COLUMN BY DON GLYNN —
Details have yet to be worked out but Nik Wallenda might not be the only tightrope walker performing at Niagara Falls this summer.
If Wallenda’s event over the Horseshoe Falls is scheduled in June — one of dates considered — it could mean that Jay Cochrane, known as the Prince of the Air, may be entertaining with a sideshow, a short distance away, between the Skylon Tower and the Hilton hotel in Niagara Falls, Ont.
Obviously the main attraction will be on the wire between Goat Island the Table Rock House area on the Ontario side.
If you’re unfamiliar with Cochrane, he has tried to get permission from the Niagara Parks Commission for some three decades to walk across the Niagara Gorge, precisely the route that Wallenda will soon travel.
Is he bitter now that another tightrope walker — a newcomer to the Niagara area — has been given the go-ahead by the park commissioners?
Not at all.
“I think it’s great that they’ve voted in favor of it,” Cochrane told reporters last month. Although he would have relished the chance for himself, he’s not upset by the park agency’s decision.
I first met Cochrane at a press conference in the mid-1980s when he was making his initial presentation to the commissioners. In those days, the commission was dead set against such stunts that, in their opinion, would detract from the beauty of the falls and the surrounding parklands.
Today, the financially strapped parks agency sees the matter in a different light. Interim chairwoman Janice Thomson has flipped flopped from her earlier pious-sounding policy, admitting that Wallenda’s act could fill the agency coffers.
What always impressed me about Cochrane was his pledge to spread the wealth from his hire-wire show. For three summers that he walked on the wire in the Fallsview area (near the casino) he raised nearly $160,000 for charity.
For the record, Cochrane completed the longest tightrope walk in North America that summer day in 2005, covering 1,800 feet from atop the Fallsview Casino to Skylon Tower. That’s the same distance that Wallenda plans for his trip.
At present, Cochrane intends to resume his performances this summer when he will take a daily walk, between June and September, from the Skylon to the 53-story Hilton Hotel on Stanley Avenue. Two charities will share in his generous donations.
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A HARD HIT: If you’re rich, it’s probably difficult to really understand how the soaring price at the gasoline pump is affecting some people trying to make ends meet.
Take the hard-working waitress who spends about $5 per day just driving from her home in Wilson to a restaurant in Ransomville. If she works six days a week, she’ll shell out $30 for the round-trip commute.
That might even dry up the tip pool.
•••
A RISKY RUN: Overheard at Bandanas Restaurant, Lake Road: “The trouble with jogging is that the ice has a tendency to fall out of your glass” — a steady customer who likes to combine exercise with his daily liquid diet.
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