Gerald Franklin Panter – who was he?

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Gerald Franklin Panter – who was he?

I couldn’t stop looking at the plaque hanging just above my head on the East Wall of the Park Street Baptist Church.  Who was Gerald Franklin Panter?

Oh I read what was engraved on the Bronze Plaque… “and his body never recovered.” But what happened to young Gerald?

Gerald was 7 years old when he was drowned.  I imagine that his body was likely in the river nearby where he was playing.  But with high water flow which was likely in April of 1939 it would have been washed away between where it entered the water and where it likely was snagged on the bottom.

It is likely that Gerald attended Sunday School at the Park Street Baptist Church where his parents were faithful members.

So many questions came with that plaque mounted above where I sat. So many…

Gerald would have been 83 years old this past February 2012.  But he never made it past 7 years of age.

The plaque states that it was “ERECTED BY HIS FATHER AND MOTHER”.

Mr. and Mrs. Panter had to be of some stature to have been able to pay for something like this plaque in 1936… or the congregation feeling their great grief and for that matter every person in this small church feeling deeply the loss of this little boy… must have all done their part so he would not be forgotten.

There was no body… so there was not likely any grave either. There was no place for the mother and father to stand beside and say their precious words to later in their life.

Doing some more digging I found… from the 1911 Census

Ancestry.ca has 78 Panter surname census records, showing that the average Panter household size in Canada was between 5 and 6 members. The average age of Panter children in 1911 was 17, with a paternal average age of 49 and a maternal average age of 41. Common first names for Panter household fathers in 1911 included Edgar, Jefferson, and Benjamin and common first names for mothers included Sarah, Deliliah, and Clara. In 1911, approximately 22 Panter individuals were recorded in the district of Peterborough West, 7 were recorded in the district of Portage la Prairie, and 7 were recorded in the district of Elgin West, among others. Common places of birth for Panter parents were noted as Ontario, England, and United States Of America. Some common heritage designations for the Panter surname were listed as English, German, and Scotch.

A bit more digging and I found…

PANTER ALBERT .. ONTARIO DEATH REGISTRATION

PANTER FREDERICK, TO ALICE VASS, AT PETERBOROUGH .. NEWSPAPER NOTICE

PANTER GEORGE, TO MINNIE CHAMBO, AT PETERBOROUGH .. NEWSPAPER NOTICE

PANTER JOHN .. COLLING SUSAN .. ONTARIO MARRIAGE REGISTRATION

PANTER JOSEPH .. SURROGATE COURT (WILL)

PANTER MARY .. ROSE ALBERT .. ONTARIO MARRIAGE REGISTRATION

PANTER PHILIPPA .. BAKER THOMAS .. ONTARIO MARRIAGE REGISTRATION

PANTER THOMAS .. ONTARIO DEATH REGISTRATION

As you can see, the third Panter down was named George and his wife was Minnie Panter.  Could this be the couple that lost little Gerald?

Park Street Baptist Church is located at `16 Park Street North in Peterborough, Ontario.

Checking with Canada 411 I found there is a P.G. Panter at 49 Park Street South… less than two blocks away from the Church.

Why did this all come to light for me? 

Today I was sitting in the Park Street Baptist Church for the morning worship service.  By chance I sat beside Gerald Franklin Panter’s memorial plaque.

That was when I started thinking – who was this family?

Many of the folk that were in church this morning are likely around the age that Gerald would have been if he was alive today.  Many likely were in the same Sunday School Class that he was. And the outside possibility is that Gerald was playing with some of them when he slipped below the surface of the water…

Ahhh… now it makes sense.

Gerald will never will be forgotten – by his friends and likely the Panters that live at 49 Park Street south.  Could that be his brother or sister?

I left the Park Street Baptist Church many questions today.

I enjoyed the service and the Pastor’s message was excellent!

But I am still thinking about Gerald Franklin Panter…from so long ago…

I will not forget you Gerald…

~ Murray Lincoln ~

www.murraylincoln.com

Stress, Pressure and staying alive through it

Misty Hollow Carving

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Stress, Pressure and staying alive through it

I think the reasons for the swirling thoughts of the last few days and the feeling of some stress… again… is the people I met with.

On Thursday I was with some ministers at a daylong seminar.  Then just after the seminar I was invited to attend two more upcoming seminars in the next few months.  It was the remembered pressure and stress of long ago that set it all off again – I am sure of that.

I used to be under pressure almost all the time.  The busy schedule of a minister and the multitude of problems that begged attention swirled around me all the time.

I found a posting on a Web Page from another pastor by the name of Greg Baker… who stated – quote..

“I pastor a Church. As such, there is pressure on me from many different directions. I have to worry about things that no one else in the Church does. If something goes wrong, I get the call. If something bad happens, I get blamed. That's part of the pressure. This pressure causes stress. Sometimes that stress is evident in relationships, in mounting frustration or exasperation, and can play havoc with my health. Wherever I am the weakest, the stress appears.” End quote.

Whoa! Just reading this made me shake a little. The same old feelings of the weight and the downward pressure on my life returned in a heartbeat!

“Wherever I am the weakest, the stress appears.” he stated.

Greg used an illustration of a Plastic Water Bottle.  With the bottle empty push down steadily on the top until it starts to collapse. The crackle of the plastic will begin at the weak points and then it will begin to fold up until the bottle is flat.

If you look closely you will see that the bottle is very thin at the places it bends and folds first.  Eventually the bottle will break at those week area.

One thing for sure happens.  The bottle will not likely hold water very well any longer.

If the bottle is straightened up again and then more pressure is applied it will collapse much more quickly the next time… and after the second time of crushing it will not likely be able to hold water at all. The holes will appear all over the plastic.

Thankfully we are not made of plastic but we are vulnerable.

We can fortify the areas of our weakness by rest, by removing ourselves from the problem areas or pressure points or we can quit – get completely away.

Retirement does that for sure. It offers the “quit” and “get completely away from it” part very well.

But if you are still in it – you MUST FIND ANOTHER WAY to get help.

Greg Baker offers the following… quote..

“A person can handle pressure if they can do three things:

1. Have a reason and cause for being under the pressure
2. Finding a way to bleed off and relieve stress
3. Strengthen their weak areas

Nervous breakdowns result from someone who either can't relieve stress, or who can't find a cause or reason to be under the pressure. The stress builds up where they are weakest and then destroys them. Someone who can't handle the stresses in life will eventually try to run. Someone who can't handle the pressures in life can suddenly snap.” End quote.

I have had a number of “Minister Friends” in recent years “snap”.  They are now out of the ministry because they had a “Moral Failure”. That is church lingo describing the fact that they did something that is morally reprehensible to the church members. It may have been sex, money, theft, anger, hatred… but sex and money are the two highest on our “church list”. (The other three are more acceptable in that more church people do them more often.)

Church people can have problems with “sex” or with “theft” but the minister doesn’t dare. Kind of ridiculous when you think about it – really!

But that is an added pressure keeping the man or woman under stress… and eventually something will break… at the weakest point.

In humans it isn’t plastic parts that break… it is rather our hearts or some circulatory part where the pressure and then the stress breaks open or out. Heart, Stroke and failing health are good starting points.

One of my minister friends has a huge problem. His wife was so sick that they had to quit the ministry.  It seemed that everything in her body went wrong at the same time. They were facing one major sickness after another until she was completely bedridden.

Why?  Where was God in all of this?

Well there was an answer for sure and God was always there. The lady(pastor’s wife) and the man(pastor) in this situation both were trying to make everything better for everyone around them.  They were playing “God” for everyone in their own human way.  Whatever was wrong here they were expected to fix it… after all that is what God is for when I have trouble… and I don’t want trouble.

Then she being the weaker of the two – broke.  He broke later.

The Doctor called it the “Evangelical Syndrome” where the Evangelical Minister and Wife are known as the “fixer-uppers”. A simple prayer and a quick scripture fixes almost everything.  And when it doesn’t help – do it again and again… and pray harder and harder… until your own health breaks completely.

The problem is still there and the people are the same lame people that they were when they came to the minister with their problems and expected him to fix them.

I have had that ministerial trip for a long time in my own life.  More people were left unfixed than the ones that were fixed. I had great prayers and exercised great spiritual powers… that made pressure and stress have to back off… until the amount that came my way finally made me collapse.

A large two litre Coca Cola Bottle will stand more pressure on it than the thin little water bottle did.  But it will eventually break as well… crumpling into a flattened plastic glob.

No? Try running over it with a truck’s tire!!!

Some situations are “Truck Tire Size” with the pressure that is applied!

One of my friends was just removed from his church with accusations of “Moral Problems”.  He was caught going to XXX places in his free time. I think he claimed that it was a ministry opportunity or something – kind of a missionary trip. Oh Boy!

The church has just incurred a huge debt with the construction project they completed… I mean Millions and Millions of dollars of debt.  And the pressure of that plus the pressure of the people that are now coming made his “bottle” fold up under the pressure… and he broke at the weakest place.

He and his wife are doing okay today. They are getting their lives back together and love each other even more than before.

Some people question her – why she decided to stay after what he did.

But removing him from the pressure and the stress has made a new man of this minister.

If he can stay away from the pressure and the stress produced by what happened around him… they will be okay.  If he doesn’t – well….

How do I understand this all?

Well I have lived it all. I have been under pressure that few would ever know. The Northview church carried over $1,350,000 debt for 18 years without paying anything on the Mortgage Principle.  Then we began in 1998 to pay it down.

Unhappy people started doing their things and leaving the church angrily.

When you have church debt and people leaving the church – it is not a formula for success! I knew pressure like no one can imagine… and the stress started to produce its toll on me.

I am not about to tell you all my weak points where I crackle and pop and break.

But I do think about the church that my friend was the minister of… the debt is very much there and it is HUGE!!!!  Who will the person be that comes in to deal with the debt and pay it down?  What pressure will they know and what stress will cause what part to break?

Unless the new minister coming is Superman – the man of steel… he will feel it all.

Oh boy…

Watching and listening to the young guys this past week… I can see the effects of the pressure they are under… but I don’t think that they can see it at all!

Double Oh Boy!!  But I can look after me… and they must look after themselves.  And the Elders and Board of Directors of these major places (or little ones as well) are responsible in major ways!!!

~ Murray Lincoln ~

www.murraylincoln.com

Resources:

http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/dealing_with_the_pressures_and_stresses_of_life

The smell of rain drops mixed with the memory of long ago places

Misty Hollow Carving

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My Web Site is a like a Gallery – please drop in for a stroll through.

To help me promote my Web Site please copy this URL address and email to someone today http://www.murraylincoln.com/  

(Cheng Po's Cave)

The smell of rain drops mixed with the memory of long ago places

This morning early as the soft rain was falling my eyes opened but my brain was not yet there. My thoughts were flooded with a way back time.  I was somewhere far away. In fact I was in a number of different places that have held me captive for years.

The first place I went was to the small house at 1422 Elliott Street in Regina.  The year was about 1952 and I was in my bedroom looking out the window.  With my nose almost pressed against the glass I could see the rain touching the glass and sliding down the pain… joining the rest of them as they ran to the roof below.  My window faced the east and looked out over the veranda roof and the prairie past that.  The smell was there as the quiet rain fell.

The second place this morning was my grandparent’s farm house west of Truax, Saskatchewan.  I was kneeling in the big, lumpy of chair that sat below the window on the west side of the west room.  It was about 1956 and it was a windy day with the rain driving against the pain of glass. The sound of the wind hitting the pain of glass and driving the rain drops wildly in any direction was memorising.  Behind me was the old brown space heater that crackled and popped as the heat from the burner inside expanded the metal and the gentle hiss of the burner kept going until it reached the heat setting asked for.  My grandma had lit the fire to just take the coolness out of the air.  But the smell of the rain was there too.

The third place was the barn loft on that same farm near Truax.  The large loft door faced east. The rain driving from the west with the nasty wind picking up made the hay we were lying on feel warm.  The kittens were holding curled up warm against my chest as they purred their contentment. The smell of fresh hay mixed with rain and kittens surrounded me. I never wanted to leave that place.

The fourth place I traveled to was Cheung Chau Island and the Caritas Retreat Centre with my daughter’s Primary Six class.  The year was about 1982 and it is an Island off the coast of Hong Kong.  we had just clamored over boulders and into a dark hole created by many boulders press together eons ago.  Outside the roar of the angry waves crashed against the lower rocks on this rough shore.  But inside the sound the waves were dimmed. It was dry and almost warm inside with the smell of rain mixed with the salty water taste in the air.  The south China Sea was mere arms distance away.

The cave was a hiding place of Pirate Cheng Po from the 1800s. Of Cheng Po I read the following to the kids…

“Cheng Po Tsai was just the son of a local fisherman when he was kidnapped by the notorious pirate couple Cheng I and Ching Shih, and adopted into a life of crime. According to legend, when Cheng I died, Cheng Po took up with his adoptive mother and married her, carrying on the family business of pillage and plunder.

At his height of infamy he is said to have commanded a fearsome pirate fleet of 600 ships and a veritable pirate army of 20,000 men.

Then, in 1810 his career took an unexpected turn when he surrendered to the government and accepted a post as navy colonel and an assignment far from his home waters off Hong Kong, patrolling instead the coast of Taiwan.

Cheng Po is said to have squirreled his pirate treasure on Cheng Chau island 6 miles off the coast of Hong Kong. Visitors can follow in his footsteps and climb down into a small cave near the coast and look for themselves, but no treasure has ever been found. The cave is on the southwestern peninsula of the island, and is well marked.”

I could have stayed in Cheng Po’s cave for a long time. In the following years I came back often.

But on that first day, with the waves, wind and the rain falling outside it was magical to sit quietly and imagine the life that Cheng Po lived – listening to the same waves and sound of the gentle rain falling.

To think that there was treasure all over the area that we were sitting in was also magical.

This morning early I returned to the places of long ago. I was 10, 12, and 38 years old… and remembering the sound of rain in my life. The gentle rain falling has left the deep impressions of places long ago and far away.

I didn’t get out of bed for a long time today as I traveled so far away and so long ago.

There is a deep magic in the rain falling as it takes me places.  I love rain.

~ Murray Lincoln ~

www.murraylincoln.com

Resources:

http://atlasobscura.com/place/cheng-po-pirate-cave