FTLComm - Porcupine Plain - August 1, 2000

Though there is no doubt about the upset that this fire cause Porcupine Plain last week as Gerald Crawford described it as a "Body Blow", as I saw the destroyed building being cleared away it struck me that Porcupine Plain has more than its share of resiliance and should be able to step forward to meet this challenge. Porcupine Plain has been a thriving farm service centre for this part of the Shand agricultural area for a long time and though the fire was nasty the real gut smasher was the removal of the rail line linking this community with Tisdale. There are a lot of viable and busy businesses functioning in Porcupine Plain. We were in town on a Monday afternoon and there were lots of folks in the streets and doing business. The damaged "porky pub" is open and the Co-op were up to their ears in customers. Small town Saskatchewan is hurting in general and a fire can really cause some initial pain but from what we saw yesterday. Porcupine Plain is still right there on the map and kickin'.