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Surrey-Delta Messenger, Wednesday, June 20, 1979
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Surrey Centennial song and history
Surrey entertainer (Alberta) Slim Edwards has got plans to celebrate Surrey's Centennial in the way he knows best - and aid the Variety Treatment Centre at the same time.
A song-writer and musician for many years, Slim has composed what he calls "Surrey's Centennial Song" and put it together with a capsule history of the municipality from 10,000 B.C. (approx.) to March 1957 as well as two photographs: Surrey's municipal hall 1871 and Surrey municipal hall 1979.
He hopes to distribute this folder through service groups and through music stores at a price of $2 with proceeds earmarked for the Surrey Cerebral Palsy Children's Treatment Centre.
"I wanted to make this a souvenier of the Centennial," Slim commented.
"Three hundred and forty kiddies go for different types of treatment at the Centre and many of them can't afford to pay for their treatment. The centre is always in need of money," he went on.
"I have been an entertainer all of my life. Kiddies has made me. I want to turn around and help them back," Slim said.
Slim said he was brought up in Lloydminister, Alberta, or a ranch with four sisters and two brothers.
By 1937, he was in Regina where he began entertaining for CKCK radio where, in those depression days, the remuneration was a sandwich and a milkshake after the show. He went on to play all over the prairies until in 1947 he went out to the Coast and sang for CKNW in the days when it was located on top of the old Fraser Café.
Slim said he worked for CKNW in the winter and in the summer toured Canada and the U.S. with his trick horse "Kitten."
This horse could tell fortunes, answer questions, untie knots, hold a rope and turn it, do a balancing act and also ring bells, Slim said.
Some of his songs which have entertained thousands over the years are: "When it's Apple Blossom Time in the Annapolis Valley", "Beautiful B. C.", and "My Fraser Valley Home", Slim said, adding that he has put out eight albums of his own material and 25 singles.
His newest single, just ready to be released, will be the "Surrey Centennial Song," with another original "The Hanging of Louis Riel" on the back, Slim said.