
Ron Caron, a remarkable citizen of Mississippi Mills, died last night.
Since his retirement from the CBC, where he served as a skilled machinist, Ron donated countless hours of his time and provided technical and production expertise to many local arts organizations – including the Mississippi Valley Textile Museum, The Valley Players, the Folkus Series, Puppets Up!, Almonte in Concert, Celtfest, the Humm and the Town itself. In fact, Ron’s restoration of the old town clock and his work in keeping it running was the focus of a CBC radio production. The clock stopped in 1999 but Ron stepped in and on the stroke of midnight, January 1, 2000, the bell sounded once again and the clock has been running ever since.
Ron lovingly restored the theatre in the Almonte Old Town Hall into a state-of-the-art facility. In the 1980s, when Ron first walked into the auditorium, he fell in love with it but even though he found the acoustics superb the facility wasn’t being used. He thought it might be possible to revive it by bringing it up to today’s standards. He offered unconditional and dedicated support to the auditorium as an advocate, leader, committee member, technical advisor, designer, builder, electrician, lighting technician, sound technician, donor and doer and as a result, the theatre is now a state of the art facility.
As a recognition of his hundreds of hours of skilled volunteer work, the town named the theatre after him in 2013. Renowned puppeteer Noreen Young was commissioned to make a puppet of him.
The town mourns the loss of this dedicated citizen. The Millstone will publish details of funeral arrangements when they become available.

