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SBy Susan Rogers (’12)

Sometimes lifelong dreams just need a nudge in the rightdirection to turn into something spectacular.

Dr. Natasha Turner (’93) wanted to be a doctor from theage of five. After graduating from Mount Allison andwriting the MCATs, she fully intended to apply to med-ical school.

“I went for a massage one day and the practitioner askedme what I was going to do. I told her of my plan to applyto med school and she said, ‘Why don’t you become anaturopath?’ I didn’t even know what that was. Butwhen I looked into it I quickly realized that it wouldn’tbe a job, it would be a way of life.”

Though she sometimes felt out of place while studyingfor her Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine (ND) at theCanadian College of Naturopathic Medicine in Toronto— she wasn’t the Birkenstock-wearing, granola-eatingtype — once she began seeing patients in her fourthyear, she knew she was in the right place.

“I discovered people out there like me, who wanted tobe healthy without becoming a health nut.”

Turner has become one of Canada’s leading naturo-pathic doctors. She founded a clinic in Toronto called Clear Medicine, and created The Clear Medicine Lifestyle System, where patients work closely with an ND, an MD, and a personal trainer.

“Seeing the amazing things that happen to people whenthey make the effort to lead healthier lives never getsold, even after 10 years of clinical practice.”

Her passion for promoting wellness, fitness, and inte-grated medicine has made her a sought-after speaker forcorporations and has earned her guest appearances onCTV News, Balance Television, and The Perfect Fit.

She has written articles for Elle Magazine, Today’sParent, Glow Magazine, and the National Post. In April2009, she published her first book, The Hormone Diet,Canada’s #1 best-selling health and lifestyle book.

“I wrote the book because of my own health problemsand because of seeing patient after patient strugglingwith managing their total health and life balance. Mybook fills a gap,” says Turner.

“Hormones control almost every single thing that hap-pens in our bodies from one minute to the next. And soeverything you do, think, and feel influences your hor-mones in one way or another. And your hormonesinfluence so many aspects of your health. The secret toliving a healthy lifestyle is hormonal balance.”

She’s now tossing around the idea of a cookbook. Thatis, when she is not seeing patients, managing her clinic,or promoting her book. Still, Turner says she managesto find time to live the healthy lifestyle she teaches.

Learn more about Dr. Turner’s clinic and her new book atwww.thehormonediet.com

Featurestory

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IBy Melissa Lombard, with files from Susan Rogers (’12)

It has been four short years since John Thaler(’06) graduated from Mount Allison and hehas certainly made the most of it. Since leav-ing Sackville, Thaler has embarked on threemissions at the Mars Desert Research Station(MDRS) in Utah.

He has participated in the MDRS missions ina range of capacities, from crew biologist, toexecutive officer, to leading his final missionas commander. He and his crewmemberslived in an 8m x 12m habitat, and followedsimilar routines as NASA astronauts.Whenever anyone would go outside theywould dress in bulky space suits and gothrough a depressurization routine in an air-lock, simulating spacewalks on the interna-tional space station.

“The simulation was an amazing experience.The landscape in the MDRS region is verysimilar to the type of terrain scientists haveidentified on Mars using satellites and themartian rovers,” says Thaler.

Another key component of the missions wasto share areas of expertise. In his first mis-sion, Thaler designed and implemented abiological science experiment that proposedand conducted a search for halophilic, orsalt-loving bacteria.

Thaler describes his experiences with MDRSas a challenge, but says the people and placeare something he will never forget.

“Psychologically it was rather daunting becauseI was nervous about how eight people weregoing to interact during isolation in the desert.In short, at the end of the two weeks, I felt like Iwas saying goodbye to lifelong friends.”

His research is in the area of musculoskeletalhealth, which relates to health concerns forastronauts in microgravity — a condition thatcomes about whenever an object is in free fall.He is currently working as a veterinary assis-tant at the Toronto Humane Society andplans to attend veterinary school next fall.

Featurestory

AllisonianJohn Thaler (’06) experiences space on earth at the Mars Desert Research Station

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and Space

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22 | WINTER 2010 RECORD P h o t o C r e d i t : G r a d y S e m m e n s ( A s s o c i a t e D i r e c t o r , M e d i a R e l a t i o n s f o r U o f C )

We were the first humans to ever seethese rocks from space.“ ”

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CBy Melissa Lombard, with files from Susan Rogers (’12)

Call it beginner’s luck, or a case of being in theright place at the right time. One thing for sure is,finding the first piece of the Buzzard Coulee mete-orite was a great first step for Ellen Milley’s (’07)career.

While working on her Master’s thesis at theUniversity of Calgary, Milley was invited by herthesis advisor, Dr. Alan Hildebrand, to help track alarge meteorite that fell four days earlier inSaskatchewan. One week after the meteor fell,Milley and Hildebrand spotted a piece of the mete-orite while driving through the site.

This is only the second time in Canada that the firstmeteorites from a fall were found by a scientificteam.

“It was an incredible feeling when we got out of thecar and checked the rocks on the frozen pond, real-izing we were the first humans to ever see theserocks from space,” Milley recalls.

Since then, she has presented her findings at a con-ference in Prague, Czech Republic, and was award-ed a congratulatory certificate for finding the mete-orite fragment by the Small Bodies DisciplineWorking Group. Funded by the Canadian SpaceAgency, the working group is Canada’s volunteergroup charged with the investigation of fireballsand the recovery of meteorites.

Meteors have fascinated Milley since her secondyear at Mount Allison, when she began researchingthe phenomenon with Dr. Robert Hawkes. Andnow, the so-called shooting stars have cementedher a place in Canadian history.

dıscoveryut of this world

Featurestory

Ellen Milley (’07) is first to find Buzzard Coulee meteorite

Dr. Alan Hildebrand, left, with Ellen Milley

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IBy Sue Seaborn

It is hard to imagine how the dots connect between analumnus called “Big Al” (A. Seth Greenwald ’59), Mel’sRestaurant, Mount Allison’s 1955 registrar, an Oxfordpub, orthopaedic implants, world-famous research, andlife-changing surgeries.

But let’s try.

In the summer of ’55 a sixteen-year-old from ManhattanIsland was hitchhiking through the Sackville area while

visiting friends in Nova Scotia. He happened upon Mel’sRestaurant and a billboard that read “Welcome to MountAllison University...Home of the Mounties.” Followingthe sign, Seth Greenwald, a soon-to-be US Marine, foundhimself in Centennial Hall and under the convincing spellof Mount Allison’s registrar, Christine MacInnes. Afterseveral hours MacInnes had talked Greenwald out of theMarine Corps and into Mount Allison, where he enrolledin physics and engineering.

Influenced by the “MacInnes Factor” Greenwald workedhis way through university under her watchful eye.

Joint adventures

Featurestory

Dr. A. Seth Greenwald: a baby boomer’s best friend

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Seth has had atremendous

impact on the medical education of

thousands oforthopaedic

surgeons around theglobe.

Dr. Allan Gross, MD, FRCS,University of Toronto.

“”

Forever grateful for the former registrar’s kindness, in1991, he founded the Christine MacInnes Bursary.

After leaving Mount Allison, Greenwald received hisMasters in Engineering Mechanics at ColumbiaUniversity, and a Sc.M. in Aeronautics and Astronauticsat Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). By theearly 60’s he had worked on moon rockets and alsodesigned parts for fighter planes. In 1966 Greenwald tookan instructor’s job at MIT but a year later was seconded toOxford University to solve a vibrations problem associatedwith several of the UK’s nuclear cooling towers. It wasthere, at an Oxford pub, that his life changed course onceagain — in a big way.

Over a British ale or two, he met orthopaedic surgeonJohn Goodfellow and pathologist Peter Bullough.Together they struggled over the complex problems ofdescribing the weight-bearing surfaces of a human hipjoint, and the causes of osteoarthritis. Goodfellow andBullough felt that it would be a great doctoral thesistopic and that Greenwald was just the person to find thesolution. After research on hundreds of donated cadav-eric hips, he received the first Doctor of Philosophy(D.Phil.) degree in Orthopaedic and EngineeringSciences from Oxford. It has become an importantcross-discipline, and one that has changed the lives of somany, worldwide.

Greenwald immersed himself in these two mergingfields — and was heavily involved in researching, teach-ing, and educating students, nurses, and orthopaedicsurgeons. In the early 70’s he settled in the Cleveland,Ohio area where he later held several positions, includ-ing founder of the Cleveland Clinic Foundation’sBiomechanics Laboratory, director of orthopaedicresearch at the Mount Sinai Medical Center, and profes-sor at Case Western Reserve University School ofMedicine. Today he is the Director of Cleveland’sOrthopaedic Research Laboratories and the world-famous continuing medical education program,Current Concepts in Joint Replacement.

It is difficult to encapsulate Greenwald’s contributions,but in a nutshell he has been a world leader in theresearch, education, and application of engineering andlife science disciplines directed towards artificial jointreplacements, and solving musculoskeletal system prob-lems. In other words — he is a baby boomer’s best friend.

When asked what his greatest accomplishments havebeen, Greenwald did not mention his multitude of hon-ours. He simply quoted Sir Isaac Newton saying, “‘If Ihave seen further, it is because I have stood on theshoulders of giants.’ I was just a part of the team, andwhile honours are nice and appreciated, I feel mybiggest achievements have been educating others andthe blending of two disciplines. It’s all been a great run!At Mount Allison I gained the confidence and maturitythat equipped me for life. This island boy did well witha degree from Mount Allison.”

Prince Charles visits the Biomechanics Laboratory in 1979and is shown a wrist replacement implant developed at theCleveland Clinic by Greenwald (left) and his staff.

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GRIDIRON GREATGRIDIRON GREATGary Ross (’10) isarguably the bestfootball player to

ever wear Garnetand Gold“ ”

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GBy Sue Seaborn

Gary Ross is arguably the best football player to everwear Garnet and Gold. And according to his coach, he isa better person than a football player and a role modelof exceptional standards.

Ross’ story is as unique as his athletic talents. Upongraduation from Riverside High in Windsor, ON, hemarried his school sweetheart, Tenecia. Over the nextfive years the two began to raise a family, and whileTenecia furthered her education, Ross supported thefamily. By 2006 it was Ross’ turn to pursue his educa-tion. With their two young sons in tow, the couplemoved to the Maritimes so he could pursue a degree inscience and return to playing the sport he loved so muchin high school.

Though relatively unknown at first — it didn’t take longfor Ross to establish himself as one of the finest players inthe Atlantic University Sport (AUS) league. In his firstyear he was recognized as a league all-star, the AUS spe-cial teams player of the year, and an Academic All-Canadian. In year two, he was again an AUS all-star andCanadian Interuniversity Sport (CIS) All-Canadian, as hebecame the first player in CIS history to compile over 600yards in each of the categories for receiving, punt returns,and kickoff returns — incredibly totaling 1,936 all-pur-pose yards over the season.

He was named an all-star receiver and the conference’stop special teams player in all four of his years in theAUS, and was honoured with a pair of CIS All-CanadianAwards as a first-team receiver and a second-team returnspecialist in each of his last two seasons.

Despite opponents strategically kicking away from theall-star returner, Ross was still able to compile someimpressive statistics in his last two seasons. In 2009 hewas named the AUS conference’s most valuable playerand nominated for the prestigious Hec Crighton trophy,awarded to the nation’s top player. Even though thisparticular award eluded him, Ross had a record-setting season, leading the AUS in receptions, receiving

yards, receiving touchdowns, and all-purpose yards(1,423 yards), and is now the AUS career leader inreceptions (172), receiving yards (2,582), and all-pur-pose yards (5,990 yards).

This year he was the only AUS player to average over100 yards receiving per game and his 60 receptions arealso a new AUS single-season record. His 818 receivingyards are a new Mounties’ single-season school recordand the fourth highest total in league history. Ross alsocurrently ranks second in AUS history with 1,679 careerpunt return yards and 1,403 career kickoff return yards.

However, athletic success is only part of the Ross story.Currently in his fourth year of studies, the two-timeUniversity Athlete of the Year has excelled equally in sci-ence — three times being named an Academic All-Canadian and earning a spot on the Dean’s List.

With one year of eligibility remaining, Ross could findhimself back in Garnet and Gold for one more cam-paign, but he also has his eye on a future in dentistry.However it turns out, he has certainly cemented his reputation as one of the all-time greats.

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