... they beat her to it. So sad that this nice lady's stroke of genius was undermined at the last second by an evil crown corporation.

Ya .. not so much, there Gerald. Checking back to the time line on my original blog on this subject, Canada Post purchased the land in November 2007, almost a year earlier. In fact, Canada Post started tearing down the Midway Chrysler dealership in July of 2008.

Not only that, but Pat Martin was already on the case in June of 2008. As pathetically late as Pat was to the game, this lady was even later. correction: Nancy was in fact on the case before Pat Martin, publishing this story in the paper Sept of 08, which prompted Pat to get involved. A misreading of dates on my part. My apologies. Gerald is trying to portray this lady as groundbreaking visionary, while deriding opponents as "blockheads" who "sniffed at the idea" of having a block of Portage Avenue encased in a giant fence while still being to small for a regulation field "and whatnot".

But you don't often come across the name of Nancy Chippendale who, having started the ball rolling, worked mostly under the radar "with a rogue group that played to win," tirelessly advocating in the certainty that if she could keep the media engaged it just might happen. She is now planning to return to school and become a PR professional and start a company "to help non-profits promote themselves."

No, Nancy Chippendale's name was not there on the day that the dream she dreamed came true.

But it is now.

I haven't felt this ill after reading the paper since Sinclair's "fight to save Upper Fort Garry".