It is traditional, as we noted in this space two years ago, for newspapers to editorialize at the end of the year about the major events that have unfolded over the previous 12 months. Editorial writers who consider themselves gifted prognosticators might also get out their crystal ball and make some predictions for the new year. The wiser ones have the good sense the following December not to look back and see how many came true.
In this case, however, we are marking the end of the first decade of the 21st Century and the beginning of the second decade of the not-so-new-any-longer "new millennium.
Calendars - like decades - are fairly arbitrary constructions in any event. If nothing else, Jan. 1 has the distinction of being an important psychological marker as the first day of the year in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars, the former promulgated by Julius Caesar in 46 B.C., the latter by Pope Gregory XIII in A.D. 1582.
As for decades, they may or may not coincide with a chronological 10-year period. Few would mark the start of Sixties as Jan. 1, 1960, when Dwight D. Eisenhower was still president of the United States. Many historians will tell you the Sixties arrived during that brief interval between the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963 and the British Invasion of the Beatles for their first North American tour three months later in February 1964.
As for the first sign of the Sixties, many of those same historians will tell you it was the disappearance of men's fedoras - almost overnight - with the inauguration of the bareheaded Kennedy as president in January 1961. As for the end of the Sixties, well, let's place that between Woodstock's peace, love and music in the mud in August 1969 and the Rolling Stones Altamont Speedway Free Festival and Hells Angels concert security violence of Dec. 6, 1969. The death of 18-year-old Meredith Hunter pretty much ended the 1960s, in this case both psychically and chronologically.
We haven't ever settled collectively on a name even for the decade now ending that began Jan. 1, 2000 and concludes tomorrow. That perhaps tells you a lot right there.
For most of us, the decade didn't so much begin with the much hyped Y2K computer bug, which turned out to be a non-event Jan. 1, 2000, but perhaps near the end of the year with bitterly contested cliff-hanger U.S. presidential election battle between Al Gore and George W. Bush. We all know more about Florida and hanging chads, which entered the everyday lexicon, than we would have ever imagined possible in 1999. And, of course, if the decade didn't begin for you then, it probably did Sept. 11, 2001. It is one of those rare historical events where the date is shorthand for everything else.
Here at home in Thompson, for those of us who were here in January 2000, and very many of us weren't, Manitoba Lt.-Gov. Peter Liba was in town to host a new year levee with Mayor Bill Comaskey at City Hall.
Niki Ashton, now NDP MP for Churchill riding, headed off on a two-year scholarship to the prestigious Li Po Chun United World College in Hong Kong, one of China's two special administrative regions. Manitoba NDP Highways Minister Steve Ashton was talking about bring in graduated licences for new drivers.
With 44 per cent of adults smoking, Thompson had the highest number of adult smokers in Canada, compared to 27.4 per cent nationally. At 26 cigarettes on average per day, Thompson smokers were also ahead of the rest of the pack, which averaged 18 smokes a day nationally.
A bitter 11-week long lockout by Inco of unionized employees between September and December 1999 was over and miners were back to work in Thompson as 2000 dawned. Unfortunately, Manitoba Telecom Services (MTS) was cutting 15 full time and 13 part time jobs in Thompson after a provincewide deal negotiated between the company and Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union (CEP).
Some things have certainly changed in Thompson over the last 10 years. In 2000, you could rent an "executive four-bedroom house" on Westwood Drive for $850 per month. A one-bedroom apartment - and apartments were plentiful - could be rented for about $430 per month.
As we said, even editorial writers who consider themselves gifted prognosticators have trouble with their crystal balls making predictions at the beginning of a year that prove to be accurate by the end of the year. We're in good company with economists there. Last year, few would have predicted the collapse of Lehman Brothers investment bank on Wall Street and the worldwide economic maelstrom that that followed. So imagine the folly of trying to do make predictions for the next decade.
What we will say is this. We think the new University College of the North (UCN) campus in Thompson, with construction getting under way in 2010 and set for completion in 2013, will be one of the two biggest stories of the coming decade. The oft-delayed project still easily represents the largest public sector investment in the 54-year history of Thompson. While the official price tag is still in the $33-million range the city last year the ultimate price tag for the entire project, including housing, will be more than $100 million.
The other big story is Vale Inco. In the city named after John Fairfield Thompson, the chairman of Inco in February 1956 when nickel was discovered at Cook Lake, all eyes are now on Sudbury where the Steelworkers are in an epic battle in their 5-month strike against the now Brazilian-owned mining giant.
Steelworkers here signed a three-year collective agreement with Vale Inco in September 2008 - the day after Lehman Brothers melted down. That deal will take them through mid-September 2011. Talk about fortuitous timing.
No one can predict at this point how things will turn out in Sudbury in the labour dispute between the Steelworkers and Vale Inco. But the final echoes, when they come, could reverberate throughout Thompson, for better or worse, for much of the coming decade.
