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Winnipeg Free Press
6 days ago
- Climate
- Winnipeg Free Press
Free Press Head Start for Aug. 15, 2025
Sunny, becoming a mix of sun and cloud this afternoon. Wind becoming west at 20 km/h gusting to 40 this morning. High 23 C. Humidex 25. UV index 7 or high. What's happening today A new 4K restoration of Winnipeg-raised director David Secter's 1965 debut feature Winter Kept Us Warm opens tonight at the Dave Barber Cinematheque and runs until Aug. 20. Shot on campus against the wishes of the conservative establishment with an assist from student actors at the University of Toronto and photo school instructors from the former Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, the film has been cited as an inspiration by David Cronenberg, who has called the film 'a shattering revelation.' For tickets and showtimes, click here. Winter Kept Us Warm is screening six times at Cinematheque. (Supplied) Today's must-read Manitoba's first targeted U.S. campaign to attract American board-certified nurses has led to three new hires, nine currently working toward being licensed and 29 additional expressions of interest. 'We're glad to see that interest, but this is just one tool in our recruitment toolbox,' Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara said in a statement. 'Our priority remains the one-on-one relationship-building that's proven to get results and keep people here for the long term.' If the province wants to attract more nurses, it needs to get its largest hospital removed from the 'grey list' alerting nurses that it's an unsafe place to work, says the head of their union. Carol Sanders has the story. Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara (Mikaela MacKenzie / Free Press files) On the bright side Neepawa is home to one of Canada's only remaining public-access television stations. Prior estimates that there are fewer than 30 left in Canada. Launching in 1983, during public-access TV's heyday, NAC-TV has a small studio and control room in which a tight-knit team of staff, volunteers and summer students dart back and forth. Part civic forum, part variety show, its programming blends local political news with charming homegrown fare — scavenger hunts, Filipino heritage events, high school sports and graduation ceremonies. Conrad Sweatman has the story. Neepawa's Community Access Television Station (NACTV) NACTV Manager Ken Waddell, left, and Eoin Devereux, journalist, in discussion on their show that discusses news and issues from the Neepawa Banner and Press. (Cheryl Hnatiuk / Free Press) On this date On Aug. 15, 1963: The Winnipeg Free Press reported in London, police had arrested four suspects and seized a large sum of money (equivalent to $300,000), apparently cracking Britain's great train robbery. The Soviet Union and China revealed the source of their acrid dispute over the nuclear test ban treaty: the U.S.S.R.'s refusal in 1959 to give China nuclear weapons. Prairie farmers expecrted a bumper crop, exceeding even that of 1952, a Free Press survey indicated. Read the rest of this day's paper here. Search our archives for more here. Today's front page Get the full story: Read today's e-edition of the Free Press .
Winnipeg Free Press
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Alice's Wonderland
Ageless Gardens is a popular documentary series that travels to gardens across Canada and introduces viewers to inspiring people who share the stories of their gardens. Filmed by Gemini Award-winning director and cinematographer Ian Toews, the series is produced by Toews and Mark Bradley, who collaborate through 291 Film Company in association with VisionTV and ZoomerMedia Limited. The Season 5 première started on May 5. The May 19 episode, Gardening for All Seasons, features Leanne Dowd, a Neepawa gardener whose garden is a story of rediscovery and transformation. The beginning of the episode takes place in April when plants are beginning to reawaken. Every gardener can relate to the joy of discovering new growth emerging from the ground in spring, but for Dowd, each new discovery brings her closer to learning more about the vast collection of plants that were planted by the garden's previous owners, Alice and Bill Moger. Ageless Gardens photo Neepawa gardener Leanne Dowd is featured in Ageless Gardens Season 5 in the episode Gardening for All Seasons. It airs May 19 on Vision TV. Alice died at the age of 87 in 2018, two years after her husband Bill. They were well-known for hybridizing lilies, delphiniums, daylilies and irises. Their once beautiful garden, however, had fallen into neglect in their later years. Dowd purchased the one-hectare property in spring of 2020. Since then, she has painstakingly uncovered and nurtured hundreds of lilies, peonies, roses, clematis and delphinium that were buried beneath layers of overgrown grape vines, raspberry canes, chest-high weedy growth and a thick carpet of fallen leaves from the many trees on the property. 'It was probably five years before Alice passed away that anything was last done with the garden,' says Dowd. 'By the time I bought the property, the garden had been sitting untended for at least seven years.' But the garden's past was so significant that Dowd set about immediately to uncover its treasures. 'The first two years, I would spend hours tiptoeing around the garden because I knew there could be plants beneath the fallen debris. I carried a fistful of orange flags and every time I came across even just a hint of a plant, I would mark it with a flag. Within months, the garden was an absolute sea of fluttering orange flags. It drove my family crazy because they had no idea where to walk on the property.' That first year in the garden was also an enormous task. Ageless Gardens photo Leanne Dowd identifies a treasure trove of hidden and rare plants left by her garden's previous owner, Alice Moger. 'Alice wanted something of everything and what resulted was a property that was jam-packed with plants,' says Dowd. 'So many old, half-dead trees had to be removed. There were mountains of debris — fallen branches — that had to be removed and rampant growth that had been left unchecked. Every bed needed to be re-dug and every plant had to be transplanted. 'Jack-in-the-pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum) was one of the plants that suddenly showed up and at first I had no idea what it was. It was just a tiny little thread of a thing. I lifted it out of its unfortunate location and planted it in a different spot and last year it just exploded with growth. That has happened so many times after plants were uncovered and exposed to more sunlight.' In 2023, while on a walkabout during the first filming of the episode which features Dowd, director Toews was intrigued by Northern Nodding Trillium, the most northerly occurring trillium in North America. 'It popped up a couple of years ago and is one of the really special plants that Alice left behind,' says Dowd. Dowd never doubted that the plants would survive and thrive. 'The garden took care of itself,' she says. The organic material that fell on the beds over the years had been left undisturbed and allowed to slowly decompose and feed and enrich the soil. 'But it's also a testament to the bone-cold-hardiness and disease resistance of Alice's plants,' says Dowd. Leanne Dowd photo The door to Alice's Wonderland in Neepawa leads the visitor into a garden full of wonder and mystery. The May 19 episode of Ageless Gardens touches on the enormity of the task of plant identification. There are, for example, hundreds of unnamed lilies and peonies, many of which Alice planted from seed decades ago. While Dowd is an experienced and knowledgeable gardener as well as a lily hybridizer and the author of Canadian Lily Hybridizers and Their Lilies (Pegasus Publications, 2023), identifying the treasure trove of rare plants left by her garden's previous owner has taken many hours of careful research and networking with horticultural experts in Manitoba and across Canada, including the Canadian Rose Society and the Canadian Peony Society. Dowd has applied for historical status for the vast collection of Canadian-bred lilies that grow in her garden. 'Heritage status would ensure their protection once I am gone,' says Dowd. 'Unless we keep a dialogue going about the history of horticulture in Canada, the push for discovery as well as preservation of the plants introduced by hybridizers, past and present will fade away.' If the application is successful, the garden would be open to the public and allow visitors a chance to see the extraordinary plant collection. Dowd is also attempting to register some of the Martagon lilies hybridized by Alice Moger with the Royal Horticultural Society Lily Group. Leanne Dowd photo This one-hectare Neepawa garden features a stunning collection of hundreds of lilies, peonies, roses, clematis, delphinium and more. The garden contains plants from some of Canada's best-known plant breeders — Frank Leith Skinner, A.J. (Bert) Porter and Isabella Preston. The vast collection of roses holds many fascinating stories. One example is the Dr. Merkeley rose, an ultra hardy (Zone 2B) double pink rose which a soldier brought home to Canada after the First World War. He gave a cutting from the rose to Dr. H.J. Merkeley, a dentist in Manitoba, who gave it to Frank Skinner who had a nursery on his Dropmore homestead. Skinner named the rose after Dr. Merkeley. Winnipeg Jets Game Days On Winnipeg Jets game days, hockey writers Mike McIntyre and Ken Wiebe send news, notes and quotes from the morning skate, as well as injury updates and lineup decisions. Arrives a few hours prior to puck drop. Dowd cannot resist backstories. 'It's the backstory that intrigues me as much as the plant itself,' she says. She is not only maintaining the numerous plants that Alice originally planted, but she also adds new plant acquisitions every year. 'I have an order of roses coming from Cornhill Nursery in New Brunswick. I add eight to 10 new roses a year,' she says. Dowd has named her garden Alice's Wonderland. The door to Alice's Wonderland leads visitors into a garden full of wonder and mystery. Be sure to watch the episode of Ageless Gardens that airs on May 19 on VisionTV at 8 p.m. The episode, Gardening for All Seasons, also travels to a protected woodland and public-cultivated garden on Vancouver Island, as well as to a beautiful private garden in Waterloo, Ont. The photography is breathtaking and the original score uplifting. The entire series affirms all the reasons why we garden — therapeutic benefits, a sense of community, and above all, a love of plants. For the series trailer and exclusive webisodes, visit colleenizacharias@ Leanne Dowd photo The fascinating story behind the origin of the Dr. Merkeley rose dates back to the First World War and involves a soldier, a Manitoba dentist and legendary breeder Frank Skinner. For advice, ideas and tips to keep your outdoor and indoor plants growing, sign up to have Winnipeg Gardener, a free monthly newsletter I write for the Winnipeg Free Press, at Colleen ZachariasGardening columnist Colleen Zacharias writes about many aspects of gardening including trends, plant recommendations, and how-to information that is uniquely relevant to Prairie gardeners. She has written a column for the Free Press since 2010 and pens the monthly newsletter Winnipeg Gardener. Read more about Colleen. Every piece of reporting Colleen produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. 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