(CP) — As early as 6 a.m. the men of this town’s phantom work force start to sift down the icefogged streets, lunches tucked under their arms, hats pulled down snug against the piercing cold, to line up at the offices of construction companies, trucking outfits and oilfield contractors, More Choosing Cremation: Rate is 30 per cent in BC is also burned. For the Traditional objections to cremation of the dead are disappearing in Quebec province, where more and more people are opting for this type of funeral. An undertaker whe is a pioneer in cremation funerals in the province says about 30 per cent of funerals in Montrea? and Quebec City now involve cremations, compared with about one per cent only three years ago. Jean Lebrun, president of Petribec Ltd, which owns the Montreal Memoria] Park ceme- tery, described the in- crease in cremations as astonishing for Quebec, which is predominantly Roman Catholic, because the church did not authorize cremations for: Catholics until 1964. ‘Phere was one crematorium up to three years ago in Qiebec— now there are eight,” Lebrun said. There are five in Montreal, two in Quebec City and one just opened in Chicoutimi, in northern Quebec. FIRST IN 1901 The first crematorium was built in Montreal in 1901. It was donated to the Mount Royal Cemetery by ‘Sir William C. Mac- donald, founder of Macdonald Tobacco Inc. and 4 local benefactor. Macdonald wanted his body to be burned after he died and built his own crematorium to ensure his wish would be carried out, “There was a great stink when this thing was built,” recalled Donald Roy, current manager of Mount Royal Cemetery Inc,, which still uses the crematorium. An enabling law had to be pased by the Quebec legislature. “It only passed by a vote of one, and there was- such a hassle that Macdonald marched off to Ottawa and got a federal patent.” Montreal Memorial sells prepaid plans for either traditional burials or cremations, and finds that 70 to 75 per cent of clients under the age of 40 sere. ALBERT. It starts in early July, with the world’s biggest rodeo — the Calgary Stampede. But it's more than a radeo. Hang onto your Stetson while you ride ferris wheels and rocket rides, take in chuckwagon races, Stage shows, casinos, comedians, singing and dancing acts, and carry on till ai! hours in nightspots. For ten days you can enjoy pancake breakfasts served from a PAGE 8, THE HERALD, Friday, April t4, 1976 One thousana / Fort St. John Awaits Tits Unevstered at Canada Manpower, unskilled and usually without families of their own, they are the unemployed of 10 provinces, attracted to this farming Community in northeast British Columbia's natural gas fields by the lure of $500 a week clear on a drilling rig. Among them are Shaun favor cremation. You can sit down with a person 15 minutes and easily convince him that cremation is the same thing (as a regular bur- ial), but is over in 90 minutes instead of five to six years,” said David Thomson, another representative. Cremation, he tells prospective clients, is non-polluting,: takes less space, provokes less grief and has been practised throughout history. It usually provides for an inside tomb that can be visited year-round. The company is beginning construction this spring on a $4-million mausoleum, the first of its kind in Canada, which will have 12,000 built-in “niches,” each holding two cremated remains, as well as “cribs” for 5,000 regular coffins..- Lebrun said Petribec © plans to build 12 to 15 such mausoleums in Quebec and Ontario. Each will contain a chapel, preparation laboratory and crematorium to provide a one-stop fu- neral. . Costs for funerals in a mausoleum are slightly reduced because there is no hearse, no cortege of limousines, no graveside flowers and no graveyard upkeep costs. Currently at Montreal: Memorial cremation funeral costs range between $400 and $6,000 while burials start at $eoo. Although cremations cost only slightly less, outside burial costs will likely. be pushed up by such factors as rising land value and increasing Salaries for grave diggers. As for the cremation process, Lebrun said the body is composed of 60 to 70 per cent water and is reduced to “‘five to seven pounds of bone fragments by a simple modern process using intense heat.” . aa hoe Cook, © an =‘ 18-year-old Kelowna, B.C., schoolijopout; Armané Tessier, a 21-year-old laborer and equipment operator from St. Pierre, Man; and Claude Brigaud, 28, an ironworker. from Tracadie, N.B, Frorn 4:30 to 9:30, when the last pick-up leaves with its crew of men, funeral, the coffin is inside a more elaborate shell, called a catafalque. This device is also becoming common at regular burials to cut casts. n Remains are usually “sealed in a wall niche behind an inscribed, bronze plate. More ex- pensive models include a variety of decorative bronze urns, cast for example in the form of a traditional Grecian urn, or as a bust of the deceased person, which can be viewed through a glass plate. ‘ Lebrun said that in England 68 per cent of fes are cremated, as high as 80 per cent in urban areas. In Canada, British Columbia is probably the leader, where cremations moved from four per cent in 1971 to 38 per cent in 1975. Lebrun, 49, a former engineer, came into the funeral business 12 years ago and became a con- yert to cremation after that. “1 believed in pollution control and respect for the dead. I found that cremation was superior in both respects. “I think ofnthe future, when our cemeteries are filled up. ... If. there is urban deterioration, cemeteries may create a problem." One way of respecting - the dead is to ensure their remains are in a definable place, Lebrun said. “Montreal is the only lace in North America to ave a bylaw preventing persons from going up on top of Mount Royal or somewhere to strew ‘the ashes of a body to the four winds,” And although Quebec law forbids it, ‘‘dozens of people have cremated remains in their homes.” Aside from taking less space, urns are | tran- sportable. “Once in a while I get requests to ex- hume a_ body, for example someone who wants to get all the MacDuffs together in Scotland," Lebrun said. high jo they will line up and wait for s. Cook, Tessier and Brigaud will not find work today, they didn't find it yesterday, they probably won't find It tomor- row. . Gerry Tucker, an easy- going businessman whose ofl contracting company has had inquiries or applications from all three, insists “there can’t be more than 10 people in Fort St. John who want to . work that can't find “jobs,” but as he speaks more than 1,000 active job-hunters are registered at the Manpower ce @ block away, BOOM IS BUST , For those 1,000 and the scores oinphantoms—the men who arrive by thumb and leave by wellare bus ticket to the DawsonnCreek hostel—the Fort St. John natural gas boom is already 4 bust. “It’s a pathetic thing,” said Blanche Morrow,: a hotel desk clerk who meets many of the transients. ‘‘It's going to get worse before it Stay at. home and go places around British Columbia this weekend. B.C. Tel’s long distance weekend rates let you dial ' *Rate does not apply on calls from the OK Tel area, coin tel, motel, hotel and to some Northern puints not served by B.C, Tel e chuckwagon, square dance in the streets, gets betler. Some. people wait weeks for a jab,” Even Manpower sends jobhunters to het, she said, hoping that her contacts with tool-pushers and drillers from the rigs will pay off in jobs. One lucky pair. she introduced to a desperate foreman as they came in the door, Others wait for days and finally disappear, their money and patience exhausted, © Dan Boychuk, manager of _the town’s Manpower office, said the rush of workers has declined since September’s decision to proceed with the Alaska Hceghway natural gas pipeline, but admitted that just two weeks before, a penniless Newfoundlander and his family landed in Fort St. John looking for work. “People get the idea they’ve really got to get in there fast and get a foot in the door,” he said, but they don't realize that the ocl industry usually hires by word of mouth when it doesn't import = skilled workers from Alberta. UNEMPLOYMENT HIGH Although his region covers only 20,000 people, 1,063 were chasing only 169 jobs in December, ‘1977. Boychuk refused to estimate what reentage is unemployed, nit admitted that if the work force is estimated to be the usual 40 per cent of the pulation, then Fort &t. John’s tnemployment rate must hover around 20 per cent. More than half those regis- tered are women, never in ‘demandon a drilling rig; the rest are men—the unskilled, the meek, the weak, the lazy,nthe ill-equipped, the foreigners, the men with families and the plain unlucky. “They'll only take green roughnecks if they really have to,” said Mrs, Morrow, because safety regulations limit the number of inex- periencednhands a rig may employ, Safety is also a con- sideration when foremen a direct (112) to most places in Gold Rush - Gay ‘90s era. Residents and d Workless Walk Streets As i turn down immigrants whose bad English may make them difficult lo tram. Others, says Tucker, are simply too unfamiliar with physical work and “are Just pathetic out. there sliding around in their shoes, not _ lmowing how to start a machine or check the oll ina truck.” Who gets hired? A foreman will take the guy who’s available early every morning for a week, said. Tucker, because “he'll think, ‘Hey, this guy really wants to work.’ Nothing ever happens on the phone.” DON’T LIKE WORK Many hired find the work not to their liking, he added, despite $2,000 a month take- home pay based on a §$4.50- an-hour rate. Crews spend two lo three months in the bush working 12-hour days in bitter cold for six or seven days a week, Room and plentiful meals are free. But Cook, Tessier and Bri- gaud “really want to work” the province between5p.m. | weekend. And drop in Friday and 5 p.m. Sunday for on some old friends. just 35¢ or less per minute* — . (minimum charge 23¢percal). VRE TEL ' ‘And remember, there's nosalestaxin and find jobs scarce. Tessier and Brigaud, rboth bilingual, met in Vancouver in 1976 and have toured the province for a steady job ever since. ‘If someone offers’ me a job now, I'll take it,” sald Brigaud, several hours after iving up his morning roun a frastealion. He had $3 to his name at the time he spoke and needed a lot of Tuck fast. on ' x 1€ eapes - commodation in Fort St. John is offered at Ihe Condill Hotel. Since the $12-a-night single rooms haveno phones, a lobby phone is always busy as one job-hunter after an- other culls the yellow pages. a NO SMOKING, SIR THE HAGUE (CP) — A. nosthoking ban during classes is to be imposed on teachers and sludents at all Dutch state high schools. Se ~ So pick up your phone this and songs like Home on the Range become visitors alike dress up in silk vests, top hats, . Alberta. Ea) singalong hits again. Ct cutaway Coats, spats, or ostrich plumes, See you at the party. It's wild. It’s carefree. And a million bustles, parasols, Overnight the city . E people get caught up in the fun. You will becomes populated with Klondike Kates, - ty too. | _ 80urdoughs and riverboat gamblers. The Biggest Party inNorthAmerica 74, | fe . But that’s only the beginning. Take a Crowds form around roulette tables inthe © | 20% 2500, Edmonton, Alberta a: couple of days t catch your breath, then casinos. Others take their chances atthe | CanadaTsu2za o gad to Edmonton for Klondike -horse races. And you can enjo Sounds like fun! ne Days ~- a chance to relive the every part of it — the infamous D ticket order forme sername ie | 2 Jaftand bathtub races, the [4 actommedaton equest forms tor a 3° midway, the nightly Coliseum gary Slampede ih y a 5 of Stars, carnival and cabaret | 4 sane Klondike Days iy — even a promenade ; si to show off your finery. Name By It's anothermammoth party, |’ ; si And you're invited. ACMI. 2 ee ee i There isn'tanother | .. 1 & celebration like it in North iow feet America. Three weeks of | prov B . excitement, action and non-stop ren ae. enjoyment packed into July. You Postal Cecte i \, ‘can make it your entire vacation, Mh) ie) S206 SB or part of your holiday. Plan to join the dress-up crowd and get your outfit here. =i We suggest you reserve early. S50, Calgary and Edmonton are alive S> for the Stampede and Klondike Days, and tickets and accommodations are in high ~ Travel Abera | CANADA E*l demand.