Long Term Ownership Review: 2011 VW Jetta TDI

The latest VW Jetta sports a classic look with gentle curves.

I try to be green. I bought my VW Jetta TDI partially on the strength of the 'clean diesel' claim. Now, thanks to the emissions scandal, I'm disappointed. At some point in the near future I may sell my beloved car back to Volkswagen. The decision will be based on the generosity of the buyback offer.

When it comes to costs, my TDI may be the least expensive car I have every owned. This is in no small part because of diesel-gate and the financial benefits I am enjoying as an owner of an affected vehicle.

Recently, I replaced the all season tires that came on the car. I installed Pirelli Cinturato P7 All Season Plus tires. The new tires set me back all of $106.75. This includes balancing, installation, GST and government disposal fees for the old tires. Why so little? Volkswagen helped out. The German automaker sent me two charge cards: one preloaded with $500 to be used anywhere and another card worth $500 for use at any VW dealership. It was a we-are-sorry-for-our-deception move on the part of  VW Canada. As I said, driving a Jetta TDI just got cheaper thanks to the dieselgate fiasco.

The oh-so-positive story that VW once spun about its clean-diesel technology has been proven to be a web of lies. VW diesels built from 2009 on spew far more pollutants of certain types than originally claimed. The cars were equipped with sophisticated software to defeat the pollution control system and essentially dial its actions back during day-to-day driving. Turning off these systems increases power and improves fuel mileage. It also results in more pollution. Sales of new TDIs have been halted in Ontario for months with no end to the market ban in sight.

It has been announced that a buyback program is being worked out with the details to be made available at the end of June. There may be other options offered the owners of the affected diesels but the buyback mated to a cash bonus is what peaks my interest. I understand the buyback will be based on the value of a low mileage, well maintained Jetta TDI in August 2015. This is just before the cheating scandal hit the pages of newspapers around the world. 

Message sent by a VW salesperson. No TDIs for sale.

For more information, read: VW Is Said to Cheat on Diesel Emissions; U.S. to Order Big Recall
and Volkswagen Chief Apologizes for Breach of Trust After Recall.

All that said, I am still happy with my Jetta. I believe it pollutes more than it should but I don't believe it is anywhere near as polluting as another car I once owned: an American compact converted to run on natural gas. I'm convinced that car emitted a constant stream of unburnt hydrocarbons whenever driven. Heck, it might have been polluting when sitting parked as one constantly smelled the tell-tale odour of natural gas when around that car.

This weekend I drove from London to Niagara Falls on little more than a quarter tank of diesel fuel. It is hard to believe that a car burning so little fuel is a polluting monster. At a little more than 85,000 kms, my car is delivering about 35 miles per U.S. gallon (41.4 miles per imperial gallon) or 6.8 litres per 100 km. On my weekend trip I calculate my car was burning approximately of 5.0 litres per 100 km. (I got off the four hundred series highways and took a lot of back roads with 80 kph limits. The slower cruising speed improves fuel economy.)

But, that's enough about the pollution scandal. Let me tell you some other things about my TDI.

My wife and I have owned our Volkswagen Jetta TDI for almost five years. It is now essentially out of warranty. That said, only hours after our warranty expired our ignition lock failed. VW agreed to pay 90 percent of the expense and our dealer absorbed the other ten percent. Very nice. Also, when a valve in the catalytic converter system failed at almost 80,000 km and 54 months, VW covered all the costs.

In the almost five years we have owned our Jetta TDI, it has developed no squeaks, no rattles. We have no complaints other than the irritation at the ongoing pollution problem. (Link to U.S.A. VW Jetta site.) Sorry but it is hard to ignore the elephant in the room.

We know we have a diesel under the hood but burning modern diesel fuel means no tell-tale odours even with the defeat mechanism engaged. For the most part, the engine is quite quiet -- at least that is what my wife and passengers tell me. I have to take their word for it as I have gone somewhat deaf in my senior years.

When my wife and I drove to Kingston from London, a distance of about 950 kms, we belted down 401 at speeds approaching 116 km/h. I don't like speeding but traffic was moving quickly and I don't like to be the slowest car on the road. The little diesel delivered 54.9 mpg (Imp.) for the trip. We made the round trip on one tank. We didn't refuel until we returned to London.

Usually, I drive a mix of city and country, but my trips are weighted heavily toward short city excursions. After some 85,000 kilometres I can say with confidence that my Jetta is delivering 6.8 litres/100 kms or 41.4 mpg (Imperial). This works out to about 35 mpg in U.S. measure. For the first 30,000 kilometres the mileage was slightly better but I am no longer making a monthly trip from London to Burlington. That once-a-month, three hundred kilometre highway drive gave my fuel economy figures a small but measurable boost.

On a long trip outside urban areas, if I stay off the freeway, keep the cruise control at 80 or 90 km/h, my Jetta TDI can deliver slightly better than 60 mpg (Imp.).  The first time, I managed to break the '6-0' barrier was on a trip from London to Kitchener/Waterloo. I took older and slower, two-lane roads. It is impossible to beat the 60 mpg barrier when belting down 401 at 110 km/h. This may be over the speed limit but no one travels at 100 km/h or 62 mph on North America's busiest freeway.

VW Clean Diesel Distance Calculator

There was a VW Clean Diesel Distance Calculator online. The calculator has been taken offline -- a victim of dieselgate.

Last summer, I drove from London to Montreal without stopping for fuel. Once I drove from London to Richmond Hill, north of Toronto, and back home on less than half a tank of fuel.

Diesel has the reputation of being more costly than gasoline. In some areas this is true, especially the States, but in London, Ontario, I have been pleasantly surprised. The last time I filled up I paid 24-cents a litre less for diesel than I would have paid for gas. An amazing spread.

After almost five years of driving a diesel and keeping excellent records, I know the difference in price between gasoline and diesel has been negligible. But, because of the incredible fuel economy I enjoy, I know I am ahead in the fuel-cost-game by more than a thousand dollars.

As I said, I've paid up to 24-cents a litre less for diesel than for gas — but this spread is very uncommon. And the spread does not always favour diesel. I have noticed a pattern: Diesel is more expensive during the cold months and gasoline is more expensive in the warmer ones. As I write this it is late spring, it is warm and I'm smiling. At my last fuel stop I paid only $0.779 (Cdn.) per litre for diesel fuel.

Before the arrival of my Jetta's first winter, I bought a set of snow tires (Continental Extreme Winter Contacts), steel rims and proper VW wheel covers. This was expensive, $1420.13 tax included, but it meant the seasonal tire changes only cost $33.84. (This cost has about doubled since I bought the car. This is ridiculous.) In the end, not constantly remounting tires on rims saves not only the tires but the pocket book. I'm hoping I'll get some consideration for this expense when I sell my vehicle back to VW Canada.

My wife and I have encountered a  few problems with our Jetta. All have been covered under warranty. The first problem cropped up just a few months after taking delivery. The engine coolant light was coming on at start-up. I would immediately turn the car off, wait a few moments, and then re-start the engine. The light remained off after the re-start.

I arranged an appointment over the Internet and left a comment describing the problem. When I took the car in, the service department was ready. They discovered a loose hose clamp. There was a slow leak that may have been there since the car left the factory in Mexico. The dealer tightened the clamp, added a little coolant and problem solved.

Oil changes for the Jetta TDI are expensive ($138.31) but I only change the oil every 15,000 kms. At 30,000 kms the dealer installed a new fuel filter and did some other minor maintenance. The bill was $363.47. I thought this was excessive.

The 45,000 kms oil change also came in at $138.31 but the 60,000 kms check-up was be a doozy. The dealer changed for not only the engine oil/filter change but also to change the oil and filter in the DSG transmission and give the car a thorough inspection. To make a long story short, the total bill at 60,000 kms was $843.60. Painful.

After four and a half years the battery in my key fob died. The dealer replaced the battery for about $16 and a VW mechanic showed me how to reprogram the key which had lost its memory when it lost power. I was pleased the dealer did not charge for the few minutes it took to reprogram the key. I have posted the method used to reprogram my key at the end of this post.

The Jetta TDI's strong suite is its roomy interior, both cabin and trunk. The car is comfortable. I'm a practical sort and can put up with hard interior plastic when I'm enjoying good leg room and fine head room. I have had a number of passengers comment on the Jetta's roomy interior. When sitting in the backseat of the Jetta, the car gives the illusion of being a much bigger car than it is. It doesn't feel like a compact.

The generous trunk can carry even more if the back seats are folded down. But don't almost all cars offer this perk today? What is neat is the small pop-out in the middle of the back seat. When removed one can carry skis inside the car while keeping the rear seat back upright. I really like that.

Once I carried three counter stools and a chair home from Toronto in my Jetta. I had to fold down the rear seats but everything fit easily. My wife and I were pleased. 

The base VW Jetta TDI comes with a stick shift but my wife and I opted for the DSG (dual-shift gearbox) automatic transmission. This added $1400 (Cdn.) to the price of our car but we're glad we did it as we have learned that the stick shift in the Jetta has collected some complaints.

Reportedly, the Jetta has a stiff clutch pedal. Some drivers encounter stalling problems when pulling away from a dead stop. Others have complained their cars stall when shifted too early into second. I've heard that holding the car in first a little longer eliminates these stalls.

My second car is a Morgan I bought new in 1968.

For 45 years I drove a stick shift in a Morgan Plus 4 with no syncro in first. I believe I understand the present VW problem. Some cars insist on being understood. In the beginning, I found my Morgan ornery but not now. Yet, when others not familiar with the little roadster try to drive it, it balks.

After 45 years shifting an antique Moss box, I love  the DSG tranny. This sophisticated double-clutch transmission can be thought of as two transmissions in one, with both fitted with its own clutch. My wife and I have found the DSG tranny well matched to our TDI's torque-rich power curve. The turbo diesel pumps out 236 ft-lbs of torque at 1,750 rpm.

This gives the car enough extra pulling power at low speeds that one must be careful. I carelessly chirped the tires in Peterborough and immediately attracted a police officer who tailed me for a number of blocks.

Some owners have complained their DSG transmissions shift harshly. Programming a computer controlled transmission to please everyone is tricky, but Volkswagen is trying. Some months back the dealer upgraded the firmware in our DSG transmission to fix a problem we didn't even know we had.

And now we do have a minor problem. We live at the top of a hill and now when going downhill through a 25 k/h zone our Jetta now has difficulty finding the right gear, especially when the engine and transmission are cold. Selecting the 'sport' transmission setting appears to avoid the problem.

The transmission firmware, found in the Electronic Control Unit or ECU, uses "fuzzy logic" to adapt the shift response to the driving style of the driver. The DSG transmission, controlled by the onboard computer, doesn't exactly learn as some claim, but it does custom tailor its shift points during use. The December software upgrade modified the "fuzzy logic" algorithm used by our ECU.

The Jetta TDI transmission can be operated as either a six speed automatic, this saves fuel, or as a sporty five speed. In the D, or six speed position, both my wife and I feel the engine lugs a little at low rpm's — especially in the city. I've been assured, it is actually not lugging. Diesels don't lug like gasoline powered engines. Supposedly, the early shifting saves fuel without damaging the engine. Still, some folk may find this annoying and force VW to modify the computer code yet again.

The sport setting lets the revs climb higher before the shift. In the city, I have come to like the extra bounce this puts in the Jetta's step. But, as much as I like the sport setting, I keep returning to D. I like keeping my fuel bills low. One month I didn't spend $40 on fuel. (But one hundred dollars spent in a month on fuel is more the norm.)

Lastly, the driver can shift the DSG transmission manually by sliding the shifter all the way to the right. In Tiptronic mode, pushing the gear shift forward causes the transmission to select a higher gear. Pulling back on the lever causes a down shift. In this mode, the DSG transmission is operated primarily by the driver, but there are overrides built in to protect the transmission from driver error. Of course, there is no clutch pedal.

The VW diesel burns Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel (ULSD) fuel. This cuts exhaust emissions and eliminates diesel odor at the tail pipe. Is it hard to find ULSD fuel? Not at all. All diesel fuel sold in Canada and the United States is ULSD fuel. It's the law.

I admit there have been times when our Jetta didn't hide its diesel heritage. For instance, on cold winter mornings, before the engine had warmed, the engine can be louder than usual. These times have been only momentary distractions. Generally, our TDI has been very well mannered, keeping its unique diesel voice politely muffled.

One nice feature of our Jetta are the heated front seats. Both the seats and the seat backs get warm and toasty very quickly. With three levels of heat intensity, you can wean yourself off this luxury without suffering heated-seat-withdrawal.

Diesels, by the way, take a little longer than gas engines on fiercely cold mornings to deliver hot, cabin-warming air. On those mornings, the heated seats are a godsend.

Originally, I topped up our fuel tank every Saturday at the grocery store fuel bar. The grocery store fuel stop had the lowest price for diesel. Now, I fuel up at Costco. The Costco fuel bar often sells diesel for three or more cents less than the grocery store.

I fill the tank at least once a week during the cold, winter months to minimize the chance of water condensation contaminating an almost empty fuel tank. And, speaking of contamination, I always say I am fueling the car and not gassing it up. This reminds me that I am driving a diesel.

I understand keeping gas out of the tank has been a problem for some diesel drivers. The nozzle on a diesel pump is usually a larger diameter than the one on an unleaded gas pump. This difference makes it difficult to put diesel into a gasoline powered vehicle but it does not protect the diesel driver from gasoline contamination.

I know one Jetta TDI owner who pumped gas instead of diesel resulting in expensive repairs. Then he lent his car to a friend who topped it up with gas before returning it; Another repair bill. And then he had an attendant at a full service station pump the wrong fuel. (After some arguing, I believe the gas station picked up the bill for the last fuel pumping error.)

Many diesel pumps and/or nozzles are colour coded. But the colour coding is not consistent. In and around London, Ontario, bright yellow often indicates diesel. That said, at Costco in London the nozzles are green. In the States pump nozzles may have green, black or even red plastic covers depending on the station and the state. One must pay attention.

"Diesel Only" warnings for fuel filler pipe and door.

Putting the wrong fuel in the diesel powered TDI is such a problem that Volkswagen sent me a "Diesel Only" warning sticker for the inside of my fuel filler door, plus a bright yellow "Diesel Only" warning ring to place around my fuel filler pipe.

I also stay away from bio-diesel. Another driver I know had serious problems after the bio-diesel congealed in the cold Canadian winter. The result was a costly repair. My "no bio-diesel rule" is stricter than the recommendation from Volkswagen. The German car maker allows a 5 percent blend of bio-diesel. I might play with bio-diesel in the middle of the hot Canadian summer but otherwise I say no thanks.

I guess I can't put off addressing the styling issue any longer. Obviously, I like the look of the Jetta but lots of early reviewers didn't. On its release, the automotive press recoiled at its conservative styling and at the choice of cabin interior materials. "Too much hard plastic," the critics said. Some went so far as to call the look "cheap." (Some of these criticisms have been delt with in the latest incarnation of the Jetta. For instance, the lines are sharper today and the dash is now cushioned.)

My original response was, "They don't know cheap." I'm old. I'm in my 60s. I can recall when cars really had cheap interiors. I believe it was a Renault 4 my friend Kathy drove in the '60s with front seats made of canvas suspended from steel-tube frames. That was cheap! (But that car was also cool, as was Kathy.)

Clean VW dash layout is now in upgraded soft-touch plastic.

The Jetta TDI Comfortline instrumentation could be more complete. For instance, I miss a temperature gauge and an oil pressure gauge. (My Morgan had those.) It would be nice to have the cruise control placed in a handy spot on the top of the wheel spokes instead of being found on a control stalk which is somewhat hidden. (I believe the latest TDI's have addressed this issue.)

On the other hand, when driving in the States I can program the digital dash display to show my speed in mph: Handy. Also, there's an outside temperature display that flashes and beeps a warning if the temperature falls close to freezing. Disc brakes on all four wheels are another bragging point but personally I have never been disappointed by cars with drum brakes on the rear, and I think they are cheaper to buy and to maintain. (That said, in a braking emergency I will probably be happy to have the stopping power of the disc brakes. And, the instrumentation has been changed slightly since I bought my Jetta. Don't put too much faith in anything I've had to say about the instrumentation. Remember my car is a 2011 and this is a long term ownership review.)

I have tested my Jetta's accident avoidance abilities; It passed. My wife tells me that she too has had to take quick, evasive action, and she also found the car responsive yet in-control. She gave our Jetta two thumbs up and she's a tough critic.

Our car has lots of pluses but so do many of its competitors. Here I'm thinking of all the stuff that came standard on my Jetta Comfortline: traction control, stability control, ABS brakes, air conditioning, cruise control, adjustable steering wheel, heated seats, anti-theft system, alloy wheels . . . . Lot's of cars can match that list feature for feature.

My car is a 2011. I understand the newest Jettas, similar to mine, have even more standard features. e.g. I believe today my Jetta comes standard with a moon roof. And VW has scrapped the torsion bar rear suspension and gone back to the better, and more expensive, independent rear suspension approach for most of the line. (The new TDIs may be the exception. The new cars have an extra tank for the blue stuff added to the exhaust system as a move to truly make the car clean diesels. The extra tank, I understand, claims the space needed to install upgraded suspension. And all this info may be for naught as, at this time, all the diesel VWs have been pulled from the market.)

Carryinging 4 adults to Montreal, my Jetta TDI got 58.2 mpg.

What brought us onto the Jetta team was the fuel economy delivered without resorting to a big bank of batteries, the gutsy turbo engine, the generous interior and large trunk.

Tipping the scale was the Volkswagen program in force at the time of purchase. It allowed purchasers to pay back only a portion of the cost of the new car through the monthly payments. At the end of the payback period — 60 months — there would be a balloon payment of $7992.

All this is of no consequence now as we paid the car off eight months early. Having the car fully paid for may make the buyback less complicated. As you can tell I'm counting on the buyback and bonus payment being generous amounts. If the paybacks are as good as the rumours suggest, watch this space for a review of the Audi A3 Sportback e-tron. I'm dreaming the Audi will be my next green car.

Photo: PR Volkwagen

If you have gotten this far, you might also be interested in Diesel: The Dark-Horse Contender for Greener, Cleaner Cars. Since the article was wrtitten, the diesel has truly become a dark-horse.

Reprogramming a key fob

This is how the VW mechanic reprogrammed my 2011 VW Jetta TDI key fob. I had to have this done after the battery died and the key fob lost its memory. The dealer was quite decent and did not charge me for doing this and the mechanic encouraged me to watch and learn.

To do the following, you must have at least one working key fob.

• Insert the key to be reprogrammed into the ignition. Turn the key to "one" but do not start the engine.
• Get out of the vehicle, close the driver’s door and insert the working key into the driver's side door lock.
• Turn the key to the right to manually lock the door. 
• Remove the key.
• Press the unlock button on the key fob. 
• Wait a full second and depress the unlock button again. 
• The door should be unlocked, open it, reach in and turn the key in the ignition to off and remove it.
• The key is now reprogrammed.

Test the reprogrammed key. If it doesn’t work, repeat the procedure. Good luck.

Online Style Guide Needed

"Newspapers ought to be one of the bastions of literacy, and reporters and editors ought to be at pains to shun corruptions and commonplace errors that may be excusable from others."

— The London Free Press Style Guide

Newspapers are in trouble. At least, when it comes to quality. I have an idea on how to improve the product, sponsor an online style guide.

At one time The London Free Press, like many publications, published it own in-house style guide. It came in a little binder filled with hole-punched, printed pages. This book form made updating quick and easy.

When the old style guide was used in conjunction with The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, a reporter or photographer or editor had a two great resources immediately at hand. The paper has stopped producing the style guide and Oxford has shut down their unique, Canadian operation.

Maybe it is time for The London Free Press to approach Sun Media and Quebecor Media and encourage the production of a company-wide, online, style guide. The guide could offer read only access to everyone, including readers, but changes to the guide would be carefully controlled. An online suggestion box would be nice. Let users of the guide suggest changes and additions just as editorial staff were once encouraged to submit new entries, corrections or changes to the members of the Style Guide committee.

Newspapers realized that "consistency must go hand in hand with accuracy" in order to maintain the complete confidence of readers. The Free Press guide points out that "dictionaries are diagnostic; the Style Guide is prescriptive. Dictionaries report how words are used by the majority, no matter whether well or ill; the Style Guide specifies how they are to be used in The Free Press, and insists on correctness."

Let me share with you a few of the entries from my copy of The London Free Press Style Guide:

accepted a position is a trite expression frequently found in business announcements. More often, a person applies for a position and the company does the accepting.

a.m., p.m. (lower case): 2 p.m. EDT; 2:30 a.m. EST. The terms a.m. and p.m. are redundant in connection with noon or midnight. They mean ante meridiem and post meridiem, whereas the sun is exactly opposite the meridiem at midnight and over it at noon.

billion (1,000,000,000), million (1,000,000). It is $4.3 billion; four billion people. A billion in Canadian usage means a thousand million. In Europe, a billion is a million million, but don't worry about the conversion; it's done by the wire services.

cement. Don't use cement when you mean concrete. Cement is the powdery substance used in making concrete. It's a concrete block, concrete abutment, concrete sidewalk. Workmen pour concrete, not cement, when they're building foundations. Concrete is a mixture of cement, sand, gravel and water. But cement mixer.

It is important to get Sun Media and Quebecor on-board when it comes to this project. It might prevent the following which appeared in The Free Press after being moved to the paper by the QMI Agency: "The Jeep . . . slammed through the cement foundation of the bungalow."

doctors fought to save. Avoid.

doughnut (never donut except when required in company names)

e.g. (means exempli gratia). Avoid, use "for example."

Today the paper not only uses e.g., but uses it incorrectly. The following is from the paper's online Email Alerts page: "Eg. Breaking news, News, Sports, Entertainment." Eg.?

Note e-mail is spelled one way at the top of the page and another way in the body of the text. Talk about the need for a style guide. Also note how the writer has failed to capitalize all the words in the name of the paper. The London Free Press name is capitalized incorrectly online. Ouch! (See below.)

the. It's capitalized in all nominative references to our own newspaper . . . The London Free Press.

till, until. The two are equally correct. The original form, till, is more common, but its expanded variation, until, is often preferred in phrases or clauses preceding the main clause. (We're not going home till the press club closes, but Until it closes, we're not budging.). 'Til, which would be a contraction of an expansion, is nonsense. Up to is acceptable, but not up until.

zero, zeros (not zeroes).

When I saw the above, I groaned. I've made that mistake all too often and I'm sure I've seen it in print. A quick check turned up lots of examples of the word zeroes in print. It turns out that "his paycheque has a few more zeroes than mine" is incorrect. The Style Guide is correct; The plural of the noun is zeros.

But there is also a verb "to zero." "The NDP zeroes in on a vulnerable Liberal seat" is correct. This time zero is a verb.

 Auugghhhh!

Are those working in the media professionals?

There was an interesting story in my local paper — The London Free Press. It seems a man was arrested, charged and found guilty of obstructing police after he got too close to the action while shooting pictures. London police were arresting a drunk on a downtown London street and Ireneusz Janiszewski thought, incorrectly it turns out, that he could go anywhere he pleased to get a picture of the arrest. Since all was occurring on a public sidewalk, he thought he was free to shoot from any vantage point, even if it involved disobeying a direct police order.

The man said he was a photojournalist: An interesting assertion which the reporter did not seem to take seriously. A quick reading of the newspaper's stories might leave one thinking Janiszewski was a photo buff or wannabe shutterbug. At best, one might think of the shooter as an "aspiring photojournalist."

Despite the reporter's unease at applying the term photojournalist to the accused, the headline writer for the second story bravely called a spade a spade, or in this case a photojournalist a photojournalist.

I think the reason for the tone of the news story was that newspaper folk are very protective of their turf. They like to refer to themselves as professionals despite the fact it does not take a special degree to do their work. (In fact, an America District Judge ruled in 1993 that newspaper reporters and photographers are not professionals as defined by U.S. federal labour law.)

Name of accused spelled two ways

Maybe, just maybe, if newspaper folk were professionals some of the most egregious errors would not appear in print. For instance, the charged man's name was spelled two ways in two stories in The Free Press.

Variety is not the spice of life in a news story, and unfortunately this story had way too much variety. A headline tells us "photojournalist given unconditional discharge" but the story tells us "he was granted a conditional discharge."

If news reporting was a profession, there would be standards. Spelling errors in names and other incorrectly reported stuff might be corrected. But days after mistakes are made, they often remain on the newspaper website. In the past, I have drawn the attention of reporters and editors to errors in posted copy. Sometimes the slip-ups are corrected — sometimes not. There is clearly no policy and this is not a hallmark of professionalism.

I worked for more than four decades in the newspaper field. In the early years I never heard the term photojournalist applied to newspaper shooters. We were simply staff photographers. When a reporter or editor needed art to illustrate a story, a photographer was given an assignment sheet detailing what was expected.

It may surprise you to know than most photographers with National Geographic did not major in photography but they have college degrees in a variety of disciplines: journalism, anthropology, sociology or psychology, fine arts, and sciences.

When I worked at The Sault Daily Star, the folk doing the hiring had an unwritten policy against hiring anyone with a journalism degree. Shortly after I was hired, a young man with a BA in English from the University of Windsor was hired as a cub reporter. With writing skills and an understanding of spelling and grammar he was preferred over a journalism graduate from Carlton University. It seems the grads from Ottawa came complete with a professional attitude that had to be dismantled.

That young man went on to become an excellent reporter and one of the best editors I have known. He has a very inquisitive mind. He is now retired but in the entire course of his career he never pulled some of the conceit-driven stunts pulled by some of the journalism grads I have worked with.

Some years ago I covered a fuel spill on Oxford Street East. The police stopped The Free Press reporter and me from getting too close to the scene. They claimed it was too dangerous. Yet, we could see police officers near the spill walking about without masks, quietly chatting with each other. The reporter, a journalism student working at the paper for the summer, was incensed. She argued angrily with the police. Finally, the officer in charge came over and in a fit of uncontrolled pique she told him to "Fuck off!" She was escorted to her car.

Thinking of that student, that professional reporter to be, and comparing her to that photojournalist wannabe convicted of obstructing a London police officer, I think I see some similarities.

_______________________________________________________________________________

Addendum:

1: For another look at the question of what is a photojournalist, check out this earlier post: Who's a photojournalist?

In truth, all too often newspapers use photographs to fill holes and to visually support for their stories. This type of newspaper editorial photography has more in common with advertising bumph than journalism.

When The London Free Press ran a story claiming men who buy sex commit more crimes, the piece ran with a stock photo. The rough dude in the photo and the cigarette smoking hooker were models and the photo came from a stock photo agency.

It must be pointed out that The Free Press owned up to this use of stock photography. They credited the source of their photo as Shutterstock. An observant reader would have realized this was not photojournalism.

2: What were the two spellings of Janiszewski's name? Well, in an earlier story his first name is Ireneusz. In the later story an "e" is dropped and he is Irenusz. 

3: The story tells us the incident occurred "near the northwest entrance of CitiPlaza (sic) at King and Wellington streets." The King and Wellington intersection is found on the east side of Citi Plaza.

I write CitiPlaza (sic) because I took pictures at the plaza some time ago and was told the correct spelling was two words and given a business card to prove it. The plaza's website still spells the name Citi Plaza. Why does The Free Press want to be cute? (This is not the first time that I have seen this in the local paper.)

4: I'm not an editor, as evident in this piece; I need an editor. That said, almost everyone could use a good editor. Our newspapers, staffed with professionals, do not see it this way. Thus, we see stuff like the following: "He was granted a conditional discharge with 12 months' probation." Note that months is simply plural; It should not be possessive. A good editor would have caught this and corrected it before it went in the daily paper and onto the Web.

5: And what exactly does it mean that the erstwhile photojournalist, he may not be doing too much photojournalism in the future, was given a conditional discharge? The paper tell us, "A discharge keeps him from acquiring a criminal record."

London Police Service sees it differently. They write on the Web: "A discharge is a criminal record for the life of the discharge (although it is not a record of “conviction.”) It is all a little confusing but what is clear is that in the end those given a discharge must request the destruction of the record. London Police Services will do this when asked but not all police forces.

My guess, and it is just a guess, is that the reason the photographer and his lawyer turned down the offer of a discharge before the case reached the courts was that they believed they would be able to win the case, beat the charge, and the photographer would walk cleanly away from the legal mess. He didn't want a discharge if he could avoid it.

I know someone who was given a type of discharge and in the short term it caused them lots of problems.

New car blues

"So, how do you like the Jetta?" My wife quickly replied that she hadn't formed an opinion; We had just driven the new car off the lot not five minutes earlier. And now we were stopped, pulled over in front of a furniture store and chatting with the fellow who had just rear-ended us.

That's right, we had not traveled five kilometres before the blush of new was banished from our baby, our new Jetta TDI.

The damage was slight: A small arced dimple from a top edge of a licence plate holder, plus a line of small indentations. Also, the impact had pushed the bumper slightly out of alignment.

The blue wedge is the misaligned bumper reflecting clear sky.

The repair will cost a little more than $400 and the fellow who hit us is picking up the tab.

This post marks the first of a series of posts that will look at the Volkswagen Jetta TDI and our feelings about our Mexican made car showing German roots.

To get an idea of the cost, go to the Volkswagen Canada website, click on Build and Price and then click on Jetta. The Jetta was simplified in 2011. Some say cheapened. The changes are most noticeable in the hard, black plastic found everywhere inside. Many are saying that the Jetta no longer has any claim to being a luxury car because of the cheapened interior. I'm not going to be so quick to damn my new car.

Before settling on the Jetta, I looked at the hybrid Lexus CT200h and the Toyota Prius. The Lexus fell from favour as it had a very long delivery time. The earthquake and tsunami affecting Japan were blamed. The Prius fell from favour for similar reasons. (Also, my wife dislikes the Prius look.) The Jetta came from behind to be chosen based on fuel economy (60 mpg or better cruising down the freeway), technical sophistication (a clean diesel engine putting out 237 ft/lbs of torque) and a six speed/five speed automatic transmission. There's more but we'll get to all that in a later post.

The deal maker was the trade-in value assigned to my aging 2003 Ford Focus. The value given was four times greater than that offered by the other Volkswagen dealer in town. The excellent trade-in brought the monthly payments down to $304 with one caveat: When the 60 month loan period is up, there will still be a balloon payment outstanding of about $7900.

Two other little financial perks applied to the Jetta: The first oil change and suggested maintenance visit does not occur until 15,000 kms and the annual bill from my insurer for the Jetta is less than what they quoted me for insuring a top-of-the-line Honda Civic.

Sunday my wife and I may drive to Burlington to a Morgan club meeting. We'll take the Jetta and report on the fuel mileage delivered by our new car.

Cheers!

Two editorials, two views

The London Free Press and many other Sun Media/Quebecor Media papers carried this editorial by Ezra Levant on the Alberta tar sands: Putting a new face on the oilsands. The right say oilsands; The left say tar sands; Levant says ethical oil.

The New York Times carried this editorial today: Profits before environment. According to the American paper: Tar sands production creates three times as many greenhouse gases as does conventional oil.

The dispute over the soundness of the tar sands development has turned ugly. It wasn't a big turn. The tar sands are an environmental disaster like so many of the things that we do for energy to support our unsupportable-in-the-long-run way of life.

Levant calls his opponents anti-oilsands agitators spreading anti-oilsands lies and propaganda. The Free Press editorial writer claims: "The chief criticism of the oilsands is esthetic: Open-pit mines just don't look pretty." Now it appears to be Levant who is lying.

A little, very little, googling will quickly show opposition to the tar sands and to the new pipeline is because many Native Canadians see the tar sands development as causing "environmental devastation." This is not an esthetic problem.

Questionable information not questioned

Someday I will write about a psychic story on which I worked while at The London Free Press. It was a good story but all of it was bunkum. The paper ran the story because it was a fun, good read. Period. No one was concerned that it was totally false. (To many readers, stories like that one make the newspaper staff look like fools.)

Error filled stories weaken the brand. This is a fact. Studies have found that newspapers do a great disservice to themselves and to their industry when they run stuff clearly, and accurately, seen as erroneous by many.

Today, under the headline 'Weird' science, The Free Press promoted the return of William Shatner's Weird or What? on the History channel. (History channel? I don't think so. Often there is no history in the history that is presented here.)

Bill Harris asks in his Sun Media television column, quoting William Shatner, "What is a crystal skull doing buried in prehistoric times?" The answer to the question is: They are fakes. British Museum and Smithsonian skulls were conclusively determined to be fakes carved with relatively modern equipment.

When I think of the story on which I worked those many years ago, I hang my head in shame. Running stuff like that, printing bunkum as fact as Harris is doing this weekend, does nothing to further the reader's understanding of our world, of science.

If you are interested in knowing a little more about the myth of the crystal skulls, check out this article from Archaeology magazine. It carries more weight than the stuff being run by the History Channel and being reported by Sun Media.

Obama, Sarah Palin something in common

It's a fast moving political brush fire flaming across the American media landscape. President Obama's black, Darth Vader bus is Canadian made. A real shocker? I don't think so.

Was this a big scoop for the New York Post? Again, I don't think so. The Obama's bus is from Hemphill Brothers Coach of Tennessee. Using a bus from these good old Southern boys puts the president in the company of other political notables such as: George W. Bush, John McCain, Fred Thompson, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rudy Guiliani, and my personal favourite user of Hemphill coaches — Sarah Palin.

An article two years ago in the Bastrop Daily Enterprise by Wes Helbling about Joey and Trent Hemphill, owner/founders of Hemphill Coach of Tennessee, reported:

Perhaps their most famous client to date has been former President George W. Bush. Trent said during the 2000 presidential primaries, a network was using their buses to interview candidates.


“The governor’s office called us, and we provided buses for him during the primaries,” said Trent. “We picked him up and took him to Austin on election night.”

The brothers were later invited to Bush’s first inauguration. The president called them again for buses during his 2004 re-election campaign. It was an unusual request, as presidents do not normally use private transportation services.

“The Secret Service armored all of the vehicles,” said Trent. “They were on the coaches 24 hours a day.”

As one might imagine, “There are a lot of logistics involved.”

Trent recalls getting a call on his cell phone from Air Force One. The reception was bad because Air Force One was flying over Iceland at the time.

The brothers were invited to a private Christmas party at the White House last December. During the final days of the Bush administration, the president sent them each a letter of thanks.

“No matter what your politics are, it was a real honor for the president to use our buses,” said Joey.

New Prevost coaches are delivered to the Hemphill Tennessee conversions facility with nothing more than a plywood floor and a driver's seat, according to information posted on a company site. This agrees with what ABC News learned from Christine Garant of Prevost, "We just make the shell. We don't know anything about the end user." Prevost's Steve Zeigler agreed, telling ABC News, "We just build an empty shell of a bus, and then sell them to a converter for outfitting,"

American craftspeople in Tennessee custom-build every wall, cabinet and piece of furniture in a Hemphill coach. Adjacent to and upstairs from the main conversion shop, there is a complete woodfinishing and upholstery shop. Many of the parts that go into a Prevost coach come from the States. The Quebec builder brags that it uses Volvo engines. Volvo engines are made in Hagerstown, Maryland.

If you are wondering whether or not the White House could have been supplied with totally American made coaches, ABC News reports:

The only U.S.-headquartered coach manufacturer, Motor Coach Industries, based in Schamburg, Ill., also builds the country's only "buy American compliant" coach, the majority of whose parts are made here, an MCI spokeswoman said. Note the red flag words: "the majority of whose parts are made here." All parts are not made here.

ABC News fails to point out that MCI also produces buses in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada and has for decades. It's roots in Canada go back to the Dirty Thirties and 1933.

Prevost coach shells are made in Canada but are finished in plants across the United States. A great number of skilled Americans, from Florida to Oregon and points in between, are employed completing these vehicles before delivery to their American buyers.

This story may be the Jon Stewart moment of the day.

Federal Tories threaten legal action against Quebec widow

According to a story from Canadian Press:

"The federal Conservative party has sent a threatening email to the widow of an asbestos victim in the latest chapter of Canada's debate over the hazardous mineral."

Michaela Keyserlingk's husband, Robert, died in 2009 of mesothelioma — a rare form of cancer. How rare is it? Well, there are probably no more than 3000 cases diagnosed in the entire United States annually. But Robert Keyerlingk was not unlucky; Robert Keryserlingk was an asbestos worker.

Asbestos workers are at the highest risk for developing mesothelioma. According to the Mesothelioma Website: "One study of asbestos insulation workers reports a mesothelioma death rate up to 344 times higher than the general population."

Asbestos is no longer mined in the United States and it's use is banned in many developed countries, including New Zealand, Australia and all European Union countries. But Canada continues to support the controlled use of a mineral the World Health Organization has labelled a carcinogenic.

CBC reports:

"The Canadian government fought to keep asbestos off a U.N. - sponsored list of dangerous substances. If included on the list, called the Rotterdam Convention, any country looking to import asbestos would be informed of all the potential risks and would have to agree in advance to accept any shipments."

Why would Canada take such a position, you may well wonder. The answer appears to be quite simple: Quebec is the fourth largest producer of chrysotile asbestos in the world, earning the province over $100 million a year. It has also earned Quebec the unwanted distinction of having one of the highest rates of mesothelioma on earth.

With her husband dead, Michaela Keyserlingk launched a Website to warn other Canadians about the danger posed by asbestos and to publicize the hard-to-defend stance of government in Canada which continue to support the mining and exporting of a substance even the parliament buildings are having removed.

So why are the federal Tories threatening Keyserlingk with legal action? She used the party logo on her site. They want the logo removed. The feisty widow is refusing.

This started me wondering: How many other sites are posting the federal PC log. A quick Google search turned up the following links. And not all the links are positive, as it will quickly become clear. If the PCs want to threaten folk, drag 'em into court, maybe the PCs should enlarge their net. They might make quite a haul.

Bacon and Brains - "The Conservative Party currently hails out of the mythical land of Alberta, where their dark presence cast a long shadow across the whole of the Canadian prairies, some of BC, Ontario and Quebec City."
Canadian Immigration Newsletter - "Don't let policy changes catch you by surprise - stay current on the latest breaking news on Canadian Immigration!"
630 CHED - "A Liberal MP is alleging that `crass politics' have resulted in a Canadian Olympic retail logo that mirrors the federal Conservative party logo."
Voices-Voix Coalition - "As part of its platform for the 2006 federal election campaign, the Conservative Party of Canada promised greater transparency for Canadians in their access to information. Read about what the Conservatives promised Canadians."
Batshite - "The results of the Canadian federal election in May pleased some–seniors, for instance–but disappointed others–such as "modernists, women, young people, immigrants [and] people fond of evidence-based policy."

As you can see, there are oodles and oodles of sites posting the PC logo. I would add it to this blog but I don't need the possible hassle. But, my guess is that using the PC logo in an editorial context is quite legal. Check the next link to see my favourite use of the sacred symbol.

Anything But Conservative - "Could the democracy that Canadians take for granted by at risk if the Harper Conservatives get a majority? . . . in a Harper democracy, students will be discouraged from voting – in fact, this government has Elections Canada so terrified that they are ordering returning officers to stop special ballots for students . . . "

So, now the PCs are threatening a widow. Nice.

Electronic darkroom helps Web images

Lot's of folk are posting image to the Web. The feeling is that they brighten their blog posts by breaking up the grey expanses of type. Hmmm. This one reason the editors with whom I once worked insisted on placing pictures on their pages.The more things change the more they stay the same.

Taken from the Web for illustration purposes:

Now, let's see what a few seconds of image enhancement does.

If this looks as good on your screen as it does on mine, I think you'll agree that a few seconds spent setting endpoints and tweaking contrast is time well spent.

Thinly staffed newsrooms fail to catch errors

Since I started blogging, I've had some disputes with reporters over their "facts". Unlike some in the past, which got downright nasty, the most recent dispute has remained civil but it follows the usual pattern.

All too often, newspapers use other newspapers for the source of their facts. This is not a good research method. It is important to go to the original source and even then one must stay vigilant for errors. This is where a good editor is important. Sadly, good editors are a dying breed at most newspapers.

Let's look at few of these media myths or "truthiness" facts as Stephen Colbert would say.

• Cats are the only animals besides humans that can be born congenitally deaf. - wrong
• The carp barrier in the canal near Chicago uses $20,000 worth of electricity per day. - nope
• In hot weather, avoid caffeinated drinks as they make you more thirsty. - not true

The $20,000 per day cost for the carp barrier would have raised questions with any good editor. That's a whomping big chunk of electricity. Can that really be true? In today's newsroom, the figure just slips through the system — or lack of system — with no questions asked.

If you'd like to know the full story about the fish barrier claim, read on. If you are a journalism student, you might find it informative. If not, move on, there is nothing more to see here.
________________________________________________________________________________

Last night I read "an electric fish barrier, built for $9 million at Chicago, consumes $20,000 worth of electricity every day." I've been following the story about the electrified barrier in the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal that was built to prevent Asian carp from reaching the Great Lakes, and I've come across this figure before. And it may be wrong.

I believe a good editor would have done some quick math and said, "Whoa!" The reporter would have been asked for the source of this figure. When I questioned the reporter, I got an e-mail telling me:

"The figures of $20,000 a day and $7.3 for electricity for the year came from a big spread in the Sunday Detroit Free Press of July 17."


Forgive the large, bold font but it is the one used by the reporter. Hmmm. Shouting? Maybe this has turned a wee bit nasty.

When I checked the Detroit Free Press, I discovered the paper had actually reported: "Below the water, an electrical field lurks, thrumming 24 hours a day at a daily cost of $20,000." I was surprised; This does not claim the charge for electricity is $20,000 a day.

I have written a number of online stories about the carp problem. It was easy to discover the following:  The Army Corps of Engineers requested $7.25 million for barrier operations in the President’s FY2011 Budget. (Let's see, $7.25 million divided by 365 is $19,863.)

It appears the Detroit paper was talking about the total cost of operating the electric fish barrier. I contacted the Army Corps of Engineers. Lynne Whelan LRC confirmed the oft quoted figure of $20,000 includes all costs associated with operating and maintaining the barrier system. It does not represent the cost of electricity alone.

Today, thanks to the immediate sharing of stories between newspapers in large chains, an error made in London, Ontario may appear in papers and media outlets right across the country. For instance, 24 Hours Vancouver carried the story.

How wild was the $20,000 per day claim? Well, in June of this year (2011) the cost of a kwh of electricity in the Chicago area cost about 15.3 cents. If you are wondering how much electricity a kwh represents, the average home in Ontario uses between 800 and 1000 kwh in total each month.

Remember: This is a barrier that does not kill the fish but simply repels them by making them feel uncomfortable when they attempt to swim through the electrified water. So, how much does it cost to make a fish feel uncomfortable. We still don't know, but it's not $20,000 a day.

The cost of electricity in the Chicago area charted for the past 5 years.

Scribbles: Motor babbling

I love abstract art done by children like my granddaughter.

Fiona loves colourful markers. Pencils are out.

Come September my granddaughter Fiona will be all of two. And Ga-ga, that's what she calls me, has had the pleasure of watching her develop. It's been wonderful.

Naturally, I think she's quite the talented little girl. But, thanks to the Internet, I know the truth — she's just a normal child developing on schedule.

Right on cue, at 18 months, the kid discovered pencils, pens and paper. (I am so thankful she discovered paper. Lots of kids don't. They discover walls.)

Fiona would sit on the floor, a pen gripped tightly in her fist and get great joy from swirling the pen over the paper. This is typical of many toddlers as they do not have good finger, hand and wrist control.

Now, the little tyke has moved past grey pencil lines and boring blue ink — she is now deep into colour. She loves her package of colourful felt-tipped pens. She sometimes makes a simple work with only one colour and a few, concise lines but it is far more common for her to attack the paper with every colourful pen-weapon at her disposal.

She chooses her colours carefully.

Toddlers learn to speak by first learning to babble. But there are more ways to babble than just verbally. There is also motor babbling that teaches children muscle control and enhances coordination.

Baby talk has meaning. Mothers understand their child's babbling. Scribbles also carry meaning. Children as young as 18 months have been known to use dots, for example, to represent falling rain. (We know this, I assume, because the message has been babbled to mom.)

I don't understand Fiona's verbal babblings but I do have a feel for her art, her motor babbling. I'm sure she is concerned with colour, line and placement. She loves to experiment with the process, mixing a variety of dots and bold dashes with sweeping, full-page ovals.

As she gains more control, she will gravitate toward more and more realism in her art. She may oscillate between realism and scribbling but the move is always towards the real.

By the time she is six years old outlines will be replacing single lines to depict legs and arms. Stick figures will be out.  It can take another two or three years before body proportions become important to a young artist like Fiona.

Then, if she is a real artist, maybe she will rediscover the abstract. Her aunt did.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It has been more than a year since I wrote the above piece on motor babbling. Fiona's love of art has remained strong. She loves to get out her paints, her brushes and create five or six works of art before moving on to another activity.

Done shortly before she turned three, Fiona titled this work "Rainbow."

Fiona, 3, finds inspiration in the world surrounding her: "Red Flower"

Woonerf Court

Woonerf: It's the latest cool word in urban planning circles. North American suburbanites have been enjoying their own form of woonerfs for years: Courts, crescents, places and culs-de-sac.

This London cul-de-sac is a perfect living yard: Woonerf.

I first encountered the word woonerf in the Toronto Star more than a year ago. In my reading since then the word has cropped up now and again, most recently in an article by Kelly Pedro in The London Free Press.

According to the London paper, woonerf is Dutch for naked street. No, we are not talking nudism. A woonerf is a residential street stripped of the clear division between traffic and pedestrian rights of way.

Traffic and kids at play share this suburban court.

One idea being floated to improve the London downtown is to convert Dundas or another downtown street into a woonerf. Two little corrections should be made here: First, a woonerf is a residential animal. If you want to release a woonerf in a commercial area, you need a winkelerf. Second, a woonerf is more commonly translated as a living street and not a naked one.

The word may be Dutch but according to Colin Hand the concept originated in Britain with a British road engineer and architect, Colin Buchanan.

In this tale of how the woonerf came to be, a story also retold in the pages of Architecture Week, it was a Dutchman, Niek De Boer, who took the Englishman's idea and ran with it or should I say planned with it.

Woonerfs are streets designed, or redesigned, to force drivers to slow down as they shared the road space with cyclists, pedestrians and children. De Boer named these streets woonerfs, or living yards. His woonerfs were residential in character and the first one was built in the City of Delft in the '60s.

In Toronto, woonerfs (pedestrian oriented streets) are planned for the West Don Lands development.

If you search the web, you'll find examples of Dutch woonerfs with gardens and pedestrian seating nestled in among the shrubs and flowers. These remind me of  the court directly above mine and linked to my court by a well-used walkway.

When I first wrote this I was being a little facetious. Now, I'm not so sure. It's possible that some of the finest examples of woonerfs may be found in North American suburbs.

The Dutch government set design standards and passed traffic laws regulating woonerfs in 1976. Some suburban courts come quite close to following many of the Dutch government guidelines:

• Playing on the roadway is permitted
• Pedestrians may use the full width of the roadway
• Drivers must make allowance for the presence of pedestrians and children at play
• Speed bumps may be encountered
• The roadway may curve and shorten a driver's line of sight
• The roadway may be narrower than that of other area roads
• There may be flower filled islands and large pots
• Seating areas may encroach into the area of the street once designated only for vehicular traffic.

If the design principals of a woonerf are applied to a commercial area, the area becomes a winkelerf, which is not covered by the woonerf regulations.

Some suburban courts, crescents, places and culs-de-sac answer many design guidelines for woonerfs. See the following pictures taken near my Byron, Ontario home.

Narrow roadway is not car friendly.

Short line of sight plus park, complete with benches, all act to calm traffic.

A walkway links culs-de-sac making the distance shorter to walk than drive.

Finding lost graves at 'Uncle Tom's' family cemetery

UWO grad students Flannery Surette and Jim Keron surveying Henson cemetery.

Contrary to popular mythology, Uncle Tom may have been a bold fighter for freedom. Josiah Henson, possibly the man behind the Uncle Tom character, was an escaped American slave who fled the United States with his wife and children to enjoy freedom in Upper Canada, the future province of Ontario.

Josiah Henson's last home still stands in Dresden, Ontario

Henson was a renowned abolitionist, preacher and "conductor" on the Underground Railroad.  He personally "conducted" more than 115 runaway slaves to freedom, according to Devon Robinson of the Uncle Tom’s Cabin Historic Site, In all, the secret network helped almost 30,000 make it safely to Canada.

Henson delivered on his promise: "I'll use my freedom well." His home in Dresden, Ontario, is now a historic site commemorating his work.

Today archaeologists from The University of Western Ontario are searching for unmarked graves hidden in the Henson Family Cemetery. A few years ago Henson's home was moved a few hundred metres (yards) to its present location beside the cemetery.

Archaeologists find lost graves with ground penetrating radar.

Originally, the search was to be completed before the 177th anniversary of Emancipation Day, which celebrates the abolition of slavery in the British colonies.

Unfortunately, rain prevented the UWO archaeologists from mapping the areas in question before the symbolic August 1st date. The team is using sophisticated Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) which beams radar waves into the ground. It cannot be used in the rain.

Hidden features and buried objects reflect the waves enabling archaeologists accurately to map anything they discover. This approach minimizes surface disturbance — very important when mapping an historic cemetery. GPR allows a thorough but respectful search by the archaeologists.

Dena Doroszenko, archaeologist for the Ontario Heritage Trust, which owns and operates the historic site, said, "This work will be extremely helpful. Because the Henson family cemetery is still in use today . . . "

A forgotten grave was unearthed at the Henson Family Cemetery during a burial —  an unnerving event. "We are trying to prevent this happening again," said Edward Eastaugh, a UWO archeology supervisor and leader of Western’s survey team.

It is possible some of the unmarked graves will later be identified with the help of family members who have a knowledge of Henson Family genealogy, Doroszenko said.

Josiah Henson shown with Harriet Beecher Stowe, top right.

Many have forgotten how influential the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, was at the time of its publication. It was the best-selling novel of the 19th century and the second best-selling book of that century, only bested by the Bible. It was a catalyst for positive, radical change when it came to society's rejection of slavery in the States and around the world.

Shortly after the release of her book, Stowe acknowledged that Josiah Henson's autobiography, published a few years earlier in 1849, had been an inspiration for her novel. Henson, himself, republished his work as The Memoirs of Uncle Tom.

Sadly, as The New York Times recently pointed out:

"Today, of course, the book has a decidedly different reputation, thanks to the popular image of its titular character, Uncle Tom — whose name has become a byword for a spineless sellout, a black man who betrays his race."

Clearly the original meaning of Uncle Tom has been lost or Henson would not have taken the name for the later release of his memoirs. The archaeologists from Western are finding long forgotten graves while showing great respect as they conduct their search.

Josiah Henson's grave is not forgotten. It is clearly marked. But the respect for "Uncle Tom" seems to have been lost. Finding the man behind the myth is easy, no GPR necessary, but finding Uncle Tom's noble character, now obscured by time, seems much harder.

Dormant or dead?

Dying? Dead? Or just dormant?

Recently I started thinking that Stephen Colbert was onto something with his newly minted word: "truthiness". Someone suggested to me that the widely reported story of lawn grasses going dormant during a drought may be more truthiness rather than truth. They were right.

When newspapers and other media outlets tell you "grass goes dormant during dry periods" and proceed to encourage you to refrain from watering, you see yourself as green, if not your lawn. Unfortunately, follow this advice too rigidly and you will not be green and your lawn will be dead — permanently dormant.

Surprisingly, the lack of truth in the advice is not in the claim of dormancy, grass does go dormant during a drought. It is the belief that dormant grass needs no water where the error creeps in. Dormant grass is living grass and so it should come as no surprise that it still requires a little water.

So, what is the greenest response to lawn care during a drought? Based on information gleaned from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and from Ohio State University:

• Water turf once every two weeks with about half an inch or 1.27 cm of water. This will supply enough moisture to keep crowns, rhizomes and roots of your lawn grass hydrated and alive. This amount of water will not regreen a dormant lawn, however, it will help to insure good recovery with the return of rainfall. (If your soil is very sandy and does not hold water well, your lawn may require watering more often —  say, once a week.)
• Use water gauges to measure the depth of water applied. A lawn water gauge can be as simple as several empty straight-sided cans, such as tuna and salmon containers, placed in the sprinkler's watering pattern.
• If possible, cycle irrigation to allow water penetration and avoid water runoff. Dry soils may not absorb even 1.27 cm of water in one application.
• Water turf in the early morning to reduce water loss from evaporation.
• Never allow sprinklers to water pavement, driveways or sidewalks. This wastes water.
• Never trim lawns shorter than two and a half inches or 6.35 cm. Taller grass develops a deeper, more extensive root system. Keep mower blades sharp to avoid tearing rather than cleanly cutting the grass. A healthy lawn is better positioned to survive a drought.

If the drought is serious and a total ban on lawn watering is in force, face reality; Your lawn may be toast.