HISTORIAN HINCHLEY AMONG NOTED MERCURY COLUMNISTS

SHERRY HAAIMA sherry.haaima@ metroland.com

Along with regular columns from staffers — Elaine Dick's 'Chit Chat', Peter Clark's 'Peter's Putterings', Lucy Hass' 'View fromthe'Frew'—avariety of columnists have filled the pages of the Renfrew Mercury over the years.

From Jim Ferguson to Michael Runtz to Mary Cook, these columns provideamixfromtheregular news and feature stories each week.

A favourite over the years has been historical columns. More recently, our'FromtheOldFiles'articles were provided by the late Olga Lewis.

Before that, longtime town historian and newspaper man, Harry Hinchley researched and wrote almost 750 weekly 'From the old files' columns, researched and wrote countless stories on Renfrew's history from noteworthy people to landmark buildings.

Overall, Hinchley had a valued association with the Renfrew Mercury and its editors for approximately 25 years. At the age of 91years, he retired.

"Harrywasnotanativeborn Renfrewite. He was born in Huron County in western Ontario and came heretowork,andwaslater appointed manager, at the United Farmers Co- operative Creamery, the building later became Renfrew Wholesale," reads a Heritage Renfrew press release,whichdrewinformation from a 1991 Mercury article by Wanda Blimkie. "Eighteen years later he became his own boss in a propane business."

Hinchley played the snare drum in the Renfrew Citizens Band in 1932. He was elected first president of Heritage Renfrew. For manyyearshewasactively involved in researching historical buildings desig- nated for Heritage Renfrew plaques and authored 26 stories in 'The Story of Renfrew', a major project of Heritage Renfrew in 1984.

"However, of all his accomplishments, writing for this newspaper brought him the most satisfaction," reads the Heritage Renfrew article. "In doing research for his column, Harry built up a tremendous library of thousands of cards, all systematically filed, recording interesting information on prominent citizens and events in the town's history. His cards now reside in the Renfrew Archives."

FOUR THINGS (ALMOST) AS OLD AS THE MERCURY