new trail autumn 2007

The Accidental Oilman

newtrailT h e U n i v e r s i t y o f A l b e r t a A l u m n i M a g a z i n e

A u t u m n 2 0 0 7

Days ofGloryCampus SportingExcellence

Plus...

Ed McDonald: Charity Fighter Jock

Tom Morimoto: Man of Many Lives

Special Inside:

Agriculture, Forestry, and HomeEconomics Insert

Alumni Recognition Awards Winners

The logical solution

†Due to provincial legislation, our auto insurance program is not offered in British Columbia, Manitoba or Saskatchewan. The TD Meloche Monnex home and auto insurance program is underwritten bySecurity National Insurance Company and distributed by Meloche Monnex Insurance and Financial Services Inc. in Quebec and by Meloche Monnex Financial Services Inc. in other provinces and territories.

TO ENJOY preferred group rates and exceptional care:

1 888 589 5656 orTDMelocheMonnex.com/ualberta

Insurance program recommended by:

ESPECIALLY for members of the University of Alberta Alumni Association.With TD Meloche Monnex, Canada’s leader in group home and auto† insurance, it all adds up toexceptional value. We offer home and auto insurance EXCLUSIVELY to members of professionaland alumni associations like you. You receive high-quality insurance products at preferred grouprates combined with exceptional service throughout the entire sales, service and claims process.

This is our last issue ofNew Trail before head-ing into CentenaryCelebrations 2008. Ifyou’ve lost touch withsomeone from youruniversity days or ever

found yourself wondering what happenedto a friend from that time, returning tothe campus during Centenary 2008 couldbe your perfect opportunity to reconnectwith them, or even make new friends.

We have many activities planned forthat year where we celebrate 100 yearsof academic and scholarly excellence,alumni achievements, and sporting tri-umphs. It’s this latter subject that we’vechosen as a theme for this issue as welook back at the athletic legacy of theUniversity of Alberta.

Many alumni have distinguishedthemselves internationally with theirathletic achievements, or just had a lotof fun and made lifelong friends playingsports on campus. One story we fea-ture is about a group of Calgarians whocame to Edmonton to attend the U of Aand ended up recruiting and organizingover 100 participants who fielded ateam in every intramural sport on cam-pus.

A lot of the people who joined in thefun are still friends today, and anextraordinary number of them havegone on to become very successful intheir professional careers. “It was agreat opportunity to socialize and havea ton of fun while attending university,”says Bob Lehodey, who played a num-ber of different sports for that intramu-ral team, and is now a Calgary lawyer.

Another story profiles a remarkablegroup of varsity athletes as we catch upwith them and find out what they’redoing in their post-university lives.

These are but two of the stories webring to you about individual effort andteam spirit that, win or lose, has alwaysbeen a big part of what president IndiraSamarasekera coined in her 2005installation address as part of thisprovince’s “can do” attitude during “thefirst Century of the University of Alberta[that] has been a debut to greatness.”

Susan Peirce, ’70 BAExecutive Director, Alumni Association

featuresnewtrailV o l u m e 6 2 N u m b e r 3

H E R E ’ S H O W T O R E A C H U S . . .Comments, suggestions, letters to the editor, story ideas –New Trail welcomes themall. Write to us at New Trail, 6th Floor, General Services Building, University of Alberta,Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, T6H 2H1. Our reader response line is also ready to takeyour call. Leave us a message at (780) 492-1702, or e-mail: [email protected]. Your privacy is your right and our responsibility. If you would like to remove your name from future mailings from the University of Alberta, please contact us at (780)492-3224 or 1-800-661-2593.

S T A Y I N T O U C HOn the Move? To keep receiving New Trail wherever you go call (780) 492-3471(1-866-492-7516 toll-free in North America) or e-mail your address change to [email protected]

ISSN: 0824-8125 Copyright 2005Publications Mail Agreement No. 40112326

Return undeliverable Canadian addresses toOffice of Alumni Affairs, University of Alberta

6th Floor, General Services BuildingEdmonton AB T6G 2H1

B A S E C A M P

SPRING 2007 1new trail

On the cover:World-class athlete Carline Muir. Photo: Richard Siemens/U of A Creative Services

2 Your LettersOur readers write to us

4 Bear Country Goings-on around the U of A

6 Quaecumque VeraWhatsoever things are true

10 Landmarks Accolades, honours and othermilestones

49 TrailsGrads making their mark inthe world

50 EvergreenAlumni association participation

50 Alumni EventsOur alma mater branches out

51 BookmarksUniversity pages to be proud of

52 Class NotesKeeping classmates up to date

56 In MemoriamBidding farewell to friends

59 ScrapbookPicture memories

60 Tuck ShopTaking a page out of the past

departments

4339

46

118

26

Sky PilotA jet fighter plane’s new role raising money for charity

Special Sports Feature Including...� The U of A’s coming of age on the football field� Kevin Tyler’s Canadian Athletics Coaching Centre� A look forward at some former athletic stars� A look back at some of the great U of A teams� The Winter’s Tale: Ice Hockey gets frozen on film

DirtshootersA quarter century ago they were the best on campus

Capital of PeaceDiscover the unconventional charms of Geneva

The Adventures of Tom MorimotoThe unlikely life of someone who’s seen more than most

The Accidental OilmanThe serendipitous path to success of a petroleum engineer

Inserts� Agriculture, Forestry, and Home Economics� Recognition Awards — this year’s outstanding alumni

newtrailA U T U M N 2 0 0 7

A L U M N I C O U N C I L2 0 0 7 – 2 0 0 8

Executive CommitteePresidentJim Hole, ’79 BSc (Ag)Past-President / Vice-PresidentNominating & BylawsHeike Juergens, ’72 BA, ’79 MEd, ’87 PhDVice-President: AwardsJudy Zender, ’67 BAVice-President: CentenaryJim Hole, ’79 BSc (Ag)Vice-President: ScholarshipsStephen Leppard, ’86 BEd, ’92 MEd, ’03EdDBoard of Governors RepresentativesRuth Kelly, ’78 BADick Wilson, ’74 BA, ’75 LLBVice-President: Strategic PlanningKurian Tharakan, ’86 BComSenate RepresentativesJennifer Rees, ’80 BSc (PT)Kerry Day, ’80 LLBVice-President: Student Life Mark Polet, ’77 BSc (Hon)SecretaryDoug Irwin, ’73 BPE

Faculty RepresentativesAgriculture, Forestry, & Home EconomicsAnand Pandarinath, ’93 BSc (For), ’00 MBA,’00 MFor ArtsJudy Zender, ’67 BA AugustanaStacey Denham Gibson, ’95 BA (Augustana), ’98 LLB BusinessKurian Tharakan, ’86 BCom DentistryTom Mather, ’69 DDSEducationStephen Leppard, ’86 BEd, ’92 MEd, ’03EdDEngineeringJim Funk, ’78 BCom, ’86 BSc(Eng)Graduate StudiesvacantLawBryan Kickham, ’71 BA, ’74 LLBMedicineLarry Jewell, ’63 BA, ’68 MDNative StudiesHeather Taylor, ‘97 BA NSNursingCarol Duggan, ’59 Dip(Nu)Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical SciencesRose Anne Lawton, ’73 BSc (Pharm)Physical Education and RecreationGerry Glassford, ’64 MARehabilitation MedicineGrant Fedoruk, ’99 BSc(PT) Campus Saint-JeanDeni Lorieau, ’73 BA ScienceMark Polet, ’77 BSc

Member at LargeC.H. William Cheung, ’86 LLB

Academic Representativevacant

Ex OfficioExecutive Director Susan Peirce, ’70 BA Graduate Students’ AssociationJulianna Charchun, ‘04 BA Students’ Union Michael JanzU of A Vice-President (External Relations) Sandra ConnHonorary PresidentDr Indira Samarasekera

DirectorSusan Peirce, ’70 BASupervising EditorRick PilgerEditorKim GreenAssociate EditorShelagh Kubish, ’85 BAContributing EditorJodeen Litwin, ’90 BScArt DirectorLisa Hall, ’89 BA

O F F I C E O FA L U M N I A F F A I R SExecutive DirectorSusan Peirce, ’70 BAAssociate Director/Manager, Alumni Education ProgramsRick PilgerAssociate Director/Manager, Alumni BranchesGina Wheatcroft, ’94 BEdExecutive Project ManagerColeen Graham, ’88 BSc(HEc), ’93 MEdAdministrative CoordinatorJacquie ReinprechtAssistant, Alumni BranchesAndrea Dunnigan, ’03 BComCoordinator, Alumni ChaptersJohn Perrino, ’93 BA(RecAdmin)Communications ManagerKim GreenCommunications AssociateShelagh Kubish, ’85 BAAssistant to the DirectorDiane TougasAssistant, Alumni Education Angela Tom, ’03 BACoordinator, Graphic CommunicationsLisa Hall, ’89 BACoordinator, Alumni RecognitionJodeen Litwin, ’90 BScAssistant, Alumni RecognitionCally Wesson, ’07 BACoordinator, Research & MarketingTracy Salmon, ’91 BA, ’96 MScAssistant, Alumni Services/ReceptionAnn MilesCoordinator, Alumni Special EventsColleen Elliott, ’94 BEd Assistant, Alumni Special EventsAshley Hunka, ’05 BACoordinator, Students & Young AlumniChloe Chalmers, ’00 BA

How to contact the Office of Alumni AffairsWrite to us at: 6th Floor, General ServicesBuilding, University of Alberta, Edmonton,Alberta T6G 2H1Call us toll-free in Canada and the U.S.A. at1-800-661-2593 or in Edmonton at 492-3224Fax: (780) 492-1568E-mail your comments, questions, addressupdates, and class notes to [email protected]

Join the Alumni Association’s online communityat www.ualberta.ca/alumni.

To advertise in New Trail contact Bonnie Lopushinsky at (780) 417-3464 or [email protected] Trail, the University of Alberta AlumniAssociation magazine, is published quarterly(circulation: 125,000). The views and opinionsexpressed in the magazine are those of the authorsand do not necessarily represent the views of theUniversity or the Alumni Association. All materialCopyright©. New Trail cannot be held responsiblefor unsolicited manuscripts or photographs.

KudosLast evening at a function Iextolled the superb New Trail— its content, layout and diver-sity of subject. It is GREAT. As I celebrate another 50thgraduation anniversary I thinkof the U of A.

By the way, I have publisheda book, Redesign the Door,dealing with 38 events in mylife which challenge tradition.Lulu published it. Now I ampublishing The Dirty Thirties...I hope. The Watrous Manitou(a Saskatchewan weekly) haspublished several chapters. Iam looking for a publisher andhave written U of A press. Wewill see what happens.

Barry Brooks, ’55 BA, ’57 BDivNorth York, ON

Long-Time ReaderI continue to find New Trailinteresting and informative, andthat it helps to maintain my tiesto the University of Alberta 46years after graduation.

Ellis Treffry, ’61 BSc(Ag)Vermilion, AB

Short-Time ReaderMy name is Jonathan Vermeire.I’m a grade six student attend-ing Our Lady of VictoriesCatholic School. I began to readyour articles when my teacherbrought his collection of NewTrail magazines into class andwas fascinated by the articlesthat you publish. I was won-dering if I could get New Traildelivered to my house, eventhough I’m not a graduate ofthe University of Alberta andI’m not 13 yet?

Jonathan Vermeire

Edmonton, AB

(Editor’s note: We sent

Jonathan a copy.)

A Satisfied Reader I enjoyed reading your Summer ’07 issue, especially the hiking story [‘Kilimanjaro High’]and the nanotechnology article.

Carol Nowicki, ’74 BSc(HEc)

Edmonton, AB

2 new trail AUTUMN 2007

L E T T E R S T O T H E E D I T O R

We Have A WinnerLast issue(Summer ’07)we ran a TuckShop contestcalled “ThoseWere The Days”where we askedyou to identifysix photos of U of A grads. It was our mostpopular contest to date, butonly one person got all thecorrect names that went withthe faces. . . congratulationsto Susanne Barton, a professorin the U of A’s Department ofPhysiology. We’ll be sendingSusanne a copy of EllenSchoeck’s, ’72 BA, ’77 MA,

recent book aboutlife on the U of Acampus called I Was There: A Century ofAlumni StoriesAbout theUniversity ofAlberta, 1906-2006.

The correct answers are: 1) Doris Anderson, ’45 BA, ’73LLD (Honorary); 2) Joe Clark,’60 BA, ’73 MA, ’85 LLB(Honorary); 3) W.O. Mitchell,’43 BA, ’75 DLitt (Honorary);4) Preston Manning, ’64 BA;5) Joe Shoctor, ’45 BA, ’46LLB, ’81 LLD (Honorary); 6) Paul Gross, ’97 BFA.

60 new trail SUMMER 2007

You could probably recognize yourself from a picture taken a long time

ago. But can you identify someone else whose face you are most likely

familiar with today? That’s what we’re asking you to do with the distin-

guished University of Alberta alumni pictured above. If you think you

have the names that go with the faces, send them to us by August 10,

2007, and we will send out a prize to the person with the most correct

answers. If more than one person correctly identifies all the people pic-

tured or if there’s a tie, we’ll put the names in a hat and draw a winner.

Good luck, and happy head hunting.

Send your answers to New Trail, 6th Floor, General Services Building,

University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, T6H 2H1 or e-mail

us at [email protected]

tuck shop

Those Were The Days

1

54

6

23

Conference ExperienceTHE BANFF CENTRE

Productive Energizing Rewarding Memorable

• Nestled in the grandeur of the Canadian Rocky Mountains, in the heart of Banff National Park • Enhanced conference facilities, including video-conferencing and television broadcast studios• More than 400 fully-appointed guest rooms• Complimentary wireless access in bedrooms and meeting spaces• Inspired new dining experiences• Over 60 exceptional meeting facilities, lecture theatres and auditoriums• Industry recognition for outstanding conference service and facilities• Unique 43-acre property with mountain vistas at every window, hiking trails near every door• Superb recreational facilities, including swimming pool, climbing wall, and weight room

107 Tunnel Mountain Drive, Box 1020, Banff, AB, Canada T1L 1H5 Fax: 403.762.6202 Ph: 403.762.6435 Toll Free: 1.877.760.4595 E-mail: [email protected] www.banffcentre.ca

AUTUMN 2007 3new trail

Toll Free: 1 800 709 1824 www.campustower.com

11145 - 87 Avenue Edmonton, Alberta

Comfort and care, every stay.

A Delighted ReaderI was delighted to find the arti-cle about Doris Anderson inyour Summer ’07 issue. I metDoris at Mount Royal College,Calgary. She, like me, was tak-ing advantage of lower fees atthe U of A affiliate. And ourfriendship lasted until gradua-tion at U of A in 1945. I lostcontact, but not interest, in hercareer after that and was alwaysgrateful for having been luckyenough to know her.

And I’m sure that after expe-riencing English classes as I didshe’d be the first to point outto you that the caption oughtto have been “Doris’s Days”!

Let me share one anecdotewith you. During our MRCyear Doris one day suggestedto me and a group that webroaden our experience byattending a Sunday eveningservice at a Spiritualist church.

We did, and attended with alldue respect. At the end of theservice we were invited torequest a “reading.” Dorisraised her hand. The mediumsaid, “I see you wearing awhite coat, and in your handis an unbalanced scale.”

Only after we left thechurch did Doris confide in usthat her part-time job was asan apprentice in a butcher shop.

I loved her then, I love herstill.

Robert W. Pulleyblank, ’45 BA,

’47 BEd, ’47 Dip(Ed)

Nanaimo, B.C.

A Tearful ReaderI read the article “The Powerof One” about Tania Spilchenin the Summer ’07 New Trailmagazine and was moved totears. What an amazing story.

Genevieve Boyer, ’98 BSc

Edmonton, AB

Down Memory LaneCongratulations on the superarticle about nanotechnologyin the Summer ’07 issue ofNew Trail. Last summer I vis-ited the University after anabsence of some 30 years andwas shown over the new insti-tute by [National Institute forNanotechnology director] NilsPetersen. By coincidence, manyyears ago he was a summerstudent in my research insti-tute at the University ofWestern Ontario!

How times have changed. In1929, former U of A presidentHenry Marshall Tory — thenpresident of the first NationalResearch Council — showed myfather, Henry Spencer (M.P. forBattle River, AB) over the firstNRC building in Ottawa (in1937 I worked one summer inthat building). Now there areNRC labs from coast to coast!

This past week, instead offlying to Vancouver as we dotwice a year, we took TheCana dian — left Toronto at 9 a.m. Tuesday and arrived atVancouver at 8 a.m. Friday. As a youngster, I travelledmany times to Ottawa withmy father from our farm inAlberta — but not ‘in style’! I hadn’t been on that route in30 years so it was a real treatand I highly recommend it.

Keep up the good work.

Elvins Y. Spencer, ’36 BSc, ’38 MScLondon, ON

We would like to hear

your comments about the

magazine. Send us your

letters via postal mail or

e-mail to the address on

the previous page.

Letters may be edited for

length or clarity.


bear country

When the Bears and Pandas hock-ey teams take to the ice, ClareDrake Arena is not a quiet

place. Up to 3,000 fans cheer, holler andhoot, trying to be heard over the music thatfills the arena when play isn’t underway.When the crowd has a U of A goal to cele-brate— which is often — the volumereally cranks up.

It’s not a place you’d expect to findpeace, but that’s exactly what workingat the games has brought RobertSoloview.

Soloview, more commonly known as“Super Fan,” has worked at Bears andPandas games for several years, takingtickets and welcoming fans. He startedhanging out at Bears hockey practicesand games after he met Blair St. Martin,’05 MD, ’04 BSc(MedSci), who wascaptain of the Bears hockey team at thetime, at a U of A Christian Club event.When he learned that St. Martin was onthe hockey team, Soloview offered tohelp the team in any way he could, andfrom there his involvement grew. Henow works part-time at sports events in

the arena, the main gym andat Foote Field — “I’m a superfan of all the sports,” hesays.

Spina bifida has made oneof Soloview’s legs weak, sohe walks with a limp, andhis speech is a little impaired.Classes at the GlenroseHospital helped, but he says that in hislife some people treated him poorly,targeting his differences. In 1999, hewas going through a difficult time, fac-ing some challenges with his health andhis spirit. But then he met St. Martin,who, he says, “helped me get my lifeback on track.”

Through St. Martin, Soloview wasintroduced to a welcoming group offriends in the Golden Bears hockeyteam and then the other sports teams.In 2003 the hockey teams presentedhim with customized Bears and Pandasjerseys with “SUPER FAN” across theback, and he wears these jerseys now tothe games. At the 2007 Green andGold Awards, he received a plaque in

recognition of his dedication and com-mitment to U of A sports and, morepoignantly, a standing ovation when itwas announced. “It was a surprise,” hesays, “and to get a standing ovation, itbrought tears to my eyes.”

He volunteers at an extended carecentre and a church, but it’s at theClare Drake Arena and Varsity Gymthat he’s found his true calling, makingpeople feel welcome when they come tosports events. He enjoys the work somuch he says he plans to stay at it untilhe retires— “when I’m 100 years old.”

Now closing in on 40, Soloviewhas found a balance in his life he waslacking before. And he’s in no hurryto give it up. “I’ll be here until I retire

t 5:26 a.m., August 4, the Delta II Rocket carrying the Phoenix Mars Lander lifted off from its Cape Canaveral,

Florida, launch pad. Ninety minutes later it had left Earth’sorbit and settled in for its 10-month journey to Mars.

Aboard that craft is a touch of U of A engineering expert-ise, a device deceptively simple yet amazingly sensitive. It’scalled a ‘telltale,’ a term coined by sailors for a little piece ofthread they once used to identify wind speed and direction.In this case the ‘telltale’ will sit atop Canada’s contribution

to the Mars mission, a multi-instrument meteorological sta-tion (MET) that will — if all goes well — track weather pat-terns and climate changes at Mars’ frigid northern plains,the first such mission to another planet’s polar environment.

Although it was built in Denmark, U of A mechanicalengineering professor Carlos Lange and his studentsdesigned the ‘telltale’ that will be part of MET’s sensoryarray. Comprised of a small hollow tube dangling from aKevlar thread and suspended from a 10 centimetre-tall, gallows-like instrument made of titanium, it will give scientists some idea about the wind speed and direction inthe polar region. “It’s a very low-tech solution to a high-tech problem,” says Lange.

Fan-tasticU of A’s bona fide super fan finds serenity in the unlikeliest places

5new trailAUTUMN 2007

Another Canadian contribution to the mission is theLidar system, which will bounce pencil-thin, laser pulses offof clouds and atmospheric dust to ascertain movement,composition and mass. But the star of the show is probablythe Phoenix Mars Lander that will dig into the Martian soilto try and provide scientists with the history of water at thelanding site as well as data on whether the Martian arcticclimate can support life and how is theregion affected by polar dynamics.

Of course, Phoenix has to landsafely on the planet for any of this tohappen — no small feat consideringthat about two-thirds of all spacecraft

destined for Mars either fail before completing their mis-sions or don’t manage to successfully deploy on the planet.

For now Lange can only cross his fingers and hope hegets the chance to see his ‘telltale’ in action so scientists canstudy the complex relationship between the various envi-ronmental factors at work in the region and if the areashows any signs of being favourable to harbour life, nowor in the past. He can also take heart in the fact that he

was there at Cape Canaveral to watchPhoenix successfully launchon its way to Mars.

“I got to see my babyfly,” he says.

arge theropod dinosaurs display remarkable specializa-tions for macrocarnivory, but tyrannosaurids take many

of these feeding adaptations to an extreme.” Readingthis sentence published in the scientific journal Acta Palaeon -tologica Polonica may give you pause to think... what?

But for the non-scientists in the crowd, what this meansis simply that Tyrannosaurus rex had one heck of a bite.Research conducted by a team of Alberta scientists, includ-ing lead author Eric Snively, a U of A biologist and postdoctoral research fellow, has found that the fused nasalbone in a T. rex’s skull and its incredibly powerful jawsgave it the potential strength to pick up a pair of 7.5 tonneTriceratops’ and the capacity to chomp through their boneswithout breaking its own teeth or damaging its skull.

“The T. rex just blows almost everyone else [somewhales and large marine reptiles exerted higher biteforces] out of the water when it comes to strength,” saysSnively. “All of the T. rex’s features came together to giveit the strongest bite of any land animal alive now or then,with a lower jaw that could apply 200,000 newtons offorce — that’s like lifting a loaded semi trailer.”

Snively and his team found that the fused tyrannosauridnasal area was stronger than unfused carnosaur nasals.This feature increased the strength of such dinosaurs as T. rex and helped them chomp down with powerful bitescapable of splintering bone. “Other carnivorous dinosaursskull bones might shear apart slightly when they bit intotheir prey,” Snively says. “But with tyrannosaurs, all theforce of the bite was transmitted to the flesh and bone theywere ripping into.”

T. rex and its closest relatives, that ruled the roost allover western North America from present-day Alberta allthe way down to Mexico, also had bigger teeth and harderskulls than other dinosaurs. But the study concludes that

it was the development of the fused and arched nasal bonesin comparison to the narrower muzzles of other dinosaursthat really gave them their cutting edge.

And if you think that lawyer who was snatched off thetoilet seat and swallowed with such alacrity in JurassicPark was just another Spielbergian flight of fancy, thinkagain. “T. rex’s neck power was as staggering as its jawmuscles,” says Snively. “In a split second, a T. rex couldtoss its head at a 45 degree angle and fling a 50 kilogramperson five metres in the air. That’s with a conservativeestimate of the creature’s muscle force.”

Snively co-authored the study with Doug Phillips, ’77MSc, ’84 PhD, from the University of Calgary and DonaldHenderson, palaeontologist and physicist from the RoyalTyrrell Museum of Palaeontology. The trio compared theteeth and skulls of both tyrannosaurids, such as T. rex,and non-tyrannosaurids, such as Allosaurus. What theyfound is that the fused, arch-like nasal bones found in a T.rex skull were an adaptation that allowed the carnivorouscreatures to break right through the bones of their preywithout breaking their own skulls.

This adaptive feature was important for T. rex becauseof its small arms that couldn’t hold on to its prey for longwhile it subdue creatures with a series of lacerating bites.“It couldn’t afford to be that delicate,” Snively says. “Ithad to bite in the creature and drive its teeth right throughthe bone.”

And that it did. Very effectively.

“LSound Bite

T. rex — a nose for nastiness

Astudy by U of A School of PublicHealth professor Cameron

Wild published in the journalAddiction found that simply mailingself-help pamphlets to problem drinkersreduced their binge drinking by 10percent.

For the study, conducted with theUniversity of Toronto, the Centre forAddiction and Mental Health and thePublic Health Agency of Canada, ascreening interview was conductedwith over 10,000 Canadians. Out ofthat number, 877 adult males andfemale drinkers with an average age of43 were randomly selected to receive abrief self-help pamphlet on alcoholuse. Another 850 individuals with sim-ilar drinking habits were chosen for acontrol group.

The 877 selected drinkers were thenmailed a pamphlet called EvaluateYour Drinking that outlined ways they could take stock of their ownalcohol use.

The control group did not receivethe initial distribution of the pamphletuntil after the study had ended. Sixmonths later, everyone in the studywas contacted to see whether theiralcohol consumption had changed.Among the 1,305 participants whocompleted the study, Wild and col-

leagues found that problemdrinkers whoreceived theself-help pam-phlet at thebeginning ofthe studyreported a 10 percentreduction inbinge drinkingrates, comparedto problemdrinkers in the control condition.

Why did the pamphletwork? “Many heavy drinkersmistakenly believe their behav-iour is more common than it actuallyis,” Wild says. “These norm misper-ceptions can perpetuate hazardous orharmful alcohol use because frequentheavy drinkers calibrate their beliefs toview their alcohol use as normative,rather than inappropriate or deviant.

“We think it’s an innovative way toreach out to problem drinkers who aretoo embarrassed to seek out formalalcohol treatment,” says Wild, whoalso notes that the ratio of untreatedto treated problem drinkers in the gen-eral population is about 10 to one.

“Problem drinkers,” he says, “don’tseek formal alcohol treatment becauseof stigma or embarrassment, andwhen asked why they have not soughthelp, state that they prefer to ‘changeon their own.’ Our research capitalizeson this by helping people take stock oftheir drinking habits. It’s a cheap andeffective public health approach toreducing hazardous and harmful alco-hol consumption in the general drink-ing population.”

quaecumque vera

HeartyHeart

Anew study to determine the effect of exercise on people who have experi-enced heart failure has found that

aerobic exercise is the best way to go. Thestudy, led by researchers from the Universityof Alberta and published in the prestigiousJournal of the American College ofCardiology, examined data from 812heart-failure patients involved in 14 trials.

The researchers examined existingresearch into studies examining aerobicexercise only, a combination of aerobicand strength training, and strength train-

ing only. What they found was that“aerobic training offers the clearestbenefits when it comes to rehabilitatingthe heart,” says Alex Clark, one of theauthors of the study.

“Traditionally, patients were recom-mended to be almost sedentary,” continuesClark, a U of A nursing professor andAlberta Heritage Population HealthInvestigator. “But the sense of taking thingseasy is counteracted by the findings of thisstudy, and this evidence from this type ofanalysis is persuasive.”

CameronWild

Bottle Bane


Nine species of beetles com-pletely new to Alberta havebeen discovered near Hinton

by University of Alberta forest ecolo-gist and chair of the department ofrenewable resources, John Spence.

In the study published in the journalBiological Conservation, Spence, alongwith research colleagues David Langor,’89 PhD and Greg Pohl, ’87 BSc, ’92MSc, concentrated on the ground-dwelling rove beetles, some of which arepredatory while others prefer to dine onfungi. The research team looked at theinsects found in old growth forests thathadn’t seen a fire for over 80 years, aswell as stands that had been harvestedanywhere from one to 27 years ago.The researchers discovered that whilesome of the stands in the process ofregeneration had the highest number ofdifferent rove beetle species, some typesof the beetles only exist in the oldgrowth forests, which means it’s crucialto some beetles’ survival to protect thishabitat, at least until harvested forestsregenerate and are recolonized.

“I understand that beetle conserva-tion is not as high on the priority listin some people’s minds as grizzly bearsor caribou,” says Spence. “But havingdevoted most of my life to studyinginsects and their communities, I would

feel awful to know we were responsiblefor the loss of any insect species.”

It’s unknown what role the beetlesplay in the overall ecosystem of theforests they dwell in, but citing theexample of the declining honey beesand their crucial role in the pollinationof plants, Spence urges caution inmanaging a species whose role is notcompletely comprehended.

“Even if you don’t really care aboutinsects,” he says, “there’s a lot of evi-

dence that different insect speciesoften turn out to be critical links forecosystem processes that we value. Andunfortunately we don’t understand howimportant they are until they’re gone.Concerns about biodiversity have aris-en to remind us that we must managenatural systems with respectful igno-rance. This is not the same as protect-ing endangered species of mammalsand birds about which we alreadyknow quite a lot.”

While the researchers found that onlyaerobic exercise reverses the remodeling ofthe heart caused by failure, which enlargesduring heart failure while also pumping lessblood, there was no evidence that strengthtraining combined with aerobic exercise wasas effective. And although the damaged heartdoesn’t become healthy, “it becomes moreeffective than without the aerobic exercise,”notes co-author Mark Haykowsky, ’91 BPE,’94 MSc, ’98 PhD.

Heart failure is a modern day ‘epidemic’—being one of the most common conditions

in people over 70 years old and affectsbetween six and 10 percent of people inthat age bracket. “Heart failure affects allareas of life, including walking, sleepingand mental health, and it makes peoplevery tired and restricted — even walkingacross a room can prove very difficult,”says Clark, whose work is supported by anAlberta Heritage Foundation for MedicalResearch award. “Overall it can have acataclysmic effect on your life.”

Alex Clark

John Spence (above): “We must manage natural systems with respectful ignorance.”

The Fab Nine

Sky PilotFor Ed McDonald, taking to the air for

charity just makes ‘plane’ sense

sits behind the pilot). Then we werebarely airborne, but already up over2,500 metres, when he had me takethe stick and fly the plane.

As you might expect from a fighterjet whose purpose was to train EasternEuropean pilots in general military fly-ing and advanced bombing techniques,the handling is smooth and precise. Ittakes just a fractional hand movementto the side to push the plane into a 45-degree banking turn. But that fraction-al movement increases exponentiallywhen you’re pulling two-and-half gsthrough a turn, as McDonald demon-strated when he asked me if I couldlift my arm in one such manoeuvre.Applying the normal force to executesuch a task resulted in my arm remain-ing firmly on my lap.

McDonald, who was born inEdmonton, has thousands of flyinghours in his day job as an Air Canadapilot who regularly flies an A340 Airbusback and forth to Europe and Asia. Buthe has only 50 hours in the cockpit ofhis new toy that he’s had for a year. Notto worry. He also flew jets in the Cana -dian Air Force (mostly out of MooseJaw, Saskatchewan) for 15 years — fulltime for five years and in the reserves foranother 10 — where he says he’s pulledas much as seven gs while executingmuch tighter and faster aerobatics thanthose he subjects his passengers to.

More than just an expensive toy or agreat way to raise money for charity, theAlbatross also fits McDonald’s businessplans. “Combined with the uncertaintyof the airline industry and the fact thatflying passenger jets is not all that stim-ulating after a while, I figured it wastime to diversify and started a bit of anengineering practice. What we do for the

“If money was no object to you, whatwould you pay for a ride in one ofthese things?” Ed McDonald, ’83BSc(Eng), ’96 MBA, poses this questionstanding beside his luminous L-39ZAAlbatross, the fighter jet that he’s justfinished hanging me upside down in,nothing between my helmeted head andthe ground but a cupola of Plexiglascanopy and over 3,000 metres of air.

Turns out money isn’t an object formany people who are willing to pay a lot of it to rip through the sky atover 800 kilometres an hour in theCzechoslovakian-built light-attack jetaircraft that McDonald bought from“a guy in Calgary who had two andwanted to get rid of one so I bought it off him for $400,000.”

So far 20 people have agreed to givea total of somewhere between $250,000and $300,000 to various charities forthe privilege of being flung around thesky where they’ll experience a g-forceof up to three or four times normal ontheir bodies and hurtle along so closeto the ground that Tiger Woods couldprobably ding the plane with a shotfrom his nine iron. You might twist andturn through the air as you follow thecourse of the North SaskatchewanRiver, and you might do a four-pointbarrel roll where McDonald will snapthe plane so that your left shoulderfaces the ground, then you’re upsidedown, followed by your right shoulderfacing the ground, and then back toupright again.

The deal McDonald does with thecharities is that they cover the cost offuel and maintenance on the airplaneand he throws in his time and the air-craft. “I don’t want to make any moneyat this,” he says. “I just want to cover

my costs. But on the other hand, I don’twant to cheapen it. The Air Force putup F-18 rides about a year ago at afundraising dinner in Calgary and ityielded 25 grand a ride. To the layper-son this plane is pretty darn close to anF-18. So the market value is anywherefrom $5,000, the minimum bid price,to $25,000. It’s eye watering whatpeople will give. There are four peopleso far that have paid $25,000 each.

“There are some very generouspeople who go to these auctions thatwant to do something for that cause,”McDonald continues. “And if I can givethem a ride in a jet fighter and they geta taste of what it’s like to fly one ofthese, and the charity can put a lot ofcash in their jeans, then everybody wins.”

He’s not kidding when he says pas-sengers get a taste of what it’s like tofly the Albatross (the same type ofplane Pierce Brosnan flew in the JamesBond movie Tomorrow Never Dies).Before we were even in the air he hadme holding the stick as we taxied downthe runway while he tidied up somethings in the cockpit (the passenger

Ed McDonald: “We owe the U of A a lot.”


airline industry is we design stuff for air-ports that use the global positioning sys-tem that allows aircraft to find runwaysin poor weather conditions. What wedesigned has to be flight checked so weneeded an aircraft to do the flight check-ing. So the issue was do you buy a littleCessna or something like that, or do youdo something off the wall and get an L-39 Albatross?”

The question is, of course, rhetorical.But what did his wife, Michele Sawatzky,’87 BSc(Den), ’89 DDS, have to saywhen he broke the news that he was inthe market for a good, used fighter jet?

“She thought I was kidding at first,”laughs McDonald. “Then when I wentand actually bought it she thought itwas probably just a piece of junk. Butwhen she and the kids [Austen, 10,and Kaitlyn, seven] came out to theairport for the first time to look at itand she saw how nice and clean andnew it looked, then she realized this is

for real. But as I’vetold her through mywhole flying career,the drive to the air-port is the most dan-gerous part of going

to work. Same with this airplane. Thebiggest risk on this airplane is losingthe engine. But it’s almost a brandnew engine and I keep a close, closeeye on it. Right now it’s behaving per-fectly and any time it starts showingany trouble it’ll be getting maintainedimmediately.”

That engine currently has only 163hours on it and will require a rebuildat 1,000 hours. It can be rebuilt fourtimes before a new engine will have tobe installed. That same engine alsosucks up about 500 litres of jet fuelan hour — fuel that, at the time of thiswriting, costs $1.10 a litre. Okay, soit’s not exactly environmentally friendly,but how often do you get to strap your-self into a rocket and pretend you’re afighter jockey?

However, if you’re looking for thatTop Gun experience this year you’regoing to be disappointed as McDonaldsays he doesn’t want to oversaturate the

market and turn what could be a once-in-a-lifetime experience into an every-day occurrence. “Various charities callme up and say ‘we have a live auctionand would you be willing to donate aride,’ ” he says. “Up until now I’ve beenbasically saying yes to everybody. ButI’ve cut it off for this season because20 is a lot.”

Which makes me feel very privilegedthat McDonald has taken the time andeffort to give me something for freefor which others are willing to ponyup as much as $25,000. He’s doing itbecause he’s an alumnus and, he says,“We owe the U of A a lot. We owe ourlivelihoods to the education we got atthe University of Alberta. Obviously weworked for it but still the U of A was abig part of our lives. I still have season’stickets to Golden Bears hockey and Ilove taking my kids to Bears games.

“It’s great to go back on campus. Itbrings back lots of memories, lots ofgood times. Whether my kids go to theU of A or any university at all is notimportant. But they do get exposure tothe place and learn that it was a bigpart of their parents’ lives.”

— Kim Green

The author on theground andthe Albatrossin flight.



landmarks

� University professor emeritusE.D. (Ted) Blodgett has beennamed the City of Edmonton’spoet laureate, a position he willhold until July 2009.

Among other duties, he will beinvolved in the September 17launch of the Poetry Festival, oneof many events connected toEdmonton’s designation as the2007 Cultural Capital of Canada.

Also part of the Cultural Capitalinitiative, a symposium will be heldat the U of A on November 9 and 10exploring the connections betweenarts and science. For informationon these and other events, checkedmontonculturalcapital.com

� Long-time U of A men’s hockeycoach Rob Daum, ’84 BEd, ’82BPE, has signed a one-year con-tract to serve as an assistantcoach with the Edmonton Oilers.Daum was head coach of theGolden Bears from the 1995–96season until 2004–05. He thencoached for two seasons with theHouston Aeros in the AmericanHockey League.

� Five U of A researchers werenamed Canada Research Chairs inMay. Anne Sales of the Faculty ofNursing was named CRC in Inter -disciplinary Healthcare Teams;Uwe Hacke of the Department ofRenewable Resources, CRC in Tree-Water Relations; Sandra Davidge ofthe Perinatal Research Centre, CRCin Women’s Cardiovascular Health(reappointment); Aksel Hallin ofthe Department of Physics, CRC inAstroparticle Physics; Tian Tang ofMechanical Engineering, CRC inNanobiomolecular Hybrid Materials.Hacke, Hallin, and Tang are alsorecipients of the Canada Foundationfor Innovation Leaders OpportunityFund, which supplies funding forinfrastructure associated with aCanada Research Chair.

� At the City of Edmonton Salute toExcellence Awards in June, professoremeritus of Art and Design WalterJule was named to the Arts andCulture Hall of Fame. His role inbuilding an internationally acclaimedcentre for printmaking at the U of Awas acknowledged.

� Professor emeritus GregHollingshead has been awardedone of three $30,000 prizes in thisyear’s Lieutenant Governor ofAlberta Arts Awards. Hollingshead,author of three novels and morethan five dozen short stories, wonthe award at a ceremony in May.

� Hugh Hoyles, ’66 BPE, profes-sor emeritus, was inducted intoVolleyball Canada’s Hall of Famein June. At the U of A, Hughcoached the Golden Bears volley-ball team and is best known forhis role establishing the CampusRecreation program. He has alsobeen involved in volleyball atprovincial, national, and interna-tional levels. He was inducted inthe Alberta Volleyball AssociationHall of Fame in 2004.

� David Petis, assistant dean(external relations) of the Facultyof Engineering for the past sevenyears, has moved to St.Catherines, Ontario, to take on theposition of vice-president,advancement, at Brock University.

� Edmonton-born philanthropistPeter Allard donated $1.5 millionto enable the university to createthe Dr. Charles A. Allard Chair inDiabetes Research, a positionnamed in honour of the donor’slate father, a renowned Edmontonsurgeon and 1943 graduate of the U of A medical school. RonaldGill, the new scientific director ofthe University’s Alberta DiabetesInstitute, is the first Allard chair-holder.

The U of A will seek $1.5 million in matching funds from thegovernment of Alberta's Access tothe Future Fund to make the endow-ment fully funded at $3 million.

In MemoriamLong-time U of A employee inthe Faculty of Physical Educationand Recreation Ron Urnesspassed away in late July. Urness,affectionately known as “RonRink,” maintained the ClareDrake Arena on campus foralmost four decades.

When W.G. Hardy, ’73 LLD (Honorary) came to the U of Ain 1920 to teach classics, he

brought his love of ancient history, akeen academic mind, and a staggeringenergy that saw him serve as chair ofthe classics department for more thana quarter of a century as well as writehundreds of short stories and academicarticles — not to mention a handful of historical novels somewhat racy forthe time. He also brought a collectionof antiquities that now form the coreof the Hardy Collection on campus.And he brought a passion for sports.

Hardy coached the U of A hockeyteam in the 1920s and remained agreat supporter of sports, particularlyhockey, for years. He led the hockeyteam through much of the early gloryyears and was instrumental in raisingthe funds for the Varsity Arena, which

opened in 1927and was in useuntil the late1950s. His name is on theHardy Cup, thetrophy westernCanadian uni-versity hockeyteams startedcompeting for in 1951.

Hardy oncesaid, “Peoplealways ask why I, a profes-sor of classics,have such aninterest in sport. I tell them it isbecause I am a professor of classicsthat I am interested in sport.” Hardybelieved that sport should play an

important role in modern society, as ithad in ancient Greece.

Hardy’s belief in the importance ofsport and in the value of a balance of

Great Teams at theUniversity of AlbertaDecades of sports have brought pride and excitement to campus, and a few

particularly notable teams have led the charge

by Shelagh Kubish, ’85 BA

Left, Classics professor and hockey coach Hardy believed in intelligentteamwork; Maury Van Vliet coached basketball, and football, and createdthe U of A’s physical education program.

Campus Sporting Excellence

athletic and intellectual pursuit wasechoed some years later when MauryVan Vliet came to the U of A in 1945to found an athletics program and theFaculty of Physical Education andRecreation. Van Vliet set a high stan-dard of excellence for the new pro-gram and believed in educating thewhole person — including aspects ofacademics, athletics and communityspirit. Athletic directors since himhave held up that standard and haveseen the U of A vault to the top rungof Canadian university sports.

Van Vliet and Hardy also agreed onthe value of teamwork. In a 1925Gateway article about hockey, Hardywrote, “in this game, as in most others,the team that plays the hardest anduses the most system and intelligencewill usually carry off the laurels.” Oneexample from that year was the men’srugby team, which won the provincialchampionship by defeating the CalgaryTigers twice with hard work and craftycoaching strategy. The second of the twogames was described as “the finest dayin Alberta’s athletic history.” It mighthave been the finest day at the time,but it was also a sign of things to come.

In fact, while it has many outstand-ing individual athletes, the U of A real-ly sets itself apart from other Canadianuniversities in terms of team perform-ance. The U of A is the only universityto have won a national championshipin each of the 11 team sports under the umbrella of Canadian Inter -university Sports (CIS) competition(formerly CIAU).

A variety of U of A teams from thepast stand out as particularly noteworthyfor various reasons — but most oftenbecause they followed Hardy’s dictumby playing the hardest and using intel-ligence to carry off the laurels of victory.We share some of their stories here.

If we’ve missed highlighting your

favourite team, please let us know.

We’d love to hear your thoughts about

the importance of athletics at the

U of A from one century to the next.

2005–06 Pandas field hockeyupsetWith this championship win, the U of Abecame the only university to havewon a championship in each of the 11team sports competed for in CIS.

Coach Carla Somerville, ’98 BPE,took an underdog team and convincedthem they could beat the UBC Thunder -birds, a field hockey powerhouse thathadn’t lost in two straight years.Somerville’s Pandas defeated UBC onthe first weekend of the 2005–06 seasonand again when it really counted — inthe national final.

“From day one we believed we couldwin,” Somerville says. “If I could figureout what it was that made us believethat, I would take it, bottle it, and sellit — and I’d be a millionaire.”

As a star field hockey player for the Pandas in the 1990s, Somerville

enjoyed herself and saw a fair bit ofsuccess. But the coaching experienceand the first national win was some-thing else. “Things just went well,”Somerville says. “We had good prac-tices, a good pre-season, we clicked as a team. We had to work hard tomake that happen but it was also a fun time.”

Looking ahead to the challenges ofthe next few years, Somerville can stillsay the national win of 2005–06 was“something we will all remember andappreciate for a long time.”

1967–68 Bears hockeyunexpected winIt was supposed to be developmentalyear—a number of the players the Bearsput on the ice were rookies — but the U of A ended up winning the nationalchampionship in an upset. The nail-biterwas played in the Montreal Forum infront of 12,000 fans.

The beginningsThe first organized practice for a U of A athletic game was a rugby practice onOctober 22, 1910. The team had a practice match against the Edmonton Eskimos andthen travelled to Calgary for their first game against Western Canada College. Theylost 28-13 but on November 5 won the first home game, despite the snowy conditions.The women students, who had formed the Wauneita Club, watched the action.

In 1922–23, the U of A team played in an inter-varsity series in men’s rugby withU of Saskatchewan. The Evergreen and Gold yearbook of the time notes, “It wasa truly historical event for it was the first game ever played with another univer-sity, and Alberta had the honour of winning it.”


The nationals werehosted in Montreal byLoyola University, SirGeorge Williams Univer -sity, and MacDonaldCollege. (The first two schools laterjoined to form Concordia Universityand the third has been incorporatedinto McGill.)

The Bears had been almost com-pletely discounted as a factor in thetournament, and when they made it tothe final against the Loyola Warriors,Montreal fans anticipated a home-teamwin. The Warriors out-shot the Bears47 to 27 and would go on to a 4–3lead at the end of the second period.

But in the third period fortuneschanged. The Bears tied the game midway through the third when RonCebryk, ’68 BSc(Eng), scored, andthen with 17 seconds remaining,Cebryk potted the game winner.

When the final buzzer sounded, U of A coach Clare Drake, ’58 BEd,’98 LLD (Honorary), had won his second University Cup in an upset.Making the victory even more special,only five months earlier, he had takenthe Bears football team to a CollegeBowl victory, also in an upset — twonational titles in two sports during thesame university season.

1978–79 Bearshockey domination of thecompetitionThe hockey Bears of 1978–79dominated Canadian univer-sity competitive season andpost-season, winning the Uni -

versity Cup that year relatively easily.The playoffs didn’t have the thrill oflast-minute goals or dramatic finishes— the Bears won their tournamentgames with wins of 7-1, 3-1, and 5-1— but that was mostly because the teamof that year was simply extremely strong.

In his just-released Bears on Ice (seepage 17 for information), StephenScriver quotes co-captain John Devaney,’82 BCom, on the year—“We wereunbeatable that year. ... We went intothat tournament fully expecting to win.”

There were several high-calibre indi-vidual players on the team—four ofthem went along with Coach Drake tothe 1980 Olympics (Devaney, RandyGregg, ’75 BSc, ’79 MD, Don Spring,’81 BCom, and Dave Hindmarch, aswell as Kevin Primeau, ’77 BPE, whoplayed on the previous year’s Bearsteam) and a few went on to the NHL.To further explain their success,Devaney notes that Clare Drake’s sys-tems were still far ahead of those ofmany of the other university hockeyteams. As long as the players followedthe system, they would win.

1993–94 Bearsbasketball first of three nationalchampionshipsWith the home crowd loud and exuber-ant, the atmosphere in Varsity Gymduring the season was amazing. Somehave described it as the high point ofbasketball in Edmonton.

Even with the excitement in thegym and the energy on the court, theBears were never expected to make itto nationals and win that year. OnMarch 20, 1994, the Golden Bearsbasketball team became nationalchampions for the first time in theUniversity’s history, defeating the heavyfavourites, the McMaster Marauders,by a score of 73–66, in Halifax.

Coach Don Horwood, ’79 MA, wasthen in his 11th year at the helm of theBears basketball team. He acknowledgedthat through the season, the Bears had-n’t been considered front-runners atany time, but they were determined.“No, we don’t have the country’s besttalent,” he was quoted in a newspaperarticle of the time, “but we were themost determined. I had a bunch ofguys who did whatever it took to win.And it wasn’t me, it was them.”

Coach Horwood (above, cutting anet in celebration) has been namedCIS coach of the year three times; in2007 he received a City of EdmontonSalute to Excellence Award and wasinducted into the city’s Hall of Fame.

Above, the 1968 Bears withtheir unexpected UniversityCup; John Devaney, co-cap-tain of the ’78–-’79 team.



1994–95 to 1999–2000Pandas volleyball six straight national winsIn 2002, the Pandas volleyball playersfrom the 1994–95 to 1999–2000 sea-sons were inducted as a unit into theAlberta Sports Hall of Fame in recog-nition of their remarkable streak of sixconsecutive national championships.Coach Laurie Eisler says they alllearned a lot from those years, and theones that followed. Mostly theylearned how hard it is to win.

“Winning is a really, really difficultthing to do,” says Eisler. “Even if youdo all the right things, you don’t alwayswin. But in those six years, that groupis still perceived as special. They had alot of adversity thrown at them, butthey beat it.”

Adversity like blown-out knees,torn ACLs — a couple of players hob-bled their way through key sets—andtheir coach delivering a baby in thehospital while the players were out onthe court playing a game.

In the 1998-99 season, five of thesix starters were lost to graduation,and they were, says Eisler, “really sig-nificant athletes.” Other teams aroundthe division saw a glimmer of hopethat the Pandas could be knocked offthe top. “They wrote us off, and dis-counted the new players we had,”

Eisler says. When the Pandas beatUBC for the ’98-99 national champi-onships, it was perceived as a hugeupset, she says.

You always plan to win as a coach,Eisler says, but win or lose, it is theability to provide athletes with theopportunity and the environment todo their best that is so rewarding.

1999–2000 Pandasrugbysurprise dominationPandas rugby became the U of A’s19th inter-university program onSeptember 1, 1999, and the team,under coach Helen Wright, ’94 BA,kicked off the program with a surpriseshowing at the Canada West champi-

onship. Playing against UBC and U ofVictoria, Alberta handled the squadsfrom a province with a long history inrugby to qualify for their first trip tothe national championships. CoachWright picked up Canada West Coachof the Year honours.

Few people thought the Pandaswould be able to make as much noiseat the national championships thatyear, but they did. The Pandas crushedtheir competition throughout the tour-nament and defeated host U of Guelph20-3 in the final. Overall the Albertateam dominated the national champi-onships physically, advancing the ballthrough superior scrum play.

Coach Wright points to a few factorsfor the team’s success. There was a bit ofgood timing involved in that several ofthe players already knew each otherthrough provincial rugby play and werekeen to play together on a varsity team.Some of those players were exceptionalathletes and, Wright notes, high-achieving academics too. When rugbywas accepted as a varsity sport at the U of A, it was easier to recruit top-notchathletes who had access to scholarshipsand the cachet of being a varsity athlete.

The U of A was really positive andsupportive, Wright says, and the alum-ni support has been “huge,” she says.“They give out scholarships, work ourfundraisers. They’re fabulous.”

It was the first of five consecutivenational wins for the Pandas rugbyteam under coach Wright, who nowworks in administrative aspects of dis-aster recovery for Landlink Consulting.


1967–68 Bears footballa historic winOnly 15 veterans were on the 1967–68 football Bears team coached byClare Drake; the rest, rookies. Some key players were lost to injury early in the season. But as the Gatewaynewspaper said of the team, “Some excellent player manage-ment, the finest college football coach-ing staff in Canada and one hell of alot of desire combined to give the Bearstheir first national football champi-onship.” The gridiron Bears won the1967 College Bowl in November,defeating the McMaster Marauders inwhat is considered by many to be thefirst true national championship gamefor Canadian university football.

Backed by a rushing touchdownfrom quarterback Terry Lampert, ’68BA, Alberta led the game 10–9 withless than a minute to go and McMasterin good shape to win if they completeda field goal. Instead, the Maraudersattempted a pass, which the Bears’John Wilson, ’71 DDS, intercepted toseal the victory. In the game, ValSchneider, ’66 BPE, ’69 MA — later tobecome head coach and then athleticdirector at the U of Saskatchewan —received the Teddy Morris trophy asoutstanding player.

1972 Bearsfootball

national win withdramatic playAfter a narrow defeat in the 1971College Bowl, the Bears got theirVanier Cup the next season whenthey faced Waterloo Lutheran(now Wilfred Laurier) in thenational final, held in Toronto.

The game is remembered bymany people for a dramatic playnear the end of the fourth quarter

when #12, defensive back Dale Schulha,’72 BPE, ’74 MSc, ’74 Dip(Ed), threw atouchdown pass off of a fake field goal.

Even today Schulha, now athleticdirector at the U of A, remembers itclearly.... “The weather conditionsweren’t great and our field goal kickerJack Schwartzberg [’73 BPE, ’74Dip(Ed)] had tried a couple of fieldgoals and was having trouble hittingthem. I noticed that WaterlooLutheran had very poor coverage interms of the outside containing unit,so walking onto the field for our thirdfield goal try, I just said to GaryWeisbrot [’73 BPE, ’74 Dip(Ed)], oneof our wide receivers, ‘be ready.’ Hesaid ‘what do you mean?’ I just said,‘be ready for me.’ So I took a lookand they were in the same alignment.Waterloo hadn’t adjusted so it wouldbe easy for me to get outside andthrow a pass. I didn’t say anything to

anybody. I got the snap back, put theball down, pulled the ball away... Iwent to the outside. Gary was wideopen so I threw him the pass.”

The touchdown pass clinched thegame for the Bears, with the finalscore 20–7.

“When I got off the field,” saysSchulha, “Coach Jim Donlevy [’59BPE, ’61 BEd, ’75 MA] was gettinginterviewed by TV and radio crews,saying the snap was a great call andall that, and the coach walked over tome after the interview and said, ‘luckyit worked, Schulha, it’s a long walkback from Toronto!’ It was reallyexciting for me to finish my collegecareer like that, having thrown atouchdown pass in a championshipgame. It was pretty special.”

Esks adopt UA coloursFrom the fall of 1949 to the fall of1958 inclusive the Bears footballprogram went into dormancy, asthere was no competition in theWest. The University gave theEdmonton Eskimos of the CanadianFootball League their jerseys, andthe Eskimos adopted green and goldas their colours. Peter Lougheed, amember of the 1947 and 1948 teams,went on to play with the EdmontonEskimos in 1949 while still a lawstudent through 1952 at the U of A.

ValSchneider

16 new trail

2002 to 2005 PandasHockeyunbeaten streakWomen’s hockey has a fine traditionat the University of Alberta, but theCIS didn’t start official ice hockeycompetition for women until the1998–99 season. When they did, thePandas were fast off the mark.

Howie Draper, ’91 BPE, was namedhead coach and within two years hadbuilt a program that continues todominate women’s university hockey.

The team is known for a remarkableunbeaten streak of 110 games from the2002–03 season through the 2004–05

season, but Coach Draper saysit’s not all about winning.

“It’s easier to say thisnow of course,” he says,“but had we not won asmany games as we didor had we not achievedour goals of winning the

national champion -ship in those

years, I still think that our team wouldhave been successful. We really were ateam in every essence of the word. Ithink that that is a far more importantindicator of success.”

The coaching staff and team psy-chologist worked to build team unity,and Draper says it was the matureplayers on the team — he cites JudyDiduck, Carol Scheibel, ’03 BEd,Robyn Rittmaster, ’94 MSc, andDelaney Collins — who drove the con-cept home. They were outstandinghockey players who, Draper says,“were able to help sell the concept oftogetherness, honesty, accountabilityand commitment to our younger playerswhich really lifted the team to achievewhat it did over that period.”

Bears soccer 2003–04 breakthrough nationalchampionshipAfter having led the Bears soccer teamto four previous national final tourna-ments (in ’88, ’95, ’98, and ’99) only toreturn to Edmonton without thenational title, coach Len Vickery tookhis athletes to Montreal for the 2003CIS championship game. It wouldprove more rewarding. Winning there,says Vickery, was “certainly exciting,and something of a breakthrough afterthe previous trips to nationals.”

The fall 2003 season saw Albertaon a mission from day one. They dom-inated the opposition in winning theirfirst four games by shutout en route toan 8–2–2 conference record. And thenfreshman Junior Castrillon-Rendon(who went on to play two years inEurope before returning to the U of Ain 2006) took it upon himself to makesure Alberta did not face heartbreak in the Canada West Final Four atSaskatoon, as he scored a hat trick in the opener against UBC, and theconference-winning goal againstTrinity Western. At the national cham-pionships, which were hosted by McGillUniversity, Alberta used double over-time to defeat Saint Mary’s University2–1 on Castrillon’s Golden Goal.

All that exorcised the demons fromthe previous year, a coulda-shoulda-woulda season in which the Bears,ranked number-one through most of the year, dropped a heartbreaker Canada West game to UBC and didn’t get to nationals. nickname

The “Golden Bears” nickname was first con-sidered by the U of A in 1929 because of the domi-nantly green uniforms with gold trim. The name was first applied to oneof the men’s teams in a road game atWinnipeg in 1931, before the home crowdtook a liking to the name and made it stickthroughout the 1932-33 school year. TheGateway newspaper used the nickname instories late in 1932 and it soon became theschool’s official athletic moniker.

n commemoration of the many outstanding players and coaches of the U of A men’s hockey

teams over the last 100 years and to recognizethe contributions of long-time Coach Clare Drake,the Faculty of Physical Education and Recreationhas produced two books. Bears on Ice byStephen Scriver details the trials and conquestsof the Bears dynasty; Clare Drake: The Coaches’Coach by Derek Drager is a biography of theinimitable coach that explains his far-reachingimpact on the game of hockey.

Proceeds from sales of aspecial edition set, leather-bound and packaged in ahand-crafted wooden case, willgo to support the Golden Bearshockey program or renovationof Clare Drake Arena, and purchasers will be rec-ognized with membership in the Founders Club.

For more information on the books, contactJocelyne Lambert by phone at 780-492-3893 ore-mail [email protected]


hen I asked Clare Drake —‘Coach,’ as I’ve known him for30 years — if he would work

with me on a memoir about hisremarkable career, his immediaterejoinder was: “Why would anybodywant to read a book about me?”

That was a telling question, not justfor what it reveals about Drake’shumility, but also for the way it speaksto the parochial nature of Canadianhockey and its fans. His remarkableaccomplishments during 28 years ascoach of the Golden Bears, his turn ashead coach of Canada’s 1980 OlympicTeam, his several seasons as an NHLassistant coach, and his seminal contri-bution to Hockey Canada’s NationalCoaching Certification Program — noneof this delivers the name recognitionof an NHL playing career or, perhaps,an NHL head-coaching resume thatincluded a Stanley Cup.

So, indeed,what madeClare Drake‘book-worthy?’I believed hislife’s work was a story worth telling, but I

knew I needed a definitive answer tothe question for myself. After checkingwith a few hockey people, I got theanswer from Ken Hitchcock, onetimecoach of the Dallas Stars, PhiladelphiaFlyers and now the Columbus BlueJackets, with a Stanley Cup (1999)and an Olympic gold medal (2002) tohis credit.

I phoned the Edmonton native whenhe was in Philadelphia and posed hima question and thesis all wrapped inone: Clare Drake, an unsung, yet pow-erful force in the development ofCanadian hockey and originator ofmany of the tactics and philosophiesused in today’s NHL?

There was a long pause at the otherend of the line before ‘Hitch’ launchedinto a grand discourse on the Drakelegacy. He acknowledged my role as aformer Golden Bear trainer and thefamiliarity with our topic it affordedme, but in the same breath he assert-ed, “You have no idea just how farClare’s reach has extended.” He listednumerous NHL coaches who creditDrake as the major source of theirknowledge and values. Finally Hitchsaid of Drake, “The man’s fingerprintsare all over the game.”

The answer to my question was sim-ple — Clare Drake was among the firstof a small group of original thinkers

who changed hockey. The old Coachwould argue differently, and did withme over a period of several years as Iworked on his biography. That’s becauseit goes against his genetic code to takecredit for anything. But as I interviewedex-Golden Bear and NHL players, for-mer and current CIS coaches, HockeyCanada officials, and veterans of theinternational game, recurring themesemerged: abiding respect, deep fond-ness and profound gratitude for Coach.

Drake’s innovative and analyticalbrain was only part of the formula; hisvalues also helped create a new move-ment in hockey and helped transformcoaching into a profession whereteachers, nurturers and leaders couldfind room to grow and succeed.

And the best part of it all? Along withchatting with a who’s who of coaching, Ireceived a one-on-one refresher course inthose essential human values that ClareDrake continues to live by. I spentcountless hours sitting at his kitchentable, talking with him and his wifeDolly, the lovely, wise woman whoplayed a huge role in his success. And Ilearned about a life of dedication, dedi-cation to bettering an entire sport, dedi-cation to bettering all the individualswhom this master touched along theway. What a privilege.

—Derek Drager, ’81 MA, ’75 BA

Clare Drake: Undercover Agent of Change

I

W

t was a most unusual set of circum-stances. In 1963 a group of U of Astudents organized an invitational

football game they called the GoldenBowl. On an unseasonably warmNovember 16 day at Edmonton’sClarke Stadium, the Golden Bearsdefeated the top-ranked Queen’sUniversity Golden Gaels to earn bragging rights as unofficial nationalchampions in university football.

None of it was supposed to happen.After all, there wasn’t an official nation-al championship held in football at theuniversity level — after two invitationalnational championships games in ’65and ’66, the College Bowl for the VanierCup would officially begin in 1967(the Golden Bears won that, too, butthat’s another story; see p. 15). Therewas no provision in the schedule foreast and west teams to get togetherexcept for a pre-season exhibitiongame, and no one expected the U of Ateam to defeat a dominant eastern col-lege team considered by some at thetime to be one of the best Canadianuniversity football teams ever.

But none of that stopped an enthu-siastic group of organizers led by then-

medical student RobertLampard, ’64 MD, ’66BSc, ’67 MSc, who tooka ‘why not?’ attitude and carried it all the waythrough to hosting agame that is consideredpivotal in the history of U of A athletics.

As Lampard explains,the whole event wasbased on unusual cir-cumstances. The eastern and westernconferences had a rule that a teamcould play only one game after theseason, and that was for playoffs. Butin 1963 there was a singular winner in the west and a singular winner inthe east, because both the U of A andQueen’s U defeated their closest rivalteam twice in the season. “We haddefeated UBC in Vancouver earlier inthe season,” Lampard explains, “andwe knew the possibility was comingup when we played UBC again inOctober. I told the coach, Gino Fracas, [’58 Dip(Ed), ’58 BEd, ’57Dip(Ed)], before the final game againstUBC that if the Bears won, the teamwould become the singular winner in

the west.” So Fracas told the players,“You gotta win this one,” and theywon 29-3.

After that game, Lampard called thecoach of the Queen’s team, FrankTindall, and asked if he’d be interestedin bringing his team to Edmonton afterthe season for an east-west game. “Tomy surprise he said yes,” Lampardsays. To prepare for the game, coachGino Fracas and assistant coach FrankMorris went to Toronto to watchQueen’s play in their final game of thatseason. Though Queen’s dominatedthat game, the coaches still came awaythinking the Bears could beat the GoldenGaels. “We were the underdogs, sure,”says Fracas, “but I felt, along with



A Golden OpportunityA perfect storm of possibilities — and the lack of a real winter

storm — helped put Golden Bears football on the map A perfect storm of possibilities — and the lack of a real winter

storm — helped put Golden Bears football on the map

(Above) TheGolden Bearscelebrate apivotal winwith fans.(Left) U of Areceiver KenNielsen catch-ing a pass.

II

Frank Morris, that we could beatQueen’s. We mapped out a game planon the way back to Edmonton.”

The plan included a lot of blitzing,man-to-man pass coverage on defenceand a short passing game that negatedthe Gaels’ pass rush and allowed theBears to control the ball for much ofthe game. “The kids worked hard allweek long, and they carried out theplan to a T,” says Fracas.

The Golden Gaels,heavy favourites beforegame time, penetratedthe Bears end onlytwice in the wholegame, and the finalscore was Alberta 25,Queen’s 7. “That’spretty good against ateam that had beenundefeated,” Fracassays. “I’m so proud ofthe effort of thatteam,” he says of theGolden Bears.“Without a doubt thatwas the best intercolle-giate football team everassembled up to thatpoint. Those players had great ability,tremendous desire, and lots of pride.”

Garry Smith, ’63 BPE, ’74 PhD,quarterback of the 1963 team, givescredit for the win to the coaches and theexcellent game plan they had devised.“All in all it was a satisfying win,”

Smith says, “that helped put westernuniversity football on the map.”

While the Queen’s University campusnewspaper had a decidedly shocked andsaddened tone — over its main story onthe game they ran a banner stating sim-ply “Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn”— the sports writers on that campusunderstood the significance. They titledtheir story “Golden Bears ProveWestern Football Has Come of Age.”

The November 19,1963, Gateway wasdevoted mostly to sto-ries of the game —write-ups about Smith,wide receiver KenNielsen, ’65 DDS, andwingback ClarenceKachman, ’64 BPE,’71 Dip(Ed), amongothers, which not onlyconveyed the excite-ment about the eventbut showed an appre-ciation of its impor-tance. An editorial inthe Gateway statedthat the game was sig-nificant “to Canada,

to Alberta, and to Edmonton” forthree main reasons — for proving thatthe west had arrived in intercollegiatesports competition, for proving that“Alberta is not the backwoods ofCanadian college sport,” and forjelling the campus spirit.

Even the Edmonton Journal, which previously had given little attention to university sports, ran astory on the game, and CHED radio’sWes Montgomery did the play-by-playas over 8,000 Alberta fans took in theaction, making it by far the largestsporting event in U of A history tothat point. “I was told it was ‘close toa financial success,’” Lampard says,“but what really mattered was the suc-cess on the field.”

That success announced the Univer -sity of Alberta’s arrival on the collegiatesports scene. But none of it would havehappened if the promotions committeehadn’t seized the day and the playersprevailed. As Lampard says, “a uniqueopportunity fell in our laps, we tookadvantage of it, and we had a group ofexperienced people to do the work.

“There was never anything like it.”—Shelagh Kubish, ’85 BA


Clarence Kachman receiving a pass. (Right) Gary Naylor with the trophy. “We had an awful timetrying to find a gold cup,” Lampard says. “We found it at a trophy place in east Edmonton, afterphoning around. It was the only gold one, so we had to take it.”

Delirious fans attacked the goal posts, which“did not go down without a fight,” the U of Ayearbook stated. “A number of these adven-turers wore battle scars to class on Monday.”

Even the weather was on

the side of the emerging

Alberta team. On Saturday

afternoon at game time the

temperature was 39°F.

By supper it had dropped

to 0°F and by Monday

it was –30°F. “We were

lucky beyond words,”

Lampard says.

Miroslava (Mirka) Pribylova,’03 BPEvolleyball, 1993–98“Those were the best years of my life,”Mirka Pribylova says about her yearsplaying volleyball at the U of A. Shewas named Pandas volleyball MVP in’94–95 and ’95–96 and was part of thePandas championship run. But it isn’tthe winning that she remembers somuch now. “I made friends for lifeplaying volleyball,” she says, “andthat’s what’s important. You play andit’s good and you win, but the winningis forgotten. Friends stay.”

Born in Brno, Czechoslovakia, Mirkacame to Edmonton in 1992. After ayear at Grant MacEwan College shecame to the U of A and played for fouryears with the Pandas. A dominant set-ter on the court, Mirka then practisedwith the Canadian national team —frustrated by the fact that she couldn’tplay any official games until she gother Canadian citizenship in 1999 — aswell as in a professional league inEurope for a few years.

But then “it was time to move on,”she says, and she retired from volley-ball in 2002. “I was getting old andwanted to get a career.”

That career is as a firefighter forthe city of Calgary. She says her job is“the best ever! I can’t imagine doinganything else,” and likes that itrequires her to stay fit and busy.

Ian Newhouse, ’80 BPE, ’83MSctrack and field, 1978–82Ian Newhouse didn’t specialize intrack and field until after his grade 11year at Strathcona Composite HighSchool, when he was invited to trainwith the Edmonton Olympic Club.

And then, hesays in under-statement,“things workedout well.”While runningfor the U of A,Newhouse setCanadian uni-versity recordsin the 400m hurdles and for indoordistances of 300m, 400m, 500m, and600m, and was named outstandingmale athlete at the U of A in 1982. Healso ran on Canada’s national teamand competed in the 400m hurdles intwo Olympic Games as well as worldchampionships and Pan Americangames, among many other meets.

After doing his PhD in kinesiology atUBC, he got a faculty position atLakehead University in Thunder Bay,Ontario. “It was a perfect opportunityfor me,” he says. “The job ad was forsomeone to teach sports medicine and

exercise physiol-ogy and perhapsdo some coach-ing.” Newhousedid all that andmore. He startedthe cross-countryand track andfield program atLakehead and

served as its head coach until 1999when he took on more administrativeduties. In 2001 he was named dean ofthe newly formed Faculty of ProfessionalSchools at Lakehead U. Already the fac-ulty has brought in a master’s of publichealth program and is dealing withrapid growth in enrollment and Ianappreciates being able to make a differ-ence by being involved in that level ofuniversity administration.

His competitive running days areover and the father of two now runs— and regularly plays squash, hockey,and golf — only to stay fit.



Where Are They Now?As varsity athletes they shone, but where has life after the U of A taken them?

We caught up with a few Bears and Pandas from years past.

Mickey Hajash, ’47 BSc(Eng)footballConsidering how well he played base-ball, football, hockey, basketball andcompeted in track and field, it’s hardto imagine him excelling even more insports. But Mickey Hajash insists thatwithout a nagging leg injury — the resultof a childhood farming accident — hecould have run faster and stronger. Asit was, Hajash focused on football(called rugby at the time) while study-ing mining engineering at the U of A,and he captained the UA football teamin 1946. He played one year, 1949, forthe CFL Calgary Stampeders, and theylost to Montreal in the Grey Cup.

With the help of Gwen McLaws,Mickey recently penned a book abouthis fascinating life — emigrating fromHungary, growing up on a farm nearBrooks, studying at the U of A, andworking as a geophysicist with theImperial Oil Esso/Exxon group, a jobthat took him around the world.

In 1945 Mickey was coached bynewly arrived Maury Van Vliet and hesays, “We had a good year.” They madeup for the shortage of able-bodied menfor football in the post-WWII era withgood coaching, hard work, and determi-nation and by going both ways, offenceand defence, for most of the game.

These days Mickey hits the golfcourse as much as he can and isinvolved in Rotary and the United Way. He is very sup-portive of the University andphilanthropy in general,providing many scholar-ships and bursaries forworthy high schoolgraduates.

Along with all the great memories from his U of A days, he has arenewed acquaintance withMaury Van Vliet, Jr., hisnext-door neighbour inVictoria — Mickey firstmet him when Maury Sr.brought the five-year-old tothose formative football prac-tices at the U of A.

Tracy David, ’82 BPE, ’88 BEdsoccer

Soccer has alwaysbeen a big part ofTracy’s life before,during, and afterher days at the U of A. Her fatherwas among theSudeten Germanswho fled Czecho -slovakia whenHitler invaded in1939. He and sev-

eral hundred others ended up in TomsLake, B.C., and in that community,Tracy says, “soccer was it. It was afarming community and we’d all playtogether all the time, different agestogether. I had success in soccer, Ithink, because I played with boys.”

When she came to the U of A tostudy physical education, Tracy wasattracted by the quality of the instruc-tion, not the soccer team — sincethere wasn’t one. “I never reallythought of playing at university,” shesays, “since I was set for soccerthrough playing with the AJAX SoccerClub.” But the idea of a Pandas soccerteam started gaining strength, and, asTracy says, “the U of A is a very pro-gressive university. When they puttheir mind to something, they do it.”

Tracy was part of the first Pandassoccer team in 1983, and continued

playing after she left university com-petition and at the same time start-

ed making her mark as acoach. She was head coachof the Pandas from 1985 to2001, an instructor atCanada’s NationalCoaching School forWomen from 1990–94, and

coached Alberta’s under-16and under-17 girls teams. Atthe same time, at the U of Ashe coordinated the women’sintramural program and theSports Club program and

taught in the BPE program. Now head coach of the

University of Victoria Vikes,Tracy has great memories of

being at the U of A, and she says theUniversity’s winning attitude and pur-suit of excellence will always make Uof A sports successful. “They have adrive to succeed. It’s tough to coachagainst... believe me!”

Joe Poplawski, ’78 BScfootball

Edmonton boyJoe Poplawskiwas an excep-tional highschool athlete —competing infootball, trackand field, soccer,basketball, and

hockey. His athletic talents drew theattention of scouts from several U.S.universities and he was offered, butdeclined, scholarships to play football,hockey, and soccer. He was deter-mined to attend the U of A and playfor the Golden Bears football teamwhere he won the starting positions onthe team as a wide receiver and place-kicker in his first season.

At the end of the 1977 season, hewas named a CIAU All-Star receiverand was selected to play for theCanadian University football sideagainst a select team of U.S. All-Starsin the first Can-Am Bowl.

After university it was on to profes-sional football where Joe was a starplayer with the Winnipeg Blue Bombersfrom the moment he took to the fieldin 1978 until his retirement in 1986. Inhis first season he won the Jackie Parkertrophy as the Outstanding Rookie inthe West, the Schenley OutstandingRookie award, and was named an All-Western wide receiver. And in 1984 hehelped carry the Blue Bombers to aGrey Cup victory.

Following his football career Joeplunged full-time into the insurancebusiness with his Winnipeg company,Ranger Insurance. He also worked asa colour commentator on Blue Bomberbroadcasts on radio station CJOB. Hecontinues to contribute as a volunteer tohis community, winning the prestigiousPremier’s Service Award in 1991.


Tracy Layton, ’72 BSc(Eng)volleyball, 1966–67 and 1970–72Fresh out of a small Bonnyville-areahigh school, where he had played onevery school sports team, Tracy Laytonplanned to become a high school phys-ical education teacher. In a requisitefirst-year volleyball class he showedenough potential to become a memberof the Bears intercollegiate volleyballteam in 1965.

He played for two years whilestudying in the Faculty of PhysicalEducation and Recreation, but in thefall of 1967 he decided that a careerchange was needed and enrolled in acommercial flight training course atthe Edmonton Flying Club.

A year later he returned to the U of Aand entered the Faculty of Engineering.He played on the Bears intercollegiatevolleyball team for three more years.

After graduating in 1972, Tracyworked as a corporate pilot for an oil-field contractor in northeastern Alberta,flying fixed wing aircraft and helicop-ters. In 1975, he and his brother incor-porated Layton Bros. Construction Co.Ltd., which is a heavy civil constructionfirm. Heavy oil construction opportuni-ties necessitated moving to Bonnyvillein 1979.

Layton Bros. now constructs multi-well drilling pads, roads, landfills andheavy oil plant sites for a number ofoil companies in northeastern Alberta.With a core group of approximately100 key personnel, Tracy is graduallybecoming less involved in the day-to-day operation of a successful construc-tion company.

Debra Covey-Barnett, ’83 BPE,’89 MAvolleyball and field hockeyCovey was named U of A’s FemaleAthlete of the Year in 1981-82 for hertalents as a volleyball and field hockeyplayer, but it was in field hockey thatshe really excelled. “Field hockey wasa natural sport for me,” Covey says.“I had played a lot of ice hockeygrowing up in Jasper. I was also strongand could change direction quickly. Soit was a good fit.”

In 1984, her first year of trying out,Covey made Canada’s under-21 fieldhockey team. She was also on the back-up squad for the Olympic team in 1988before taking to the field in Barcelona in1992 for the Canadian Olympic team,an experience she describes as “amaz-ing.” Her last tournament before turningher field hockey knowledge into a jobwas the 1994 World Cup in Dublin.

After two degrees from the U of A,Debra worked for eight years with theAlberta Field Hockey Association andcoached at the U of Calgary. While at U of C she received the 3M Coach ofthe Year Award in 1996 and was namedCIAU Coach of the Year for ’97–98.

From Calgary Debra and her hus-band, Andy Barnett, moved to Florida,where he worked with an internation-al performance institute, and then afew years ago they settled in NewJersey, close to Andy’s work as strengthand conditioning coach with the NewYork Giants football team. They andtheir two sons, now eight and five —enjoy the atmosphere of the GardenState. “There are rolling hills, farms,gardens,” says Debra. “They aren’t themountains of Jasper National Park,but it’s been really nice.”

She might get involved in coachingfield hockey in her community as herboys get older, but whether she coach-es in field hockey or not, she says shetook a lot of life lessons from her daysas a Panda. “Through sports, youlearn about relationships with others.You know what you are like when youare tired, frustrated, and how youreact, how to get along with others instressful situations. You also learn alot about yourself and about whatyou’re capable of.”


Alb

erta

Spo

rts

Hal

l of

Fam

e

Shandra Doran, ’97 BSc, ’05 PhDvolleyball, 1993–98A right-side hitter during her volleyballdays at the U of A, Shandra Doranholds the 1995 CIAU Championshipas her fondest memory. “It was held atthe U of A,” she says, “so we were ableto win the first ever national champi-onship for U of A women’s volleyballright in our own gym. For me person-ally it was an amazing experience.”

It was even more special forShandra because she had been reallyclose to not even trying out for thePandas volleyball team and hadn’texpected to excel. Making the team,being named a starter, winning thenationals — it all taught her a lotabout herself “in terms of perform-ance under pressure and relishing thattype of stressful atmosphere.”

She took that ability to performunder pressure and played volleyballfor several more years, including stintson Canada’s national team and a sea-son of professional play in Japan. Shealso continued a stellar academiccareer, finishing a PhD in biologicalsciences at the U of A before startingmedical studies at the U of Calgary.The connection between the hardwork on the court and in the class-room is undeniable. “Absolutely vol-leyball helped me on the academicside,” she says. “The discipline, theability to work as part of a team, thetime management, and a general all-round confidence about how to carryyourself all help.”

Shandra has one more year of classesin medicine before starting residency inJuly 2008.

Darwin Semotiuk, ’63 BPE, ’65 MAbasketball and footballA five-year standout for the footballand basketball teams at the U of A —he captained both teams — DarwinSemotiuk was named male athlete ofthe year at the U of A in 1967 andplayed for Canada’s national basket-ball team in 1965-66. Since that timehe’s made his name in academics andcoaching, particularly at the Universityof Western Ontario.

He arrived at Western in 1971 aftercompleting his PhD at Ohio StateUniversity in 1970. Along with teachingundergraduate and graduate coursesand conducting research (he becamefull professor in 1987), he coachedfootball, starting as assistant coachbefore becoming head coach in 1975.With Darwin on the coaching staff,the Mustangs won four Vanier Cuptitles. In 1982 he left coaching behindto become the first chair of intercolle-giate athletics at Western. He retiredfrom that position in 2002 and hascontinued as a tenured faculty mem-

ber in Western’s Faculty of HealthSciences. His research has focused ongovernment sport policy and how dif-ferent national sports systems areaddressing the issue of resource alloca-tion for high performance sport andhow to win more medals.

In addition to being recognized forathletic excellence, Darwin hasreceived numerous awards for his aca-demic work and for his contributionto advancing inter-university sport.

Adrianne VanderZalm, ’05 BSc(Kin)hockey, 2000–05

In her first yearmajoring in kine-siology at the U of A, Adi decid-ed to try out forthe Pandas hockeyteam as a walk-on.She made the teamthat year and

played with the Pandas for the next fiveyears, which she calls “the most chal-lenging and fulfilling years of my life.”

She learned a lot about herself bybeing a student-athlete — about push-ing the limits and accomplishing morethan she thought she could do. “I hadnever experienced something asdemanding before,” she says. “Ilearned the value of hard work anddiscipline. Our head coach, HowieDraper, has instilled values of workethic, determination, family, and thepursuit of excellence in every one ofhis players. These values, I believe, arethe reason for the great success of thePandas Hockey program.”

Recognizing what being a Pandameant for her, Adi does what she canto give back — as a member of thePandas Hockey Alumni Society, shevolunteers at events organized by fellowalumni in support of the current team.

Now living in Salzburg, Austria, Adiis playing with the Salzburg RavensWomen’s Hockey Club, playing compet-itive hockey while travelling Europe “andhopefully learning a little German.”

—Shelagh Kubish, ’85 BA


It was a cold and stormy day, andTim McKort, ’92 BA, was thinkingabout what it means to be Canadian.

Sitting in a warm Edmonton restaurant,he found his answer in the outdoorscene of people scurrying by, bundledup against the wind and swirling snow.“Look at this,” he said, “we’re out ina blizzard and we aren’t scared. Weexist in a cold-weather climate. We arehardy. We persevere.” The icy roadswe drive on are “like a rink. We’redriving on a hockey rink, right?”

Talk to him for a bit and you realizethe reference to hockey is not unusual.A lifelong fan of the game and still asometime player, Edmonton-bornMcKort sees many connectionsbetween hockey and life in Canada.Both are fast, sometimes rough, enter-taining, complex, full of surprises, andrequire teamwork. He is interested inthe way players in both arenas behave,so Canada’s game was a perfect back-drop for his first feature-length film,which wrapped up shooting in differ-ent Alberta locations in late 2006.

Sure Shot Dombrowski — produced,written, and directed by McKort — is acomedy about hockey, friendship, life.The cast of characters includes SureShot; his best friend, Moose Forget;Joanne Avery (who married both SureShot and Moose — at different times);and numerous hockey players. Theaction unfolds in a series of flashbacksas a busload of fans travel to Mundare,Alberta, to attend Sure Shot’s funeral.Through the movie it becomes clearerthat there were two Sure Shots — onepublic, the other private — and thatthe rough, tough hockey player is notall there was to the man.

It’s a dichotomy McKort under-stands. He started playing hockey atage five and by high school, he says,“I was the guy who had all these jockbuddies but I liked Shakespeare too. I

was always into sports but I loved lit-erature. It was a weird mix.”

With his Shakespeare-influencedanalytical eye and a degree in creativewriting, McKort set about makingfilms that showcase quirky charactersand reflect on people and their moti-

vations. The four films he’s madethrough his production companiesWestern Directives Inc. and A LittleLate Films have progressed in lengthfrom 20 minutes to 30 minutes to onehour and now to feature length, butthey all, he states in a press release,“take a satirical look at humanismwithin urban boundaries and theextraordinary stories that flow fromthe streams of human interaction.”

Through the films, he has also pro-gressed as a writer. “It all ties back tothe U of A, where I took creative writ-ing,” he says. That’s where he learnedto tell the extraordinary stories of ordi-nary people. Professor emeritus RudyWiebe, ’56 BA, ’60 MA, set McKorton this path with some direct advice.

“When I finished my four years, Iasked Wiebe, ‘Do you think I’ll everwrite the great Canadian novel?’ andhe said, ‘No way! You don’t have ahope in hell, but you should write forTV and film. You have a way withdialogue, you write solid visualimagery, so try that.’ It was goodadvice I thought.”

He wrote the script for Sure ShotDombrowski about five years ago,then spent 18 months planning it andshooting it. During that time heshelved his day job producing videoprojects for businesses. “I didn’t workon anything else,” he says, “just didsome small writing gigs and devotedmyself to putting the movie together.”

With its flashback approach, SureShot Dombrowski was not an easyscript to shoot. The characters have toage, and the settings have to be true tothe times. McKort worked to get itright. Some games are set in Russia,and McKort looked at a lot of arenasto find one like those in Russia, with alarge space between the ice and thestands. The arena at NAIT was theonly one in Edmonton like that, sothose games were shot there.

He took the same amount of carecasting people who could play hockey.Moose Forget is played by ShaneBodgen, a one-time Edmonton Oilersdraft pick, and all the actors playinghockey got on-ice advice from coachesof a junior hockey team.

As much as he was concernedabout getting the technical and artisticdetails right, he also made sure thefinancial end of the project was sound.

“Film-making should be by andlarge a business,” he says, “and if youdon’t approach it that way you’re nevergoing to make money, you’ll never getrespect, and you’ll never reach that nextplateau. By raising more money, youcan hire better actors, better crew, and


The Winter’s TaleA grad’s love of the Bard leads to a film shot between the boards

Tim McKort: “Film-making should be by andlarge a business.”

get better equipment — all these thingsare crucial in the technical aspects ofcreating art.”

McKort hustled to raise the neces-sary cash, using all kinds of innovativeapproaches. After meeting with themayors of Mundare and Leduc, he gotsponsors from the local businesses,and he sold advertising for the rinkboards shown during the movie. “Youhave to be a bit of a negotiator, getlots of stuff for free. Our budget willbe around $200,000, which doesn’tsound like a lot of money, but try toraise $200,000 from nothing, not evena bank involved.”

With such determination, McKortsays he’s taking his project to theEdmonton Film Festival and beyond.“Nobody’s gonna make it easy,” hesays, “but I won’t take no for ananswer. I’ll get a distribution deal. It’sjust a matter of knocking on doors,pushing the project ahead.”

The lessons helearned playingsports have helpedin the businessarena, too. Hockey,he says, teachesyou to be a part ofsomething, to workon a team. “Even ifyou are in it forfun and recreation,you’re still part ofthat,” he says.“You have to make three passes tomake a goal. It’s still that feeling ofsatisfaction, being able to pass thepuck to your buddy who dekes thegoalie and you feel good about con-tributing to that success. It is verymuch a team effort, and the people whoare most successful are those who aregoing to be able to dominate in thatenvironment. It is like business.”

— Shelagh Kubish, ’85 BA

� Sure Shot Dombrowski will have itsworld premiere on Sunday, September30, 2007, at 9:00 p.m., at the MetroCinema theatre located inside TheCitadel Theatre, in Edmonton.

The premiere is par t of EdmontonInternational Film Festival 2007. Fortickets and more information, visitwww.edmontonfilmfest.com

Screenings are being planned forLeduc and Mundare, Alberta, with datesand times to be finalized.


Above, Tim McKort gives direction to Kelly Taylor, playing Sure ShotDombrowski, at Rexall Place, and at right, shares a laugh with actorsTracie Gray (Joanne Avery), Shane Bodgen (Moose Forget), and Kelly Taylor.

In the mid-’70s, a group of Calgarians enrolled atthe U of A and took up residence in a house inEdmonton’s Garneau district. Although interested

in pursuing careers in a broad spectrum of disci-plines from commerce, engineering and arts to law,science and medicine, they had one key thing incommon besides their hometown — they loved playing sports. And they were very good.

Commerce student Don Cranston, ’79BCom, ’81 MBA, grew up playingracquet sports. KevinHamm, ’79 BSc, ’83

Commerce student Jamie McVicar, ’80BCom, played many sports well, and KipCarver, ’81 BPE, ’86 BCom, was once anationally ranked tennis player.

Various fraternity and faculty organizationsencouraged the Calgarians to join their intra-mural teams. And some of them did. But then

the group, most of whom were classmates ateither Henry Wisewood High School or Western

Canada High School, decided to formtheir own intramural teams. About 15people were involved initially as theone-time high school rivals becameteammates. It was a decision thatwould enrich their university experi-ence and lead to lifelong friendships.

The organizational aspects wereformidable. “We spent a lot of timeon the phone, organizing teams, del-egating responsibilities and makingsure we could field a team in each

sport,” explains Cranston, whocredits the University for offer-ing one of the country’s topintramural programs. The

organizational work paidoff. The team, called theDirtshooters — a refer-ence to Calgary’s cow-boy roots — spent its

first year in the B confer-ence of the intramural pro-

gram, accumulating 2,068points to take first spot and earn

itself a place in the A conferencethe following year.

DirtshootersA quarter century ago a group of Calgarians dominated the U of A’s intramural sports scene. Today, many are the movers

and shakers in Canada’s energy capital

Dirtshooters alumnus DonaldCranston with some of the

memorabilia he accumu-lated from his intra-

mural experiencesduring the late

1970s.


DDS, was an awesomewater polo player.

Engineering student BobLehodey, ’79BSc(Eng), was an alpine ski racer.


In 1979, the team to beat was theFaculty of Law. It had won the A conference the same year the upstartDirtshooters had won the B conference,and now the battle lines had beendrawn. Points were awarded for bothachievement as well as participationand the Dirtshooters finished that yearatop the standings with 3,154 pointsto Law’s 3,053.

The intramural program had a sig-nificant participation component, andthat was its real strength, says McVicar,who attended two other universities,both unable to replicate the U of A’sintramural strengths. Furthermore,members of the group say the directorof campus recreation back then, HughHoyles, ’66 BPE, did an exceptionaljob of organizing the program andencouraging participation.

“We worked toward a goal and itwas fun to see what you could accom-plish,” McVicar says. “For me the biggest joy in sport hasalways been the learning curve.” And there were somepretty steep learning curves in sports such as snooker,archery, three-on-three basketball, curling, field hockey,and table tennis.

Nevertheless, someone with the necessary skills alwaysstepped up to the plate, explains Lehodey, and becausethere were so many naturally talented athletes within thegroup — which grew in numbers to also include a smatteringof Edmontonians — they caught on to the basics quickly.(The actual number of men and women Dirtshooter mem-bers varied, but one membership list included as many as130 people at the peak of the A conference run.)

It was much more than simply learning how to play 30or so different sports. “It was a great opportunity to social-ize and have a ton of fun while attending university,” saysLehodey, who, along with Cranston and McVicar, still hasa lot of the memorabilia from that era — photos, plaques,trophies, membership lists, and Gateway articles chroni-cling the Dirtshooters’ exploits.

Members of the Dirtshooters loved sport for all the rightreasons: it was fun, it kept participants active, and it wastremendously social — the group was also organizedenough to hold formals at the Royal Glenora Club.“These experiences made university fun,” says McVicar.Even after the original members graduated, the group con-tinued to participate in intramural sports under the leader-ship of some of the original members’ younger siblings.

Current campus recreation director Leah Hall Dorothysays there’s no doubt the fun and social opportunities thatintramural sport creates are very important to the overalluniversity experience. When alumni are asked to reflect on

what made their experiences at univer-sity great, they often cite their partici-pation in sport, she explains. That’sbacked up with research published in 2004 by the National Intramural-Recreational Sports Association.NIRSA researchers concluded that“One of the most consistent findingsin recreational research is that stu-dent satisfaction is highly correlatedwith extracurricular involvement,specifically in intramural and recre-ational sports.” And Hall Dorothyadds, “Intramural sports also providestudents with other learning experi-ences outside the classrooms — onesthat they eventually transfer to thework world.”

Today, an extraordinary number of Dirtshooters alumni — many stillactive in sport and most back livingin Calgary — have gone on to becomesuccessful in their professional careers.

Cranston accepted an invitation from his uncle inMedicine Hat to learn the family business, and today he’spresident of Nutter’s, a chain of 29 natural food storesacross Western Canada. Lehodey is a lawyer with Osler,Hoskin & Harcourt LLP in Calgary. McVicar is the chieffinancial officer for Devonian Properties Inc. Jeff Tonken,’78 BCom, is president and CEO of Birchcliff Energy Ltd.Bill McCaffrey, ’78 BSc, ’82 BSc(Eng), is president and CEOof MEG Energy Corp., an emerging oil sands companywith a major stake in developing the Athabasca tar sands.Jeffrey Kohn, ’79 BA, was chief executive officer of TGSNorth American Real Estate Investment Trust and is nowan independent real estate developer. Graham Bennett, ’81LLB, is general counsel and corporate secretary with TheMancal Group in Calgary. Matt Woofter, ’80 BSc, after asuccessful geology career with a number of companies, isstriking out on his own. Kevin Hamm is a dentist. JimThorne, ’78 BSc, ’82 MD, has been involved in sportsmedicine for many years and has been the team doctor forTeam Canada at five World Hockey Championships,including both the men’s senior and junior gold medalteams in 1997.

Many of the Dirtshooters also still move within the samesocial and community circles within the city, so they seeone another frequently. And later this year they’ll have thechance to swap a few Dirtshooters stories when they gettogether to celebrate the group’s 25th anniversary. McVicarsays that gathering will likely be held at a bar.

Concludes Tonken: “We had a ball. We drank, we partied,we played some sports and we got an education. We met alot of new friends, and then we came back to Calgary.”

—Michael Robb, ’89 BA

Members of the

Dirtshooters loved

sport for all the right

reasons: it was fun, it

kept participants

active, and it was

tremendously social.

Kevin Tyler has a unique perspec-tive on Canada’s place in the track

and field world. “There needs to be a cultural shift

here,” says the director of the CanadianAthletics Coaching Centre at the U of A(the CACC is a legacy of the 2001World Championships in Athletics heldin Edmonton). “What’s happened in theU.S. is they have a very strong highschool and collegiate sports program.High school coaches are paid, and a bigchunk of their responsibility is trackingathletes throughout the year. But theyhave 10 times the population of us so itdoesn’t matter how good their sportsprograms are because out of that wholevast American system you’re going toget some Olympic-calibre athletes whofall out of the crowd. We don’t havethat population base so we can’t rely onthat system.

“We have to be more effective withwhat we do with the athletes,” he con-tinues. “It’s a big jump to go from top16 in the world to top three. You canget them to top 16 with sweat andsome good hard work, but you haveto define what you want and you haveto adapt your program to bring themfurther along. What works for the ath-lete who’s ranked 35th in the worlddoesn’t necessarily work for the ath-lete who’s fourth in the world.”

What works for Tyler is not onlytraining athletes, but also trainingcoaches so they can offer a better cali-bre of direction and leadership for theathletes under their care. Applying ashared knowledge of training tech-niques and styles can improve thequality of coaching across the countryand result in both beginner and eliteathletes getting better advice on howto improve their results. That’s why

Tyler has made sure the CACC has avery dynamic coaching education pro-gram (a fundamental reason the centrewas started and why it was based at auniversity), including conferences,publications, and online advice. “Wehave the best coaching educationresources for track and field coachesin the world right now,” he says.

The CACC has a vast mandate —encouraging participation and excel-lence in athletics through mentoring,training, education, competition andresearch for coaches and athletes at all levels of sport. That mandate hasdrawn many of the elite Canadiantrack and field athletes to train withTyler and the other coaches and train-ers at the CACC.

That list of world-class athletesincludes Tyler Christopher, Carline Muir,Adam Kunkel, Nicolas Macrozonaris,Keston Nelson, and Brian Barnett,among others, who are bringing a lotof attention to Edmonton, attentionthat Tyler anticipates will ramp up toa frenzy as the 2008 Olympics drawcloser because some of these athleteshave an excellent chance of bringinghome some hardware from Beijing. “Istarted coaching Tyler [Christopher]after hours in 2004,” Tyler says. “Insix months he was ranked second inthe world and won a medal at theworld championships. Now we have10 or 12 top athletes here.”

How elite are these athletes? They’retops in Canada and winning medals at


The two Tylers — coach Kevin Tyler and runner Tyler Christopher — in Helsinki with Christopher’sworld championship bronze medal.

Personal BestKevin Tyler is setting the gold standard

at the Canadian Athletics Coaching Centre


international meets. Tyler Christopherwon a bronze at the World Champion -ships in 2005. Adam Kunkel won agold medal and set a new Cana dianrecord in the 400m hurdles at the PanAmerican Games in Brazil in late July.Brian Barnett was on the men’s 4 x100m relay team that won silver, fin-ishing second to the U.S. team, at thePan Am games. Carline Muir, 19 yearsold, runs both 400m and 200m. “She’sthe best in the country,” Tyler says.“She’s got a long career ahead of herand she’s only going to get better.”

Luring Muir to Edmonton was some-thing of a coup for the two Tylers. Aftermeeting her at a meet in Pennsylvania,Tyler invited her to come to a trainingcamp in Edmonton. “I liked it a lot,”says Muir. “Tyler and Kevin showed mearound, and I talked to other coachesabout what it would mean to trainwith Kevin Tyler.” Muir, who has hersights firmly set on Beijing 2008, eventurned down a full scholarship at TexasA & M to train at the U of A.

That offer to Muir from Texas A & M is part of the culture Tyler isfighting against and the reason he’s soproactive about the coaching culture in

Canada — the belief that it’s to beexpected that our best athletes go toAmerican universities for training.They still run internationally inCanadian clothes and proudly drape

themselves in the Canadian flag atinternational meets, but it’s the coachesin the U.S. who are training them. Andthat leaves a hole north of the border,where the Canadian coaches aren’tlearning along with their charges whatit takes to win.

“Doesn’t it make sense to have astrong program in Canada?” says Tyler.“One: it motivates and inspires otherathletes. And two: it gives Canadiancoaches the experience of workingwith top athletes as they move throughthe ranks. It’s a very different experi-ence working with athletes at a worldchampionship final as compared to aCanadian nationals final. It’s a wholeother level. But you lose those experi-ences if you lose those athletes.

“I’d like to see six athletes based herego to the Olympics in 2008,” continuesTyler. It’s doable. He currently coachesfive elite athletes out of the 10 to 12 atthe Centre who have the potential towin at the international level. All five ofTyler’s athletes are carded (Sport Canada


Sign of things to come? Tyler Christopher medalled at the 2005 world championships shortly after he came to train at the U of A. The CACC hopesto mentor more Canadian coaches to develop high-performance athletes in this country.

“I’m here to win.

We’re trying to breed

a winning culture

around here.”

provides funding through the AthleticAssistance Program — or ‘carding’ pro-gram — to athletes who either are orhave the potential to be one of the top16 in the world in their sport.)

Having elite athletes on campus asthey prepare for international competi-tion is pretty exciting, but it’s only partof what Tyler oversees at the CoachingCentre. On the other end is the com-munity education, which aims to pre-pare Canadian youth for a lifetime ofactive living. “There isn’t a single thingwe could do that would be a betterlegacy than to encourage kids in thecommunity to be active,” Tyler says.One of the main programs the Centredelivers for elementary-aged students iscalled Run, Jump, Throw. And in Junethe Centre, in cooperation with CapitalHealth and the City of Edmonton, heldthe inaugural Little, Big Run.

That event saw 3,000 kids fromgrades three through nine take part inrun, jump and throw exercises as wellas a 1K run. The rest of the Edmontoncommunity turned out in big numbersto participate in 5K and 10K runs.

Although he clearly loved helping toorganize and participating in the Little,Big Run, he’s quick to point out that atthe elite level, it’s not community-basedsport any more. It’s a business with anend goal of winning medals.

“If you’re going to be in the busi-ness,” he says, “I just don’t understand,why you would do it any other way? Icould never be satisfied just going to aworld championships and workingwith a team and saying ‘this is fantas-tic, I’m on the Olympic team,’ lookaround, and then go sightseeing after-wards. I don’t get any satisfaction fromthat. I’m here to win. We’re trying tobreed a winning culture around here.”

Winning came early to the highachiever who won all three runningevents he competed in as a fourth graderin regional competition — the first yearhe was eligible to compete. But when hemoved on to the district final, “I got mybutt kicked,” he says. So he and his dadshopped around for a running club thatfit him, and in grade five he won theprovincial finals in the 100m.

“I remember wewent out for dinnerafter the race at Mr.Mike’s Steak House. Ihad my medal and Iwas hooked. Youwere the fastest thereis in the wholeprovince at that ageand there’s some-where to go with this.Next year I broke theprovincial record.”

He kept on withrunning, becoming amember of thenational team andtwice finishing fifthat the nationals. At23, it was borderlinewhether he couldmake the nationalrelay team for the’88 Olympics, so hetried out for the bob-sled team — andcaught himself a ridein the Canadian sled.After that, schoolwas a priority.

“I was actuallyworking on a PhD incriminology,” he says.“That was 10 yearsago. I really liked working with youthand was involved in young offenderlegislation as well as working in somecommunity-based programs withyouth at risk who were coming rightfrom secure custody into the commu-nity. You learn really quickly with thatgroup that if you’re reactive, then youare in for a whole mess of trouble.They cannot handle that kind ofbehaviour. They need someone who iscalm. I wasn’t the best at it, but overtime I started to learn what worked.”

That patience and calmness hasworked for him as a coach who’s trust-ed by the elite athletes under his tute-lage.“A lot of it is attitudinal and aneagerness to teach,” Tyler says about hiscoaching style. “That’s what has workedfor me. I’m quite laid back with the ath-letes. If you are patient and understand

what you know and you apply it prop-erly, you can be very successful.”

As for the future, Tyler says heknows where the program at theCACC is going for the next year, andbeyond that he has some definite ideasabout where he’d like the state ofcoaching and training Canadian ath-letes to be at three years from now.

“I’d like to see activities similar towhat we have here in different citiesacross the country. Right now theUniversity of Toronto has launched avery aggressive plan for their sportsprogram — new track, new stadium,paying some good salaries to trackcoaches they’re trying to attract. It’sgoing to get a little more competitive.People,” he concludes, “are getting aglimpse at what’s possible.”

— Shelagh Kubish, ’85 BA


Canadian record holder in the 400m hurdles, Adam Kunkel has hishopes set on international medals.

II

travel


Capital of Peace

Geneva — Coreen Croskery,’03 BA, shows us there’s

nothing conventional aboutthis city by the lake

still look at the Genevan city scapewith the same appreciation I hadwhen I first saw it. I arrived herefrom Edmonton three years ago

to work in an education program forchildren and recently decided to settlehere permanently with my new hus-band. What I love most about Genevais that it offers the best of both worlds— a cosmopolitan city with all thetranquility of nature tucked into oneunique package. Right now, forinstance, from my downtown apart-ment I have a view of shimmeringLake Geneva in the foreground withthe Jura mountains in the background.

Foreign residents make up over 40percent of Geneva’s population, makingit one of the most diverse internationalcommunities in the world. Located ina country that would fit into Albertaabout 16 times, Geneva is also a cityof international headquarters—includ-ing the World Trade Organization and

the European headquarters of theUnited Nations—as well as the homeoffice for numerous international busi-nesses. It is also, of course, famous forits international banking industry andthus not known for its flamboyance.

But as the summer approaches, thefairly conservative city of Geneva seemsto tilt its head back and exhale a hugesigh of relief. The flowers bloom andthe promenade around the lake fillswith people as the city comes to lifeand basks in the hours of warm, goldenlight and soft, gentle breezes. This isthe best time to enjoy all the charmsGeneva has to offer, some of which youmust see if you ever visit Switzerland’s‘capital of peace’ (but not its actualcapital, that distinction belongs to Bern).And don’t worry about the ‘French-ness’of it all if you don’t speak that languageas it’s relatively easy to get by withEnglish in Geneva.

Park It HereLake Geneva and the city’s impressive140-metre-high water fountain, la jetd’eau, are the trademarks of the city.The Rhone River feeds directly into thelake and both the lake and the river runcentrally through Geneva dividing it,like Paris, into left bank (rive gauche)and right bank (rive droit). There arealways people strolling, jogging and eat-ing their lunches waterside. As springarrives, the outdoor terraces open upand the vendors appear. On the leftbank there’s even an open-air cinema,giving it an especially lively nighttimeatmosphere. But you can still alwaysfind a quiet place on the rocks along theshoreline of Quai de Cologny to spendthe day taking in the sun and waves.

On hot days you can dive right intothe water from the rocks, or make yourway to one of the lakeside beaches. TheBains des Paquis are most popular for

their saunas, Geneve Plage for itswater-skiing, and Baby Plage for itskid’s park. If you’re feeling a littlemore adventurous, assorted boats areavailable to rent. And, if you’re not upto taking the wheel (or the oars) your-self, there are dozens of cruises avail-able for short and long excursions.

Most people can walk the entireshoreline from one bank to the other inabout an hour. But I recommend youtake your time and enjoy it since thebest part is the picturesque parks. Theirimpressive size and beauty make thestunning parks in Geneva an inspira-tional and rejuvenating presence. Forinstance, the Jardin Anglais and Perledu Lac are both lush green spacesalways adorned with immaculatelycultivated flowers—you must see thegiant flower clock in the EnglishGardens where, during August’s Fetesde Geneve, the park is a nightly partyfilled with live music, dancing andinternational cuisine.

Visit Parc la Grange, just across thestreet from the left bank’s Quai GustaveAdor, to see its rose gardens with over200 varieties of roses. Parc des Eaux-Vives, another enormous green spaceand a former private residence, backsonto Parc la Grange making it possibleto spend hours walking the trails andenjoying the tranquility of the space. It hosts Musiques en Été, which putson well-attended and free nightly open-air jazz concerts.

Another park not to be missed isParc des Bastions. Also a former privateresidence, this park includes some uni-versity buildings, a town hall—whosecourtyard hosts the Musiques en Étéopen-air classical music concerts—andthe historic Reformation Wall, whichcommemorates Geneva’s central rolein the 16th-century Reformation, oneof whose leading figures, John Calvin,is the spiritual father of the city. At theentrance to this over-100-metre-longwall you’ll find chess and checkergames being played with giant piecesat all times of the day and evening. Youcan join in the play or just watch fromthe park’s restaurant.

While you’re promenading aroundthe lake you’ll see the Swiss Juramountains and the French Alps on thehorizon. Both these destinations areeasily accessible. From city centre toFrance’s Mont Saleve, for example,takes only about 30 minutes. You cantake the bus to the edge of town and

from there walk another 10 minutesto cross the French border and, voilà,you are at the mountain. It’s possibleto drive or hike to the top, but I pre-fer to enjoy the scenic cable car rideup to the mountaintop restaurantwhere you’ll have a panoramic viewof Geneva.


The UN European headquarters (top) with the giant Broken Chair, installed in 1997 to commemoratethe international conference in Ottawa banning land mines, and a view from the Jardin Anglais.

Boat cruises (tickets anddepartures): Quai JardinAnglais, Quai Mont Blancor Quai Paquis; BoatRentals: Les Corsaires,33 Quai Gustave Andor

Mont Saleve, Bus #34direction Veyrier, SaleveCable Car: 74100Etrembieres, France

Bains des Paquis: Quaidu Mont Blanc 30

Geneve Plage: Quai deCologny, Port Noir

Baby Plage: Port desEaux-Vives

Jardin Anglais and flowerclock (Horloge Fleurie):Quai Général-Guisan

La Perle du Lac: Rue deLausanne

Parc la Grange: QuaiGustave Ador

Parc des Eaux-Vives: 82Quai Gustave Ador

Parc des Bastions:Place Neuve

Victoria Hall: RueGénéral-Dufour 14

Le Chat Noir: RueVautier 13, Carouge

International Red CrossMuseum: Avenue de laPaix 17

Museum of Modern Art:Rue des Vieux-Grenadiers 10

Art and History Museum:Rue Charles-Galland 2

Plainpalais market:Wednesdays andSaturdays, Plaine dePlainpalais

La Clémance: Place duBourg-de-Four 20

Auer: Rue de Rive 4

Au Carnivore: Place duBourg-de-Four 30

Demi Lune Café: 3 RueEtienne Dumont

Flanagans: 4 Rue duCheval-Blanc

Librairie Ancienne: 20Grand Rue

Molino’s: Place duMolard 7

Celine and Sebastion’s:Rue des Eaux-Vives 5

Finding your way around

Meals and MartsFrom Place Neuve or Parc des Bastionsyou can easily wind your way up to thecity’s Old Town. Its 16th-to-18th-centu-ry architecture provides a unique ambi-ence and plenty of sites to see and visit.It’s always nice to be in Old Town atnoon to hear the pealing bells of thecathedral located just behind PlaceBourg-de-Four, which is one of the mostpopular meeting spots in the city andwhere the terrace of café La Clémanceis always brimming with people.

Surrounding Place Bourg-de-Fourare some great restaurants and pubs.Not to be missed is Au Carnivore forits delectable French cuisine. Or, for alivelier atmosphere, Demi Lune offersboth international cuisine and a chicpub atmosphere. There are also a hand-ful of traditional British pubs in thecity, including the nearby Flannagans,that cater specifically to that expatcommunity.

Old Town also offers an array ofboutiques, galleries and one-of-a-kindshops, including an antique bookseller.

Heading down from Old Town you’llfind the city centre shopping districtalong Rue du Marché, Rue de laConfédération, and Rue de la Croix.Here you can find whatever it is you’relooking for. Ten smaller streets jut outfrom this main stretch (which the tramline runs on) each with more shops,restaurants, and cafés — notable in thiswarren of streets are Place de laFusterie and Place du Molard, with itsalways popular Molino’s Italian restau-rant. I would suggest also venturinginto Old Town in the evening to see itslit cobblestone road that welcomespassersby in a multitude of languages.Continue north from Place du Molardand you will come to Rue du Rhonewhere you’ll find a bevy of luxuryclothing and jewellery stores that fea-ture displays of the watches the Swissare so well-known for.

And if you’re interested in open airmarkets, don’t miss seeing the Plainpalaisflea market held in the university areatwice a week. There’s something foreveryone as this market encircles an

entire field and features a huge assort-ment of antiques and bric-a-brac.

In the winter or fall take the oppor-tunity to have an unforgettable hotchocolate at Auer on Rue de Rive. Thisis traditional hot chocolate like you’venever experienced before. With a consis-tency more like pudding, it has to betasted to be believed. Switzerland isworld-famous for its chocolate so you’llsee a lot of impressive displays inchocolaterier windows. My favourite?Everything and anything that comes outof Celine and Sebastions (including itsadjoining patisserie) are so above andbeyond delicious that I wonder justwhat this chocolatier’s house secrets are.

Out and AboutParc des Bastions faces a traffic circle,Place Neuve, which is surrounded byGeneva’s major concert hall, operahouse, conservatoire and museum,making it the cultural hub of the city,as well as an architectural hot spot. Ifyou enjoy symphonies, operas or the-atre, be sure to take in a show in this


Parc des Bastions

area. I highly recommend checking outthe program for Victoria Hall for itsexceptional classical music concertseries. For something a little moremodern, Chat Noir is popular for itspop, world, and jazz concerts. It islocated in Carouge, another unique18th-century district worth visiting.From the more than 40 museums tochoose from around the city my per-sonal favourites are the Red CrossMuseum (that humanitarian organiza-tion was founded in Geneva), theModern Art Museum, and the ArtHistory Museum.

On-Time TrainsThe bus and tram systems are incrediblyuseful and efficient. I highly recommendusing them and simply walking insteadof taking taxis. An all-day pass, avail-able at all the stops, is the most efficientfor a full day of getting around. Thefare includes the use of the tram, buses,and the yellow boats, mouettes, whichshuttle to each side of the lake.

For long and short trips, there’s alsothe ultra-precise rail system, which, yes,functions with the precision of a, well,Swiss watch. The surrounding cities ofMontreux, Lausanne and Annecymake great day trips. Not simply acountry of edelweiss and cuckoo clocks—though I actually did hear an alpen-

horn while hiking once—the array ofinternational people and picturesqueplaces makes Switzerland an amazingplace to live. Come in the summer andyou will experience Geneva at itsfinest, when the city often described as“discreet” develops a flair for fun inthe sun.


Lake Geneva with its famous 140-metre-high water fountain, la jet d’eau, is the focal pointof this famed city.

om Morimoto, ’49 BSc(Eng),’52 MSc, has had an unlikely life.Unlikely that someone of Japanese

descent should grow up in FortMcMurray, Alberta, when it was stilla fur-trading centre. Even moreunlikely that someone with those rootswould go on to rub shoulders withroyalty — both British and Arabic —in the Royal Enclosure at England’sfamed Royal Ascot horserace.

Unlikely that someone significantlyunder the minimum requirements forheight and weight — and of Japanesedescent — should make it into theCanadian army and take part in theD-Day storming of Juno Beach.

Unlikely that someone who hadtraded for muskrat furs on theAthabasca River delta,washed dishes at Yellowknife’sWildcat Café, and labouredunderground in agold mine shouldgo on to earn anengineering degree.Even more unlikelythat he shouldestablish himself asa designer of natural gas plantsin Western Canada when mostsuch projects were turned over toAmerican companies.

Unlikely, most of all, that oneindividual should gather up in hislife story so many diverse strandsof the history of the developmentof Western Canada: the fur tradeand riverboat era; the early daysof aviation; the attempts to unlockthe wealth of the Athabasca oilsands; the opening up of the Northand the northern gold fever of the’30s; the Second World War and

the subsequent influx into universitiesof returned veterans; the developmentof Alberta’s energy industry; and thesubsequent export of the hard-wonenergy-industry expertise.

These days Morimoto, who couldeasily pass for much fewer than hisalmost-90 years, divides his time betweenhis homes in Kelowna and Arizona andcan most often be found on the golfcourse, where he sometimes shoots underhis age. “Theoretically, it should geteasier every year,” he chuckles.Recently, Morimoto gatheredtogether his memories into abook. Titled Breaking Trail:From Canada’s Northern

Frontier to the Oil Fields of Dubai(Fifth House; Calgary), the book is partmemoir, part history. It details a singu-lar life of adventure and accomplish-ment set against the background of thelarger historical context. It also pro-vides glimpses of everyday life in FortMcMurray in the first third of the pastcentury, Yellowknife during the goldfrenzy of the ’30s, wartime England,and Dubai at the beginning of its trans-formation from an inconsequentialbackwater emirate to an internationalhotspot developing at a volcanic pace.

Born in Edmonton in 1918,Morimoto moved with his parents to

Fort McMurray when he was twoyears old and the trading centre

at the confluence of theAthabasca and ClearwaterRivers was experiencing oneof its earlier booms. Theheroes of his earliest memo-ries were the men of theriver: men known for theirability to pilot a steamboat

through the perils of theAthabasca, chop mountains ofwood to feed the steamboatfires, or carry prodigiousloads on their backs — oftenmore than 200 kilograms —on portages.

When aircraft began to insinuate themselves into theFort McMurray sky, it was thebeginning of a new era: therivermen were supplanted in theimagination of Morimoto andhis friends; their new heroeswere the men of the air, the daring pilots and the resourcefulaero-engineers who kept the ships


The Adventures of Tom MorimotoMark Twain himself couldn’t have scripted a more unlikely

story than that of one U of A grad

Tom Morimoto as a baby with hismother and father.

T


Above, goalie Tom Morimoto; right, Morimoto poses with his son, Dana, and granddaughter, Ariel,underneath the sign for Morimoto Drive, the Fort McMurray street named in recognition of the con-tributions made by Morimoto’s father as a pioneer resident. The photograph was taken in 2001;the following year Dana, who was both a friend and advisor to his father, passed away suddenly.His memory is kept alive by his two daughters, Ariel and Danielle.

of the air flying. Morimoto would gainan up-close experience of these worthieswhen he gave up working in his father’spotato farm and vegetable patch — any-thing was better than hoeing spuds, herecalls — to become a radio operatorwith Canadian Airways, the companyrun by legendary airmen such as PunchDickins and Wop May (who had been aU of A student before he enlisted tofight in the First World War).

In 1936 Canadian Airways movedits northern headquarters out of FortMcMurray to Edmonton and it nolonger required an assistant radio oper-ator. Morimoto was out of a job.However, his radio training would con-tinue to shape his future. In the shortterm it landed him a job that wouldprove interesting, if not profitable. BobFitzsimmons, the president andfounder of the International BitumenCompany, a pioneering commercialattempt to unlock the wealth of theAthabasca oil sands, had arranged forCanadian Airways to build a radio sta-tion for his company. The station oper-ated on the airline company’s networkafter hours and Morimoto was selectedto be the radio operator.

While Fitzsimmons’ plant, locatedin an isolated location on the Athabasca

River north of Fort McMurray, even-tually produced some 1,100 barrels of asphalt and 50 barrels of distillate— which in Morimoto’s eyes makes itthe first producer of commerciallyprocessed bitumen from the Athabascaoil sands — the abrasive nature of thesand, which quickly wore out the equip-ment, doomed the operation and theworkers received no pay. Morimoto wasamong those who, lacking any meansto pay for passage on a steamboat upthe river to Fort McMurray, had to waituntil freeze-up to walk the 87 kilome-tres back home.

Morimoto recalls encounteringFitzsimmons a few months after themid-winter walk up the frozenAthabasca and the latter giving him$50 and some shares of InternationalBitumen stock — the only pay he everreceived for the summer’s work.

Morimoto’s next adventure tookhim even further north, to Yellowknife,which was experiencing a claims-stakingfrenzy following the discoveries thatled to the Con, Negus, and Rycon goldmines. In 1938, as soon as the ice hadmelted on Great Slave Lake and theplanes started flying, Morimoto man-aged to board a flight north and arrivedin Yellowknife looking for work. After

a job washing dishes at the storiedWildcat Café and misadventures stakingclaims in the bush, he found employ-ment underground in the Negus mine,where his duties included sampling therock at the face of the mine, keepingthe machines in good order and sup-plying dynamite to the miners.

The Negus miners considered them-selves the elite of their profession andthey were also able to lay claim to supe-riority in another realm, winning thefirst hockey championship of theNorthwest Territories in 1939–40.Morimoto was the team’s goalie. Morethan on any skating ability, he relied onhis quick reflexes, reflexes he had devel-oped as a boxer, a skill he had taughthimself with the help of a book he hadobtained when he was 12 for the mas-sive sum — to him, in those days — of$1.00 in response to the occasional bul-lying of bigger kids who singled him outbecause of his Japanese ancestry.

Determined to join up when theSecond World War began to intensify in Europe, Morimoto was able to doso with the judicious “oiling of wheels” by a lieutenant anxious to engage himas a radio operator. Magically (andfleetingly) his height increased by twoinches, to bring him to the five-foot-

four-inches minimum and the doctorsdecided that there were sufficientgrounds to overlook his weight defi-ciency. “I heard one of them say that Iwas from way up north and I probablyhadn’t had enough to eat,” he laughs.

After training in Ontario and NovaScotia, Morimoto was off to war. “Ienlisted as a volunteer during the darkdays of 1940, when the German armywas overrunning Europe, and I feltthat our whole Western World wasbeing threatened by Hitler’s Nazis,”writes Morimoto in Breaking Trail.“Although Japan was not in the warwhen I enlisted, it became an ally ofGermany after Pearl Harbor, thusbecoming my enemy as well.”

As a radio operator with the ThirdCanadian division, Morimoto took partin the D-Day invasion of Normandy andwas part of the Allied forces that pushedback the German army until its surren-der. He says that he encountered “verylittle racial prejudice” because of hisJapanese origins while in the army.However, during “rehabilitation ses-sions” set up to prepare soldiers forreturn to civilian life, attempts weremade to dissuade him from his intentionto attend university — and these were atleast partly based on his ethnicity.

Always scrappy — he won a boxingmedal in the army even though therewas no weight category for someone as

light as him —Morimoto didn’t give inand enrolled in the University of Albertaengineering school, earning not only an undergraduate degree in chemicalengineering but a graduate degree aswell. While working with the AlbertaResearch Council and completing hismaster’s degree, Morimoto encounteredKarl Clark, the head of the Universitymining engineering department whowas building an oil sands researchplant. Morimoto recalls that, once Clarklearned he was from Fort McMurray,the professor took a fatherly interest in him and soon became a friend andvalued mentor.

In 1952, master’s degree in hand,Morimoto began working for CanadianCelanese, which was building its petro-chemical plant outside Edmonton. Fromthere his career took him to progressive-ly more responsible positions — atPolymer Corporation in Sarnia,Ontario, and then at Brown and Rootin Calgary — before he landed a job aschief process engineer with a new com-pany put together by two legends ofCanadian industry. That company,Mon-Max, was a joint venture of FredMannix’s giant, Calgary-based construc-tion company and MontrealEngineering, which had been foundedby Max Aitken, the future LordBeaverbrook, and was Canada’s largestengineering firm. Morimoto recallsthere being an interesting clash of cor-porate styles — eastern establishmentcontrasted with western maverick.

Mon-Max was set up to break intothe field of engineering and building gasplants in Western Canada. Although itwas hard going at first — the practice ofawarding design contracts to Americanfirms was firmly entrenched — hardwork and perseverance paid dividendsand Mon-Max was eventually able tomake inroads that saw the companybegin to win more and more contractsand Morimoto gain a reputation for hisengineering design skill.

In 1977, shortly after he had leftMon-Max to begin work as a consult-ant, a new opportunity presented itselfto Morimoto: he was invited to be partof a project half way around the world

in a then little-known Arab emirate.Canadian oilman Angus Mackenzie hadconvinced the rulers of Dubai that theycould make money from the natural gasthat was being flared from their oilfieldsand formed a company, Scimitar Oil, toenter into a joint venture — the DugasProject — with the rulers of the emirate.

Morimoto was brought on as a consultant to oversee the design of theDugas plant and eventually became avice-president of Scimitar, responsiblefor overseeing the engineering and oper-ation of the plant. Before long Dugaswas producing in the order of 30,000barrels a day of propane, butane andcondensate (most of it shipped by tankerto Japan), and 150 million standardcubic feet of dry gas. “With productionlike this, we soon paid off all the debtfrom our foreign loan, and from then onthe profits rolled in for the governmentand Scimitar Oils… The Dugas Projectand Scimitar Oils became the darlings ofthe financial world,” writes Morimotoin Breaking Trail.

Among the many friends thatMorimoto and his wife, Kim, made inDubai was an urbane and polishedPalestinian named Omar Assi, whowas the right-hand man of Dubai’scrown prince, Sheikh Maktoum. TheDubai royal family was heavilyinvolved in horse racing in England —amongst the three of them, the Sheikhand his two brothers owned some 700racehorses — and Royal Ascot, thehighlight of social events in Englandduring the summer, became an annualevent for Morimoto (dressed in therequisite top hat and tails) and hiswife, who would join the Maktoumentourage in the Royal Enclosure.

Life for Morimoto isn’t quite ascolourful or busy these days, but hecontinues to remain active with a num-ber of involvements — including a goldand platinum property in Wyomingand, of course, his golf — and he treasures the friendships made duringa most unlikely life. “I’ve been blessedto have seen a lot,” he says, “and thebest part is the good friends who havehelped me along the way.”

— Rick Pilger


Morimoto in his Canadian Armed Forces uniform.

If it hadn’t been for a junior highschool principal for whom he occasionally babysat, Glenn Brant,

’51 BSc(Eng), might never have beenadmitted to the University of Albertaback in the 1940s.

His high school math marks werevery good; his science marks weresolid; but his high school English…well, let’s just say, he failed.

Brant initially attended the localrural schools around the family farmwhere he grew up south of Barrhead,Alberta. Although the teachers werestrong in the maths and sciences, manyof them were Ukrainian immigrantswhose English wasn’t so good, andmany students, Brant included, sufferedfrom that lack of language proficiency.

Brant also suffered from a lack offarming skills. One day, for example,his father asked him to harness thehorses. “I was 13 at the time. I couldn’ttie the knots. I really wasn’t a good farm boy,” he admits candidly. “Infact, I was a major disappointment tomy father.” One day his father, in a fit of exasperation, stormed intothe house. “Minnie-Emily,” he

yelled to his wife, “we’re selling the

farm. This boy needs

to get an education because he’s nevergoing to make a living farming.”

His father wasn’t kidding. In 1943the family moved to Edmonton whereBrant finished high school, albeit lack-ing the English skills necessary to atfirst be accepted to university. That’swhen the principal he once babysat formade a submission to the examinationboard on Brant’s behalf, convincingthe board members that the solid stu-dent knew enough about the Englishlanguage to be awarded at least apassing mark.

Based on that successful appeal,Brant was admitted to the U of A. Afew months later, while riding the trol-ley across the High Level Bridge toregister for classes, he bumped intoArt Davison, ’51 BSc(Eng). Brantasked him what he was going to take.“Chemical engineering,” repliedDavison. “What about you?” Brantreplied that he was going to enrol in

pharmacy. The two looked over the admission information

for that faculty and discovered English was

part of the pharmacycurricula.

Uh-oh.

By the time the trolley arrived onthe south side of the river, Brant haddecided engineering might be the better choice.

Around Christmas, following hisfirst term at the U of A, Brant wassummoned to the office of the dean ofengineering, R.M. Hardy, ’77 LLD(Honorary), where the two had afrank discussion. Hardy asked theyoung student: “How do you like itaround here?” Brant replied that heliked it a lot. He was having a ball.“Well,” Hardy said, “that’s good. But if you don’t pull up your marks,

The Accidental OilmanLife’s a gas for one grad who’s found a

creative way to give back to his alma mater

Engineering grad Glenn Brant has

made a point over the course of his career of being “consistently inconsistent.”


�

How Glenn’sGift WorksThe Pension Protection Act of 2006 in the UnitedStates provides charitably minded individuals anopportunity to make gifts from their IndividualRetirement Arrangement (IRA) to a qualified char-itable organization and exclude that amount fromgross income. In short, turn a nest egg into agolden egg!

Glenn is currently working with both theUniversity Development Office and the Facultyof Engineering to maximize his donation’s bene-fit to the Faculty. Glenn has reviewed his posi-tion and feels that a reduction of his IRA valuewill not hamper his ability to meet incomerequirements and, more importantly, willenhance a good cause.

To Qualify:

• A donor must be 70.5 years of age or older• The transfer must go directly from the IRA to

the qualified charity• Gifts must not exceed $100,000 US per tax-

payer, per year• The gift must be outright• The gift must be made prior to December 31,

2007• All gifts must be at arm’s length and made

directly to the University of AlbertaFoundation USA, Inc.

To learn more about how the changes to thePension Protection Act of 2006 in the UnitedStates can enhance your planned giving to the U of A, or to discuss any other charitable giving options with a member of our staff,please contact us.

Name:______________________________

Address:_____________________________

___________________________________

Telephone:___________________________

e-mail:______________________________

Please contact us at:Development Office, Gift Planning6th Floor, General Services BuildingEdmonton, Alberta T6G 2H1Telephone: (780) 492-0332Toll Free: 1 (888) 799-9899e-mail: [email protected]

you won’t be around much longer toenjoy it.”

Brant got the message and promisedthe dean things would change. Hecracked the books and buckled down.Three years later, his uncle, BobCramer, invited the young student tohop in the car one February day for aride to look at the site of a new oilwell. The newspapers were full of sto-ries about the Leduc oil discovery andas the two stood in a Leduc field look-ing at Imperial Oil’s operations takeshape, Cramer suggested to hisnephew that there just might be afuture for him in the oil industry.

A teacher went to bat for him. Hisfather encouraged him to get an edu-cation. A fellow student gave him somesage advice at a critical time in his life.The dean read the riot act to him. Andhis uncle gave him a glimpse of theprovince’s — and possibly his — future.Together, those interventions set him ona path that would parallel theprovince’s development.

Brant graduated in 1951 and wentto work immediately for Texaco, acompany he had worked for duringthe summers. The salary was $195 amonth, recalls Brant. “I had the dis-tinction of being the lowest paid grad-uate of petroleum engineering. But itwas a wonderful place to get workexperience. Back then, if you had aproblem, you couldn’t rely on manuals.There were none. But Texaco, they surewere stingy.”

Brant worked for Texaco for sixyears before moving to Devon PalmerOils Limited in 1957, eventuallybecoming vice-president and generalmanager. Then, in 1963, he moved onto Prairie Oil Royalties Company Ltd.,serving that company as its presidentuntil 1966. Then, he shocked hisfriends by moving from a president’schair to a consulting chair. “I wasnever interested in having an officewith a couch,” he jokes.

After separating from his wife in1968 (they later divorced), he foundthat consulting work didn’t pay enoughfor him to carry out his fatherhoodresponsibilities for their four children:Jo-Ann, ’80 BA, as well as University ofCalgary graduates Rollin, Neil, and

Brenda. That’s when he moved south tojoin Pennant Oils Ltd., an independentoil and gas company owned by twoWest Texas oilmen. Following a merger,the company became Pennant-PumpOil Ltd., with Brant serving as presi-dent from 1973 to 1976. He followedthat up with the presidency and CEOposition for a medium-sized independ-ent oil company in Midland called FlagRedfern Oil Company. In 1989, afterhis children were grown, he went backto being an oil and gas consultant, andsubsequently co-founded GlencoeResources Ltd. in Calgary.

Today, the affable 78-year-old isstill working, dividing his timebetween Mid land, Texas, and Calgary.As chair of the board of Glencoe,Brant is excited about the company’sprospects. Glencoe is operating twocarbon dioxide treating and compres-sion facilities in the province, captur-ing about 220,000 tonnes of CO2

annually. The CO2 is compressed,cooled, liquefied, and then injectedinto older oil reservoirs to enhance therecovery of the remaining oil.

Capturing and utilizing the CO2 thatwould otherwise be emitted into theatmosphere results in enormous envi-ronmental benefits, explains companypresident Angus Brotherhood. “It’s cut-ting-edge technology and the way of thefuture, no question,” he says, pointingout that the technology will have majorimplications for oil sands operations,which produce a lot of CO2.

For his part, Brant says he’s stillhaving fun staying involved. If therewas something else to do that was moreinteresting and that he could do better,he’d do it. But there isn’t, and besides,he admits, “I’m a lousy golfer.”

Brant recently visited the U of Acampus, met with the dean of engineer-ing, and toured some of the extraordi-nary facilities developed since he was anundergraduate more than 50 years ago.And he has found a way to supportthose facilities and the students whobenefit from learning in this state-of-the-art educational environment by utilizinghis Individual Retirement Arrangement(IRA), the U.S. equivalent to a CanadianRRIF, to invest in his alma mater.

—Michael Robb, ’89 BA

trailsF o l l o w i n g t h e F o o t s t e p s o f U n i v e r s i t y o f A l b e r t a A l u m n i

The University of

Alberta has a long

and successful his-

tory in the field of

intervarsity athletics.

The list of national

championships and ‘Academic All-

Canadians’ is both long and a source of

great pride for all U of A alumni. But the

success of the various athletics pro-

grams at the U of A is not measured

only in the number of trophies and

championship rings that were won.

Having had the privilege of being a mem-

ber of the Golden Bears football team, I

can say, undoubtedly, that the lifelong

connections forged with fellow teammates

and the University is the true measure of

the athletics program’s success.

Of course, in retrospect, I now know

that during my time as a student at the

U of A, the future was measured in weeks,

not years, and my focus was on how

best to balance studies, football and the

occasional ‘social’ event from one

Monday to the next. Today, my closest

friends remain those fellow athletes that

I balanced the future with, and the

bonds that were forged on those teams

continue to strengthen and grow to

encompass our families and our profes-

sions.

Now I must confess that although I

wasn’t actually part of a cup winning foot-

ball team while I played at the U of A (and

believe me, I’d have died for a champi-

onship ring), it takes but a moment’s

reflection to realize that if I had to choose,

I’d pick the friendships and connections

to the U of A over the hardware every

time. After all, it’s those friendships

and connections that endure and grow

long after the glow from a championship

has faded… or so I hear.

Jim Hole, ’79 BSc (Ag)

Alumni Association President

Chair Centenary Committee

R E F L E C T I O N S

beautiful thing about art is the ability to create something old fromsomething new. This bust stands in a little café in Naples that is notfar from the National Archeological Museum. It looks out the window

of the café at Italian life passing by and though it looks like an old-fashioned bust, it’s made from layers of newspaper sheets.

I went to Italy this past summer with a class of 17 U of A Nutrition students, tolearn about the Mediterranean diet and Italian food culture. While waiting to getinto the museum, we crowded at the counter of this café and drank cappuccinoand ate Nutella-filled croissants while one of my classmates played the piano…others perched on rickety chairs and passersby put their briefcases and umbrellasdown on the sidewalk and stopped to listen.

— Cynthia Strawson-Fawcett, ’95 BA


A

September 19, 2007Red Deer, AB

Centenary Road TripHoliday Inn on 67th Street5 p.m. Guest Speaker: Timothy CaulfieldContact: Office of Alumni Affairs

October 5, 2007Seattle, WA

7th Annual Reception &Canada GalaSeattle Westin Hotel5:30 p.m.Contact: Office of Alumni Affairs

October 17, 2007Fort McMurray, AB

Centenary Road TripSawridge Inn & Conference Centre Guest Speaker: Jonathan SchaefferContact: Office of Alumni Affairs

October 27, 2007Boston, MA

Tragically Hip concertreceptionJoin fellow U of A alumni at areception before the Hip play atthe Orpheum Theatre.Contact: Andrew Scholte, ’06PhD, [email protected]

November 17, 2007Napa Valley, CA

Wine Tasting & Vineyard TourFor more information contact the School of Business at (877)362-3222

November 25Victoria, B.C.

Afternoon Tea at the EmpressHotelGuest speaker to be announcedContact: Office of Alumni Affairs

November 25Vancouver, B.C.

Alumni Brunch at the RoyalVancouver Yacht ClubGuest speaker to be announcedContact: Office of Alumni Affairs

November 26, 2007Singapore

President’s Dinner with AlumniContact: Office of Alumni Affairs

November 27, 2007Calgary, AB

Alumni Night at the TheatreThe Mystery of Edmond Drood atVertigo TheatreContact: Office of Alumni Affairs

November 29, 2007Lethbridge, AB

Unique Experiences EventGuest speaker to be announcedContact: Laurence Hoye, ’55 BSc,’56 MSc, [email protected]

December 2007Hong Kong

Date to be confirmedUAAAHK Family Christmas Party

Note to all alumni: We cannot sendevent invitations without currentaddresses. Update your address by calling 780-492-3224 (toll-free in North America 1-800-661-2593) or e-mail [email protected].

Alumni EventsFor more information about alumni events, contact the Office of Alumni

Affairs by phone at 780- 492-3224 or (toll-free in North America)

1-800-661-2593 or by e-mail at [email protected]. You can also

check the alumni events website at www.ualberta.ca/alumni/events.

When Disaster Strikes

The Alumni Association’s auto and

home insurance affinity partner,

TD Meloche Monnex, recently imple-

mented a new Catastrophe Response

Plan to handle unusually high numbers

of claims caused by a natural disaster,

such as an extreme weather event.

What does this mean? In the event

of a catastrophe, TD Meloche

Monnex’s claims department will be

supported by a dedicated team

equipped to deal with unexpected dev-

astation that requires immediate

action. Agreements with a variety of

claims suppliers — such as car rental

companies, appraisers, and restoration

firms — are in place to insure priority

and guarantee consistent service levels.

With the increases in catastrophic

events over the past few years, ranging

from floods in Alberta and Manitoba

to fires in British Columbia, this plan

offers extra security for policy holders.

That’s the kind of service you can

expect as a member of the U of A

Alumni Association insured with TD

Meloche Monnex. For more informa-

tion about insurance products avail-

able to alumni or to get an insurance

quote, call 1-888-589-5656 or visit the

website at www.melochemonnex.com

Clothing Call

If you have any interesting U of A

clothing items from the past that

you’d be willing to share, the curator

of the University’s centennial would

like to borrow them. Lucie Heins, ’05

BSc(HumanEcology), is pulling togeth-

er items for a show about the

University’s history.

When it’s all done the show will

offer a glimpse into the past century at

the University. To bring that past to

life, Heins has sifted through the col-

lection held at the Textile and Clothing

Department at the U of A. She still

needs some items and is asking the

University’s alumni to help. Specifically

the collection would like the following

items for loan or donation:

• A blanket used by the Wauneita

Club (1910–1969) during

initiations.

• Sports clothing and sports equip-

ment used while at the U of A.

Donations can be brought to Marijke

Kerkhoven, ’86 MSc, ’80 BSc(HomeEc),

managing curator of the clothing and

textile collection at the Department of

Human Ecology. Marijke can be

reached by telephone at (780) 492-2528

or e-mail [email protected]

evergreen


bookmarksThe Intrepid FoxHelen Smart (Liss), ’49 Dip(Ed)

The Intrepid Fox is the storyof the author’s father, a Polishimmigrant who carved a suc-cessful farm out of the rawwilderness that was northernAlberta in the early days of

the last century. John Liss fought for farm-ers’ rights against the big grain companiesand dairy cartels. When he went off to warin 1941, Helen and her six siblings helpedtheir mother with the farm. This book is afascinating story of a difficult pioneer lifein Alberta warmed by the love of a close-knit family. (Trafford, www.trafford.com)

NahanniDavid M. Mannes, ’76 BEd, ’82 MEd

This adventure novelrevolves around legends andmysterious murders thattook place in the Nahanniwilderness in the early partof the 20th century. Ayoung woman, with the

help of a retired Mountie, goes in searchof her missing father and brother. (SagaBooks, www.sagabooks.net)

Zhorna: Material Culture of theUkrainian PioneersRoman Fodchuk, ’54 BSc(Ag)

This book chronicles thefascinating but lesser-known aspects of theUkrainian culture andpioneering experience.The everyday items ofthese pioneers tell a story

of initiative, tenacity, and the close rela-tionship between themselves and nature.Fodchuk focuses on items ranging fromclothing, kitchen gadgets and cookingutensils to building techniques and the specialized application of hand-made agricultural tools. (University of CalgaryPress, www.uofcpress.com)

Searching for Billie: A NovelFreda Jackson, ’76 BEd

Jackson’s first novel, Searchingfor Billie transports readers tolate-19th-century westernCanada. In 1897, Jane, ayoung Englishwoman, is sentto Canada to search for Billie

Thomm, a home child, one of thousands oforphans and beggars who had been shippedto Canada to find better lives. As Janesearches for Billie she encounters all kinds ofpeople and adventures in northern Alberta.(Heritage House Press, www.heritagehouse.ca)

Redesign the DoorBarry Brooks, ’55 BA, ’57 BDiv

Dealing with 38 events in thelife of the author, a clergy/businessman who has a Masterof Divinity and an MBA, thiscollection of short storiesexplores incidents that chal-

lenge us to “redesign the doors” of ourthinking and acceptance of other people.Some stories are funny and some are sad.(Lulu, www.lulu.com)

The McLoughlin CorrespondentsBetty Donaldson, ’60 Dip(RehabMed)

A love of canoeing drew Bettyinto studying the fur tradeand in this, her first novel,she constructs a fictional five-decade correspondencebetween siblings. Set at the

turn of the 19th century, the correspon-dence chronicles the lives of a youngwoman who enters an Ursuline convent andeventually becomes Mother Superior, andher brother, who works in the fur trade.(Athena Press, www.athenapress.com)

Structural Wood Design: APractice-Oriented ApproachAbi Aghayere, ’88 PhD, and Jason Vigil

This textbook takes a practical, design-oriented and code-based approach todesigning wood structures.With dozens of practical,worked examples, the book

strives to present structural components inthe context of the entire building, empha-sizing how all parts work together in pro-viding strength. Aghayere is a professor ofcivil engineering technology at RochesterInstitute of Technology. (Wiley-VCH,www.wiley-vch.de)

Teachers in the Middle: Reclaimingthe Wasteland of the AdolescentYears of SchoolingJohn Smyth, ’79 PhD, and Peter McInerney

Indicating that there is a pro-found crisis afflicting second-ary schools in most parts ofthe world and that teachersare “in the middle” in variousways, this book shows how

schools, teachers and young people are re-inventing themselves against the damag-ing prevailing educational policy discourses.The authors provide a critique as well ashope and possibility for schools. Smyth isa professor in the School of Education atUniversity of Ballarat in Australia. (PeterLang Publishing, www.peterlang.com)


Call for Class Organizers

The Office of Alumni Affairs is

recruiting class organizers for

Homecoming 2008. Invite your class-

mates to come back, check out your

old hangouts, and join the University

community as we celebrate the U of A’s

centenary.

This is a great opportunity for you

to help plan your class reunion, and

with the support of the Alumni Affairs

Office, it won’t take much of your

time. We will do all we can to ensure

that organizing your reunion is as easy

as possible for you.

If you or your classmates are inter-

ested in volunteering as class organiz-

ers, or if you would like more infor-

mation about Homecoming 2008,

please contact Colleen Elliott in the

Office of Alumni Affairs. She can be

reached by telephone at (780) 492-

0866 or toll-free 1-800-661-2593 or

by e-mail at [email protected]

Delta Phi DiamondAnniversary Celebration

The Delta Phi Chapter of the Delta

Kappa Epsilon men’s fraternity is

celebrating its 75th anniversary. Dekes

are invited to the diamond anniversary

ball and reunion weekend on October

12 and 13, 2007. For more informa-

tion, please contact the 75th anniver-

sary chairman Bro. Jorj Sayde (#960,

2001–02) at 780-722-7029. You can also

visit the website at www.dke.ca/75th

SEPTEMBER 18 – 21

UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA

CentenaryHomecoming

2008


c lassnotes

’50s’53 W. Alan Bell, BA, ’55 BEd,’67 MEd, was installed as theDistrict Deputy Grand Master forthe Lakeland District of the GrandLodge (Masons) of Alberta in June.Alan, one of 15 district deputygrand masters in Alberta, will holdthe office for one year; lodgesunder his jurisdiction are in north-east Alberta, including Edmonton.

Gerald O. Lundgren, BSc(Pharm),of Victoria, recently retired as apharmacist-owner after more than50 years of practice. “I enjoyed mycareer in pharmacy in twoprovinces, Alberta and B.C.,”Gerald says, “especially the latteryears after finally getting on goodterms with the bank!”

Gerald says that the bestmoments of his working life werewith “the incredible staff I was ableto recruit over the years.” He andhis wife, Geraldine, became grand-parents for the first time recentlywhen they welcomed twin grand-daughters. “My son-in-law hastaken the position of principal tim-panist with the VancouverSymphony Orchestra, so they willbe close at hand for family visitsfor which we are so grateful.”

Tess Trueman, MD, ’51 BSc, ofCourtenay, B.C., taught at the U ofA in 1959-60 and practised obstet-rics and gynecology in Calgary from1960 to 1975, where she taught atthe U of Calgary’s medical school.When she retired, Tess moved toB.C., where she has lived in a fewdifferent places but now has set-tled in Courtenay.

’57 Evangeline Munns, BSc, ofKing City, Ontario, won severalawards when she was on campusincluding a World University Servicescholarship in 1956 and beingnamed to the Golden Key Societyin 1956 and ’57. She was on theexecutive of the World UniversityService, the Student ChristianMovement, and the Varsity ChristianFellowship; was treasurer of theBlue Stocking Club; co-director ofVarsity Varieties in 1956; and partof the Wauneita Society, theGateway, the Psychology Club, andthe Debating Society. All this quali-fied her well to take on the role ofclass historian in 1957.

Now celebrating 50 years sincegraduation from the U of A,Evangeline says, “I loved my yearsat the University of Alberta.” Shehas not slowed down. Recentlyretired as the clinical director ofplay therapy services at Blue HillsChild and Family Services, she isstill active giving workshops in playtherapy across North America, andservices a number of professionalsin play therapy. She received anaward for making an outstandingcontribution to play therapy inCanada, has published a book onTheraplay and written numerouschapters in other books. “I teachskiing and watercolour painting. Myhusband, Tom, and I have a lovelydaughter who is pursuing a psy-chology doctorate degree at JamesMadison University this fall.”

’60s’60 Lawrence A. Mysak, BA, ’61BSc, Canada Steamship LinesProfessor in the Department ofAtmospheric and Oceanic Sciencesat McGill U, was elected presidentof the International Association forthe Physical Sciences of theOceans (IAPSO) for a four-yearterm. In July 2009, IAPSO, togetherwith two other associations, willhold a 10-day joint assembly inMontreal, which is expected toattract up to 2,000 delegates fromaround the world. Professor Mysakis currently serving on the organiz-ing committee for this assembly.

’61 Ellis Treffry, BSc(Ag), wasrecently honoured by the AlbertaInstitute of Agrologists with a goldaward for 46 years of continuouscontribution to the Institute. Thegold award emphasizes the years

of service, promotion of the profes-sion of agrology, foresight towardsInstitute affairs and professional-ism in the agricultural community.“The Univer sity of Alberta and theFaculty of Agriculture were indeedthe formulating forces in my careerand life aspirations which led tothis recognition.”

’64 Maxine Hancock (Runions),BEd, ’88 MA, ’92 PhD, andCampbell Hancock, ’65 BEd,recently moved to Nova Scotiawhere they will live on acreage onNorth Mountain at the northeastend of the Annapolis Valley. Camintends to develop a “GrandpaFarm” and Maxine will write.Maxine notes that they will be clos-er to their daughter CamilleHancock Friesen, ’92 MD, and herfamily in Halifax and their daughterHeather Hancock, ’93 MSc, andfamily in Chicago. She writes, “Wewill still be deeply connected to theWest, since I will continue on facul-ty at Regent College with thesissupervision and some teachingduties and, of course, we have oursons and their families in Albertato keep us closely connected!”

’66 Albert Karvonen, MEd, ’60BEd, ’64 Dip(Ed), of Boyle, AB,received an honorary degree fromAthabasca U in June in recognitionof his films on wildlife conservation.

Tony Vander Voet, BSc, ’67 MSc,of Brampton, Ontario, received anAmethyst Award from the Ontariogovernment on June 19, 2007. Thisaward is the highest honour theOntario public service bestows onindividuals or groups. Tony, who got a PhD from the U of Toronto in1976, received his award for indi-vidual leadership in the field of sci-

ence, research and innovation poli-cy, and for his record as a mentorof other public service staff. He iscurrently director of policy at theMinistry of Research and Innovationin the Ontario Public Service.

’67 Carolyn Debnam, BPE, ofToronto, writes, “please visit mywebsite and write anytime ... wouldlove to hear how you are.”Carolyn’s website address iswww.carolyndebnam.com

’68 David W. Leonard, BA, ’69MA, of Edmonton, received theAlberta Order of Excellence inJune 2007 for his role in preserv-ing and understanding Alberta’shistory. After studying at the U ofA, David worked as an archivist atthe Provincial Archives of Albertaand he has made archives hislife’s work, breaking from thatendeavour only briefly when hegot a PhD from the U of Sheffield.He has, at different times duringthe past three decades, been anarchivist with the City of Edmonton,the Northwest Territories, and theProvincial Archives of Alberta, andproject historian at the AlbertaHistoric Sites Service. In the1980s his interest in northwestAlberta in particular was piquedwhen he came across a popula-tion distribution map and heasked himself why, without a rail-way in the area, people would set-tle in the northwest. That questionled to several published historiesof the Peace River Country.

’69 John Blatherwick, MD, wasawarded the Order of BritishColumbia (OBC) in June 2007 andreceived the Order of Canada in1994. He was also awarded theCam Coady Medal by the B.C.

Alfred E. Harper, ’45 BSc(Ag), ’47 MSc, of MercerIsland, Washington, is now retired from academic life.Shortly after he finished his science studies at the U of A, Alfred completed a PhD in biochemistry at theU of Wisconsin and followed that up with post-doctoralresearch at the University of Cambridge. He and hiswife, Naila Jwaideh, who was a U of Wisconsin gradu-ate student in English when they married nearly 60years ago, then returned to Wisconsin. Until Alfredretired in 1990, he taught and did research on metab-olism and nutrition in the Departments of Biochemistryand Nutritional Sciences at the U of Wisconsin.

Of his post-retirement life, Alfred writes, “we movedto Seattle where our two daughters and their familieslive. I kept in touch over the years with only a few ofmy U of A classmates and this year the last of them,Robert Buckley, died. In Seattle I was a VisitingScholar in the Metabolic Unit in the Department ofMedicine. More recently I have developed a majorinterest in the conflict between religion and scienceand, particularly, with the writings of Richard Dawkinsand Sam Harris on the subject. In addition, in aneffort to delay deterioration from aging, Naila and Icontinue to be active gardeners.”

Medical Association and theGeorge Elliot award by UBC wherehe is a clinical professor. So withall the awards in hand, he retiredas the chief medical health officerfor Vancouver Coastal Health inAugust after more than 36 years asa medical health officer in B.C.,the last 23-plus as the medicalhealth officer for Vancouver. Inretirement he plans to add to his21 published books (CanadianOrders, Decorations and Medals isin most libraries in Canada), spendmore time as honorary colonel of12 Field Ambulance and, alongwith his wife, Carol Blatherwick,’69 MD (who retired from familypractice three years earlier), enjoytheir grandchildren and travel.

Irene Knopp (Grzyb), BEd, retiredin 2003 after teaching at ThorsbyElementary School since 1969. “Icontinue to work as a substituteteacher for the Black Gold RegionalSchools. As well, my husband andI and our son operate Thorsby TireShop, celebrating 40 years in busi-ness on August 1, 2007.” Irenealso notes that since 1986, sheand her family returned to theirfarm roots and conduct a smallfamily farm business. “Our daugh-ter is married to a rancher and theyreside in southern Saskatchewan.We have six grandchildren.”

Keith Tronc, PhD, of Brisbane,Australia, became assistant direc-tor of the Mt. Gravatt College ofAdvanced Education and subse-quently associate professor anddean of field studies at GriffithUniversity. Then, in 1990, hechanged careers and became abarrister of the Supreme Court ofQueensland, where he has special-ized in criminal law and education-al law. He also serves as a consult-ant in educational administrationand has produced over 100 expertreports for courts all over Australiadeciding school litigation. Since1976, he has published 42 bookson education, educational adminis-tration, education and the law, anda variety of purely legal issues suchas advocacy, search warrants andjustices of the peace. In 2006, theAustralian Council of EducationalLeaders presented him with theHeadley Beare Award for educa-tional writing.

’70s’70 Jay Riat, MEng, senior associ-ate engineer at Energy ManagementCoSyn in Edmonton, was awardeda 2007 APEGGA Summit Award forCommunity Service. He is co-chairof the Guru Nanak Dev HealingGarden project at the MazankowskiAlberta Heart Institute and is thefounding director and a member ofthe board of trustees for the GuruNanak Shrine Fellowship (GNSF), aworldwide organization for humani-tarian service. As national presidentof GNSF, Jay has led the communi-ty in raising $2 million to createthe healing garden, a unique andtranquil environment for patientsrecovering from heart surgery.

Jay’s work in the community nearand far extends back decades. In1969 he sent funds from Edmontonto India for the Bihar Relief Fund,and in 2004 he raised money forthe tsunami relief for the Red CrossSociety. As part of GNSF, he hashelped raise tens of thousands ofdollars for donations of medicalequipment to India, Pakistan, andZambia and for earthquake relief inIndia and El Salvador.

’72 Joseph Gustafson,BSc(Pharm), a pharmacist in Olds,AB, received a 2007 WyethConsumer Healthcare Bowl ofHygeia award.

’73 Wayne Moen, BA, ofEdmonton, was named regionaldirector for Alberta for the CanadianReal Estate Association.

George Webber, BA, of Calgary,received the silver award in photo-journalism and photo essay at theNational Magazine Awards in June.He won the award for “The LastDays of the St. Louis,” published inCalgary’s Swerve magazine. Also inJune George received the commu-nity achievement award in arts atthe city of Calgary’s awards.

’75 Terrance Chapelsky, BEd,recently received the Institute ofChartered Accountants of Alberta’sDistinguished Service Award.

Hal Kluczny, BEd, ’84 MEd, ’98EdD, of Millet, Alberta, retired in2004 from Wetaskiwin RegionalPublic schools after 12 years assuperintendent, eight previous yearsas deputy superintendent, and a pre-

vious 13 years in various roles asteacher and administrator. He alsoserved on CASS provincial executive,becoming president in 2001-2002.From 2004-present, Hal has beenemployed by Alberta Education as asenior education manager for Zone2/3 Field Services. He plans fullretirement in September 2007.

Tim O’Brien, MBA, ’72 BA, ofEdmonton, has been appointedsenior vice-president of OilfieldTransportation and TubularManagement and Manufacturing,at Flint Energy.

’76 Glen Magneson, BEd, coachesa girls basketball team in Foremost,AB, and the team recently won theprovincial basketball championshipsfor the eighth time.

’77 Irene Colliton, MD, ’75 BSc(MedSci), of Edmonton, receivedthe Western Regional Award ofExcellence from the Society ofObstetricians and Gynaecologists ofCanada in June in recognition of herleadership in medical roles in theCapital Health Region and for main-taining one of the largest family med-icine obstetrics practices in the city.

Garry Kissel, BEd, of Glendon,AB, retired in June as principalof Glendon School after 30years in education.

’78 Susan McDaniel, PhD, isnow a professor of family studiesand senior researcher at theInstitute of Public andInternational Affairs at the U ofUtah. The position is roughlyequivalent to a senior CanadaResearch Chair in internationalpublic policy. All Susan’s Canadianresearch and policy involvementswill continue, including her role onthe lead team for the newly funded

SSHRC cluster on populationchange and life course. Susan iseditor of SAGE: Major Work onAgeing/ Gerontology (Sage,London, U.K.), a four-volume bookto be released in Fall 2007 thatfocuses on cutting-edge researchand theory in ageing and gerontol-ogy with a lead essay and connect-ing commentary written by Susan.She will be part of a delegation ofinternational sociologists to visitsociology departments in India inNovember 2007 and serves on thescientific advisory board of the newCouncil of Canadian Academies.

Darryl Smith, DDS, ’75 BSc, ofCrooked Creek,AB, became presidentof the Canadian Dental Asso ciationin June. Past-president of the AlbertaDental Association and Collegeand the Peace River and DistrictDental Society, Darryl has servedon numerous CDA committees.

’79 David Kastelic, BCom, ofEdmonton, has been appointedvice-president, tubular managementand manufacturing, at Flint Energy,


In 1999, Marcel Mercier, ’69 BSc, ’72 MSc, and Elaine Kozak, ’72BA, left the corporate world to turn their love of the country and goodwine into a way of life. They purchased a 100-year old farm on BritishColumbia’s Salt Spring Island and began the long process of convert-ing it from sheep grazing to wine growing.

Over the next three years, seven acres were planted to vine and awinery built. A century-old orchard of apple, pear, plum and cherrytrees was rehabilitated to enhance the beauty of the site and retainthe diversity of its flora. A stand of magnificent Garry Oaks was pre-served and gives the winery estate its name. “Our mission is to makewines we’re proud of, and to have fun doing it,” they note. The web-site is garryoakswine.com

Gerald Krispin,’81 BA, who hasbeen a professorof religious stud-ies at ConcordiaUniversity Collegein Edmontonsince 1987, wasrecently namedpresident ofConcordia.

Gerald has a master of divinity fromLutheran Theological Seminary inSaskatoon, Saskatchewan, and a doc-torate in theology from ConcordiaLutheran Seminary in St. Louis.

which provides products and serv-ices for the oil and gas industry.

’80s’80 John Corder, BSc, recentlyretired after 16 years with the PipeLine Contractors Association ofCanada and over 30 years in theconstruction industry. “Most of mytime in construction has beenspent in the field of labour rela-tions. After several years living inEdmonton I returned to school atthe U of A and graduated in 1980with a BSc. I had originally spentsome time in the early ’60s atUBC, so my time at the U of A wasbrief but one of the most enjoy-able of my life — or was it becauseI married my sweetheart duringthat period?

“No matter. I still travel toEdmonton from time to time as aconsultant and feel like one ofthose people I used to see in air-ports and wonder what on earth anold guy like that could possibly bedoing. I take in an EdmontonCrackercats ball game whenever Ican and, of course, the oddEskimos and Oilers game as well. Icurrently reside in Oakville, Ontario,with my sweetheart Sandi, our sonRoss, who is following in my foot-steps and returning to universityafter several years away (U of T, I’mafraid to say), and our belovedminiature schnauzer Chester.”

Donald W. M. Juzwishin, MHSA,’77 BA, ’05 PhD, has beenappointed chief executive officer ofthe Health Council of Canada.Most recently a private consultantin health care policy in St. Albert,AB, he also served as the directorof health technology assessmentat the Alberta Heritage Foundationfor Medical Research. Prior to that,he was with the Ministry of Healthin British Columbia. He has heldexecutive positions at the RoyalAlexandra Hospital in Edmonton,Alberta, and at the Greater VictoriaHospital Society in Victoria, B.C.

’82 David C. Bird, PhD, retiredlast June as principal of McKenzieElementary in Victoria, B.C., “aftermany wonderful years and chil-dren!” After celebrating the wed-ding of their youngest son in July,David and his wife, Yvette, travelledto Jakarta for a two-year universityteaching assignment.

Terry Freeman, BCom, recentlybecame the Edmonton-based man-aging director of Northern PlainsCapital — a private equity firm spe-cializing in oilfield services — after14 years as CFO of Flint EnergyServices and its predecessors.

’82 Christos Katopodis, MEng,of Winnipeg, received the CanadianSociety for Civil Engineering’sCamille A. Dagenais Award in June2007. The award recognizes civilengineers who have made outstand-

ing contributions to the developmentand practice of hydrotechnical engi-neering in Canada. Christos alsoreceived (in April 2007) a teamgovernment distinction award forwork on oilsands projects.

Christos works at the FreshwaterInstitute in Winnipeg, where heoversees regional habitat engineer-ing for the central and arctic regionof Fisheries and Oceans Canada.His research work bridges hydraulicsand ecology, and he is spearheading

interdisciplinary efforts in hydraulics,hydrology, river mechanics, ecology,biology, ecosystems, fish physiology,migrations and habitat. He contri -butes to river restoration or enhance-ment, minimizing or mitigating envi-ronmental impacts, estimating ecological or in-stream flow regimesand facilitating fish passage.

’83 Salvatore Amelio, LLB, hasbeen named a partner in the lawfirm Hendrickson, Gower, Massing,Olivieri LLP.


What trail are you following?

Please enclose all old address labels. � Revise my address to the one below.

� I/We receive multiple copies—send one copy only to the address below.

Name ________________________________________ Phone ________________________

Street ________________________________________________________________________

City ______________________________ Prov./State __________ Postal code ___________

Fax ______________________ E-mail ______________________________________________

Class Note ____________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Mail to: Alumni Affairs/6th Floor General Services Building/University of Alberta/Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2H1

The personal information requested on this form is collected under the authority of Section 33(c) of the Alberta Freedom ofInformation and Protection of Privacy Act for the purpose of alumni and development programs at the University of Alberta.Questions concerning the collection, or disposal of this information should be directed to: Coordinator, Research and Marketing,6th Floor General Services Bldg. University of Alberta Edmonton AB T6G 2H1, ph: 780-492-2515.

�

Advances in monitoring and medical care mean thatchildbirth is no longer as risky as it was in past cen-turies, and mothers today have every reason tobelieve they will deliver a healthy baby. But whatabout the experience of the mother? Nursing profes-sors emeriti Vangie Bergum, ’86 PhD, (at right in thephoto) and Jeanne Van der Zalm, ’73 Dip(Nu), ’76BSc(Nu), ’94 MSc(Nu), ’99 PhD, put some researchon mothering together in one place. Their recentlyreleased book of writings about childbirth is calledMotherlife: Studies of Mothering Experiences. It con-tains the writings of 16 contributing authors fromacross Canada and one from Australia. Proceedsfrom the sales of the book will be donated to theLois Hole Hospital for Women.Ka

ren

Karb

ashe

wsk

i/Cap

ital H

ealth

’84 Karen Drozd, BEd, of Honolulu,is currently teaching performingarts and multicultural education atthe U of Hawaii at Manoa’s Institutefor Teacher Education. Karen hasalso taught courses in music appre-ciation, introduction to world music,music methods for elementaryteachers, jazz history, and appliedmusic in various instruments. Sheis involved in a Pacific Resourcesin Education and Learning andNational Endowment for the Artsproject called “Voices United,”through which she is researching,collecting, and compiling songs forchildren from Micronesia, Polynesia,and Melanesia to be presented atthe Festival for the Pacific Arts inJuly 2008 in American Samoa.

Marty Proctor, BSc(Eng), ’85 MEng,was recently appointed to the exec-utive management team of NorthAmerican Oil Sands Corporation.He joined the company in 2006 assenior vice-president, Upstream, andhas more than 20 years of diverseexperience in the oil and gas indus-try. Marty has worked on success-ful oil and gas projects in Canada,the U.S., Kazakhstan, and China.

’85 Caroline Hatcher, BSc(Nu),of Calgary, received a 2007 awardfor excellence in nursing administra-tion from the College and Associationof Registered Nurses of Alberta.

Susan Kilmister, Dip(Ed), ’78 BEd,and her husband have returned toNew Zealand after living in Melbournefor nine years. They’ve built a newhouse on a lovely five-acre property

north of Auckland. Susan recentlyundertook training in the fitnessarea and plans to set up a smallpersonal training business.

’86 Scott Sangster, LLB, ofCalgary, has been named a partnerin the law firm Fraser MilnerCasgrain LLP.

’88 Jo Milne-Home, PhD, ’80MEd, teaches psychology and isdirector of the clinical psychologyclinic at the University of WesternSydney in Australia. She won the2006 National Carrick Citation forTeaching Excellence. For more than10 years the Carrick Institute hasawarded citations for outstandingcontributions to student learning.Jo also won the inaugural UWS vice-chancellor’s teaching excellenceaward in 2002. She is a TeachingFellow in UWS’s College of Arts,where she provides leadership inimplementing projects in theLearning and Teaching Action Plan.

Cathy Carter-Snell, MSc(Nu), ’85 BSc(Nu), who teaches atMount Royal College in Calgary,received a 2007 award for excel-lence in nursing education from theCollege and Association ofRegistered Nurses of Alberta.

’89 Alex A. Adjei, PhD, ofWilliamsville, New York, joined thefaculty of the Roswell Park CancerInstitute in 2006 as chair of theDepartment of Medicine and seniorvice-president for clinical research.The RPCI is in Buffalo, New York.

’90s’90 Stephen Kane, BCom,and his wife, Tonya Kane(Throness), ’95 BSc(Nu),are living in Houston, Texas.Stephen recently leftPricewaterhouseCoopers tojoin Green Earth Fuels asController.

’91 Moshe Elhav, MA, ’90BA, and his wife, Meytal Elhav, ’00MA, ’95 BA, recently moved toLondon, England, where Moshe willtake up his appointment as financedirector for Knorr Global withUnilever Best Foods UK Ltd.

Connie Jensen (Polushin), MEd,’88 BEd, ’89 Dip(Ed), of BuckLake, AB, retired after 40 years ofteaching and administration atBluffton School in the Wolf CreekSchool Division. “I’m looking for-ward to time travelling, writing, gar-dening and especially time with myfamily and friends.”

Leon Pfeiffer, BCom, of Edmonton,has been named a principal atKingston Ross Pasnak charteredaccountants.

’92 Brian Drewry, BPE, is nowsports editor at the Victoria TimesColonist newspaper. He and hiswife, Heather, and two girls,Hannah and Emma, are enjoyinglife on beautiful Vancouver Island.

’93 Gregory Hadubiak, MHSA, aCaritas Health Group vice-presidentoverseeing the operations of theGrey Nuns Community Hospital andPlanning & Development and

Support Services, has been nameda Fellow with the American Collegeof Healthcare Executives.

Catherine Heggerud (Ferguson),MBA, ’90 BCom, and CollinHeggerud, ’92 BSc, of Calgary,recently moved again and note thatafter welcoming three children —Evan, Sean, and Caitlin — in threeyears, they are looking forward to“fewer sleepless nights and fewerdiapers.”

Keith Lambert, BSc(Eng), ofCalgary, has been named seniorvice-president of ProductionServices at Flint Energy.

Allan Sawiak, BCom, has beennamed a principal at Kingston RossPasnak chartered accountants inEdmonton.

’94 Valerie Fong, BSc(Pharm), of Lethbridge, was named 2007’sM.J. Huston Pharmacist of the Yearin recognition of her commitmentto the profession and excellence inpharmacist practice.

Krista Singleton-Cambage, BA,recently accepted a position as aninternational environment advisorwith the Nature Conservancy’sIndo-Pacific Resource Centre inBrisbane, Australia.

’95 Joe Leeson, BA, was recentlypromoted to corporal with the RCMPand posted to Whistler, B.C., wherehe will be until the Olympics of2010 and supervise a watch of fivepolice officers.

Doug Thorlakson, BCom, a lieu-tenant in the Canadian army,recently transferred to Kingston,


’83 Greg Allan, BPE, and his wife,Danielle, of Lunby, B.C., have aCanadian Kennel Club registeredkennel called Kemxtus Kennel,where they breed Newfoundlanddogs. The website of the company iskemxtusnewfoundlands.com.

At the Sterling Awards in June, Edmonton’s CatalystTheatre’s production of Frankenstein received eightawards, including outstanding production of a musi-cal. Writer and director Jonathan Christenson, ’89BA, ’92 BA, ’96 MFA, who is artistic director atCatalyst, won awards for outstanding musical direc-tor, score, and new play. Bretta Gerecke, ’96 MFA,resident designer at Catalyst, also won threeawards — for outstanding set design, costumedesign, and lighting design. Nancy McAlear, ’94BFA, received the Sterling award for outstandingperformance by an actress in a supporting role.Frankenstein had a very successful run in early2007 at the Catalyst and is back by populardemand. It will have a three-week run in February2008. Tickets are available through TIX on theSquare, www.tixonthesquare.ca

The Alumni Association notes withsorrow the passing of the followinggraduates:

’30 Alice Eugenie Porteous (Bulyea),BSc(HEc), of Edmonton, AB, in April 2007’32 Frances Mary Richardson (Fisher),BSc, of Wilmington, Delaware, in April2007’33 Allison Chown (Grant), BA, ofVictoria, BC, in January 2007George Victor Eckenfelder, BSc, ofSidney, BC, in March 2007’36 Thomas Patching, BSc(Eng), ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’38 A. Franklin Johnson, BSc, ’49 PhD,of Spooner, Wisconsin, in April 2007Ellen Adelaide Tatham, BA, ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007W. Ivan Jackson, DDS, of Sidney, BC, inMay 2007’39 Joseph Bugis, BA, ’42 MD, ofEdmonton, AB, in June 2007’40 Louise Lamplough Marshal, BSc,of Montreal, QC, in April 2007Alan Marshall Brownlee, BA, ’41 LLB,of Victoria, BC, in May 2007’42 Teddy Lee Marfleet, BSc, ’46 MD,of Maidstone, SK, in April 2007Ralph King Hole, BCom, of Edmonton,AB, in April 2007Gordon Robert Callbeck, BA, ’44 MD,of Duncan, BC, in June 2007’44 Bernice Elvira Gibb (Thomson), BA,of West Vancouver, BC, in February 2007William Treleaven Andrew, BSc, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007Marion Winnifred Panabaker, BA, ofCalgary, AB, in March 2007’45 William B. Jackson, BSc, ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007Margaret Docherty, Dip(Nu), ’54 Dip(PHNu), of Edmonton, AB, in April 2007Isabel Freda Kenny, Dip(Pharm), ofCalgary, AB, in April 2007’46 Mary Marguerite Taylor Boorman,Dip(Nu), ’47 BSc(Nu), of Missoula,Montana, in April 2007’47 Andrew Stanley, Dip(Pharm), ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’48 Frank Loewen, BEd, ’49 MEd, ofAbbotsford, BC, in April 2007Frances Cleary Finn, BCom, of Calgary,AB, in March 2007Herbert E. Wahl, BSc, of Whitehorse,Yukon, in March 2007Bert McDonald, BSc, of Victoria, BC, inMay 2007Robert George Reynolds, BSc, ofEdmonton, AB, in June 2007’49 William George Robson, BSc(Eng),of Ottawa, ON, in March 2007William David Usher, BSc(Eng), ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007Adrian Douglas Berry, BEd, of RedDeer, AB, in June 2007Lionel Avila Page, BEd, of Edmonton,AB, in June 2007

Kenelm Cyrus Miller, BSc, ’51 MD, ofElk Point, AB, in June 2007’50 Don McNichol, BSc(Eng), ofCalgary, AB, in March 2007Nickolas Dawson, BEd, of Edmonton,AB, in May 2007’51 Michael Lyon Chornopsky, BSc(Eng),of Calgary, AB, in March 2007Raymond John Ostolosky, BSc, ’53 MD,of Nanaimo, BC, in April 2007J. Stuart S. Knop, BCom, of Edmonton,AB, in June 2007V. Lois MacKenzie-Sawers, BSc, ’53MD, of Vancouver, BC, in May 2007’52 Alvin Johnstone, BCom, of RedDeer, AB, in June 2007’53 Mildred Margaret Orlick(Whitney), Dip(Ed), ’55 Dip(Ed), ’67BEd, of Edmonton, AB, in March 2007Patricia Ann George (Robinson),Dip(Nu), ’82 BSc(Nu), of St. Albert, AB,in April 2007Nick Lynkowski, Dip(Ed), of Myrnam,AB, in May 2007’54 Zan F. Nikiforuk, BSc, ’56 MSc, ofCalgary, AB, in April 2007Marwin Gustav Neumeister, BSc(Eng),of Delta, BC, in March 2007Mario Isidore Tedeschini, BSc, ’56 MD,of Edmonton, AB, in May 2007

William W. Winspear, BCom, of Sidney,BC, in June 2007Norman Blamire, BSc(Eng), ofAldergrove, BC, in May 2007’55 Harold Fayerman, DDS, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’56 Terrance Roger Mott, BSc(Eng),’61 BEd, ’71 MEd, ’75 PhD, ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007’57 Suzanne Alice Stelter, Dip(Nu), ofSurrey, BC, in February 2007Tellex Gallant, BA, ’58 LLB, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’58 Gabrielle Margaret Darimont,BEd, of St. Paul, AB, in April 2007’59 Kenneth Clair Webb, BSc(Eng), ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007Russel Robert Jakob, BSc(Eng), ofLong Beach, CA, in April 2007’60 Carole Irene Comfort(Crosweller), BSc(Pharm), of Calgary,AB, in January 2007’61 Sora Mina Shilman (Satanove),BA, of North York, ON, in April 2007Eunice Irene Kenny, BEd, of Edmonton,AB, in March 2007Stephen Russel Ramsankar, BSc, ’63BEd, ’89 LLD (Honorary), of Edmonton,AB, in July 2007

’61 Agnes Gladys Buckles-Borchert,BEd, ’68 MEd, of Edmonton, AB, in July2007’62 Jessie Louise Martel, BEd, ’66Dip(Ed), of Edmonton, AB, in May 2007Lloyd Lawrence Daviduck, BSc(Eng), ofCrossfield, AB, in January 2007’63 Karen Gertrude Pickard (Bartell),Dip(Nu), of Canmore, AB, in March 2007Gwen Stephania Polomark, BEd, ofMundare, AB, in April 2007Barbara Joanne Sykes, BEd, ’81Dip(Ed), of Edmonton, AB, in April 2007John MacLeod Grindley, BSc, ’70 LLB,of Edmonton, AB, in May 2007Elizabeth Trent Nadon McIntosh, BA,’65 MA, ’77 BEd, ’83 MEd, of SherwoodPark, AB, in May 2007’64 Donald W. Watson, BCom, ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007Vern Klaus Kratzer, BEd, of Edmonton,AB, in May 2007’65 Peter Morhaliek, BEd, ’74 Dip(Ed),’78 MEd, of Edmonton, AB, in July 2006’66 Brian van Huystee, BEd, ’84 MEd,of St. Albert, AB, in December 2006William George McKenzie, BEd, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’67 Lynda Marion Morgan (Carlyle),BA, of Sylvan Lake, AB, in April 2007

In Memoriam

Clarence Campbell, ’24 BA, ’26LLB, is known for a lot of things.

For instance, the former president ofthe National Hockey League has a tro-phy named after him that the winnerof the Western Conference (formerlythe Campbell Conference) is awarded— and that no one on the winningteam dare hoist for fear it will cursetheir chances of going on to win theStanley Cup.

Campbell is also known as theman most responsible for incitingMontreal hockey fans to riot after hesuspended star player MauriceRichard for the last three games ofthe 1955 season, as well as theentirety of the playoffs, for his punch-ing of a referee... and then had thetemerity to show up at the MontrealForum for a game between theCanadians and Detroit Red Wings.After being taunted and showeredwith debris during the game,Campbell finally left the arena after

someone lobbed a tear gas canisterinto the crowd that was then forcedout of the building where they causedover half a million in damage result-ing in 60 people being arrested.

Some also see him as being part-ly to blame for keeping players fromorganizing a union and receiving faircompensation for their efforts —although he was also responsible forinitiating an NHL pension plan with

contributions from the players andthe league. Regardless of how he isviewed, Campbell was the most pow-erful man in the NHL from the late1940s until 1977 where he oversawthe league tripling in size and theregular per-season team gamesincreased from 50 to 70 (there arenow 82).

Born in Fleming, Saskatchewan,in 1905, after getting his law degree

Ice-CAs our centenary approaches,we take a look at alumni pastwho stand out in our 100-yeartradition of excellence.


Ontario, to take up a position asdirector of army training. He wasawarded a Mention in Dispatchesby the Governor General for actionsin Afghanistan of August 2006. Thepresentation took place in Ottawain February 2007. The Mention inDispatches was created to recog-nize members of the CanadianForces on active service and otherindividuals working with or in con-junction with the Canadian Forcesfor valiant conduct, devotion toduty, or other distinguished service.

’96 Loren Andruko, MSc, ’87BSc(Eng), has been named a prin-cipal at Sierra Systems of Edmonton,an information technology andbusiness consulting company.

Laurie Mah, BCom, of Toronto, hasbeen named manager of accountservices at Youthography Inc. For -merly with YTV Canada, Laurie bringsto Youthography an expertise in theconsumer habits of young Canadiansin the areas of health, beauty andfashion. She leads a variety of keyinternal and client-oriented projects,moderates research groups andmanages Youthography’s quarterlytrend report, ‘Ping’ –where her loveof pop culture, analytical skills andwriting abilities allow her to trans-late youth insight into actionableplans for businesses.

Daniel Wiart, BCom, has beennamed a principal at Kingston RossPasnak chartered accountants inEdmonton.

’97 Ward Hanson, LLB, ’86 BA,of Edmonton, has been named apartner in the law firm Fraser MilnerCasgrain LLP.

’98 Mathew Baril, BCom, recentlyrelocated from Ottawa to Hanoi,Vietnam, where his wife will begin aCanadian International DevelopmentAgency posting as the first secretaryof development in the Canadianembassy there.

James Benoit, BCom, has relocatedto Mauritius to head up a new cor-porate and investment bank special-izing in Asia, India and Africa busi-ness. This follows a 17-year careerwith the international banking andfinancial organization HSBC in avariety of countries, including China(Shanghai and Hong Kong), thePhilippines, Oman and Mauritius.

’00s’00 Patricia Marck, PhD, ’80BSc(Nu), ’91 MSc(Nu), a professorin the U of A’s Faculty of Nursing,received a 2007 award for excel-lence in nursing research from theCollege and Association ofRegistered Nurses of Alberta.

’01 Jonathan Skuba, DDS, hasbeen elected president of theAlberta Dental Association &College, the regulatory and mem-bership body for Alberta dentists.He is the youngest dentist toassume this role in the 100-yearhistory of the ADA+C. Jonathan isfollowing in his father’s footsteps(Lloyd Skuba, ’72 DDS) who heldthe same position in 1999–2000.

’02 Sharon Chadwick, MPH, ’93BSc(Nu), who works with AlbertaEmployment, Immigration andIndustry, was honoured at the2007 College and Association ofRegistered Nurses of AlbertaAwards. Sharon received theLifetime Achievement Award.

Francene Ann Snukal, BEd, of Calgary,AB, in January 2007Ronald William Hodges, BEd, ’71Dip(Ed), of Edmonton, AB, in May 2007’68 Mary Louise Taylor, BA, ’72 MA, ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007Annette Mageau, BEd, ’69 Dip(Ed), ’71MEd, of Edmonton, AB, in April 2007’69 Robert Braybrook, BSc(Eng), ofSaanichton, BC, in February 2007Susan Alma Hutchison, BCom, ofCalgary, AB, in March 2007Robert Wadsworth Dean, Dip(Ed), ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007Gretta J. Lundblad, BA, of Heisler, AB,in May 2007Berislav Steve Marjanovich, BSc(Eng),of Sinac, Croatia, in June 2007’70 Dolores Fay Ruttan, BEd, ’76 MEd,of Edmonton, AB, in May 2007Ronald David Pearson, BA, ’71 Dip(Ed),’78 BEd, of Vancouver, BC, in May 2007Michael Rehorick, BEd, of Red Deer,AB, in May 2007Dorothy Quinn, BEd, of Edmonton, AB,in February 2007’71 Kenneth James A. Plomp, BA, ofEdmonton, AB, in June 2007’72 Vernon Walter Kumpula, BSc, ’74MD, of Barrie, ON, in May 2007

Mary Ann A. Kulak, BEd, of New Kiew,AB, in June 2007Joseph Couture, PhD, of Wetaskiwin,AB, in June 2007Evelyn E. Lunde, BEd, of Edmonton, AB,in June 2007’73 Robert Dean Tomlinson, BSc(Eng),of Melbourne, Australia, in April 2007’74 Eileen Catherine Klein, BEd, ofSaskatoon, SK, in April 2007Abdul Mannan, PhD, of Bangladesh, inApril 2007Vera Clara Kinoskita, BEd, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’75 Shirley Irene Paustian, PhD, ofEdmonton, AB, in April 2007’76 Lawrence Paul Yurkiw, BSc, ’78,DDS, of Edmonton, AB, in February 2007’78 Naresh Chander Sharma, Dip(Ed),of Edmonton, AB, in June 2007’79 Richard Andrew Stollery, BSc, ’80BSc, ’84 BSc(Nu), of Camrose, AB, inJune 2007’80 Scott Robertson Wiebe, BCom, ofVancouver, BC, in May 2007Martin Albert Hausch, BA, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007’81 Wendy Edith Downe (Chynoweth),BEd, of Calgary, AB, in March 2007’83 Scott Jon Thorkelson, BA, ofEdmonton, AB, in May 2007Diana Louise Brierley, MSc, ofEdmonton, AB, in June 2007’84 Bonnie Eileen Gable, BEd, ofSherwood Park, AB, in April 2007June Anne Foster, BEd, of Edmonton,AB, in April 2007Edith Alfansa Wilson (Onderdonk), MEd,of Sherwood Park, AB, in April 2007’85 John Samuel, PhD, of Edmonton,AB, in April 2007’86 Christopher Allan Chichak, BEd,of Whitecourt, AB, in April 2007’87 Charlene Elizabeth Bromley, BA,of Edmonton, AB, in April 2007Barbara Faye Akins, BFA, of Kaleden,BC, in May 2007’88 Lynne M.B. Boytzun, BCom, ofCalgary, AB, in May 2007’89 Fae Angeline Scott, BEd, ofBeaumont, AB, in May 2007’90 Michele Marie Melik, BSc(Eng), ofSt. Albert, AB, in March 2007’92 Dennis Phillip Trischuk, BEd, ofFort Saskatchewan, AB, in April 2007’96 Kirsty Lynne Musselman, BSc, ’02MSc, of Wetaskiwin, AB, in December2006’00 Susan Louise Bennett, BSc(Eng),of Calgary, AB, in May 2007

***Alumni interested in submitting remem-brances about U of A graduates can senda text file to [email protected]. Tributesare posted on the ‘Memory Lane’ webpageat www.ualberta.ca/alumni/memorylane

from the U of A, he won a RhodesScholarship to Oxford University,where he also played for the OxfordUniversity Ice Hockey Club and refer-eed some hockey and lacrossegames. Returning to Canada duringthe Depression, he landed a jobwith an Edmonton law firm andbegan officiating minor league hock-ey before being hired as an NHL ref-eree in 1936.

When war broke out he enlistedas a private in the Canadian Armyand would eventually command the4th Armored Division — although hetook a reduction in rank to partici-pate in the D-Day invasion in 1945.Following the war he was appointedthe prosecution lawyer for theCanadian War Crimes Commissionat the Nuremberg trial of Nazi KurtMeyer, convicted of executing inno-cent Canadian prisoners-of-war. Hewas also awarded the Order of theBritish Empire and made King'sCounsel... as well as being inductedinto the Hockey Hall of Fame in1966, 11 years before he wouldstep down as NHL president.

In the end, Campbell would reignas NHL president for 31 years andhis time at the helm became theyardstick against which all succeededpresidents would be measured.


’07 Mary Bradley, BSc(Nu), followedthe footsteps of her mother, GillianBradley (Taylor), ’74 BSc, and hergrandmother, Phyllis Taylor(Brewster), ’36 BSc(Pharm), instudying at the U of A. One of 19pharmacy grads in 1936, Taylor, nowdeceased, became a research phar-macist, following up her U of Adegree with graduate studies at theUniversity of Minnesota, the Universityof London and the University ofCalifornia–Berkeley. Gillian Bradleytravelled the world as a member ofthe Canadian military and nowmakes her home in Calgary.

CentenaryHomecoming

2008SEPTEMBER 18 – 21

UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA

Alumni Recognition Awards � Football Game, BBQ & entertainmentTuck Shop Breakfast on Quad � Lectures � Faculty Receptions & Open Houses

Unveiling of Centenary Legacy � Alumni Centenary Dinner & Fireworks

If you are interested in planning a class reunion as part of Homecoming 2008 contact the Office of Alumni Affairs at (780) 492-3224, 1-800-661-2593, or [email protected]


Danielle Peers, ’01 BA,won the inauguralCanadian BasketballOutstanding Athleteaward in July 2007.Danielle, who plays cen-tre on the nationalwheelchair basketballteam, was named MVPof Canada’s gold medalteam at the world cham-pionships last summerand was a league MVPwhen she played in anall-men’s wheelchairleague in Europe. She isalso an ambassador forMuscular DystrophyCanada and a motiva-tional speaker.

Shane Gauthier, ’04 MEd, ’98 BEd, of Edmonton, has been workingfor Alberta Children’s Services and recently was promoted to manag-er of consultation in the Department of International, Intergovern -mental and Aboriginal Relations. He’s also, as a distance student,completing a master’s degree in liberal arts from Harvard University.

Somehow he has also found time to conceive of and write and pro-duce a children’s book. Patches the Beaver, Welcome to HarmonyWoods, is the first in a Patches the Beaver series he plans to produce.This book teaches children that we are “patched together by friendshipno matter where we are from, no matter who we are, and no matterwhat we look like.” Shane recently took his book to the Beijing

International Book Fair and is planning todevelop it into an interactive game and acartoon for television. “I’ve been busy!” hesays. For more information on his book, visitthe website at www.patchesthebeaver.com

Aware that studying at the U of A hasgiven him so much, Shane wanted to givea little back and has established two stu-dent awards in the Faculty of Education’sDepartment of Educational Psychology torecognize top undergraduate and graduatepapers in the area of special education.

Mark Woltersdorf, LLB, ofEdmonton, has been named apartner in the law firm FraserMilner Casgrain LLP.

Ronald Volpi, MBA, is working forNOVA Chemicals Corporation inJoffre, Alberta He describes his jobas “supply chain planning whereI’m responsible for polyethylene

inventory — basically trying to maxi-mize efficiency and margins whilekeeping customers happy and withenough resin to run their business-es, all with the least amount ofinventory. This place puts out 1.3billion pounds of plastic per year.”

’03 Martin Poirier, MEd, ofCalgary, was appointed coach of

Team Canada Debate in April2006. Under his tutelage, TeamCanada won the 2006 PanAmerican Debate Championshipsin L.A. in October, the 2006European Debate Championshipsin Stuttgart, Germany, inNovember, and finished fourth atthe 2007 World Schools Debate

Championships in Seoul, SouthKorea, in July.

’07 Anne McLellan, LLD(Honorary), of Edmonton, formerdeputy prime minister of Canada,has joined New MillenniumCapital, a Canadian iron ore development company, as a strategic advisor.


Scrapbook

1

1

2

2

3

5

4

6

7

At the Whitehorse alumni event held August 24, Catherine Harwood, JaneIsakson, ’98 BFA, Dave Brekke, ’77 MEd, ’65 BEd; Patricia McClelland, ’89MSc(Nu), ’80 BSc(Nu), and Lorraine Hoyt, ’66 Dip(Nu), ’63 Dip(Nu). Youngalumni at the 2007 University of AlbertaAlumni & Friends Dinner in Thailand, July 10. At the Summer Shindig at Edmonton’sBilliard Club July 19 were Maria Hunt, ’01 BSc(Env&Cons) and Chris Yiu, ’00 BEd and Mark Jung, ’94 BSc, who won a $100 restaurant gift certificate courtesy of Alberta Venture magazine.

& Alumni kayak trip in B.C., June 2007.

3

5

4

76

These former Bears — seen here waving the Canadian andJapanese flags at a press conference in Tokyo — made alittle trip to Japan to play a few games of hockey. Thequestion is, who are they? That’s what we’re asking you.

We don’t want to give away too much, so suffice it tosay they all had great university careers and some went onto play the game at a higher level, and some even higherstill. If you think you have the names that go with the faces,send them to us by November 9, 2007, and we’ll send outa prize to the person with the most correct answers. (We’ll

also send out a separate prize if one of their teammates atthe time writes in to identify them — after all, that is a bitof an unfair advantage.)

If more than one non-teammate correctly identifies allthe people pictured, or if there’s a tie, we’ll put the namesin a hat and draw a winner. Good luck, and keep yourstick on the ice.

Send your answers to New Trail, 6th Floor, GeneralServices Building, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta,Canada, T6H 2H1 or e-mail us at [email protected].

tuck shop

Face Off


Reun

ion

2007

September 27 – 30

..Thursday, September 27..

� Alumni Awards Ceremony & Reception �

It’s a night to celebrate outstanding U of Aalumni and their accomplishments!

Time: 5:30 p.m.– 8:30 p.m.; Place: Winspear Centre Cost: free

..Friday, September 28..

� Faculty Friday �A variety of open houses, tours and receptions hosted by the faculties.

� Faculty Events, Open House �

� Campus Tours �Time: 12:30 p.m.–1:30 p.m.

Place: Meet outside of Alumni Lounge, SUBCost: free

� Empey Lecture �“Is Your Community Weighing You Down?”featuring renowned scholar and researcher,

Dr. Kim Raine. Time: 1:15 p.m.–2:30 p.m. Place: TELUS Centre Cost: Free

� Reunion Dinner �

Sit with your classmates and enjoy the nostalgia of this evening celebration. This dinner is the marquee event of

Reunion 2007 — a celebration of the history of your alma mater and a chance toreacquaint yourself with your classmates!

Time: Reception: 6:00 p.m.; Dinner: 7:15 p.m.

Place: Hall D, Shaw Conference CentreCost: $45/person

It’s not too late to register!

For more details and to register check out www.ualberta.ca/alumni/reunion

or contact Colleen Elliott, Coordinator,Alumni Special Events at (780) 492-0866

or toll-free 1-800-661-2593 for information.

Please note, pre-registration is requiredfor all events. The registration deadline isMonday, September 24, 2007 depending

on space availability.

..Saturday, September 29..

..Sunday, September 30..

� President’s Breakfast �For those who graduated in 1957 or earlier. This is your chance to meet President Indira

Samarasekera and hear her dynamic and daring vision for the future of the University. Time: 9:00 a.m. – noon Place: Hall D, Shaw Conference Centre Cost: $15/person

new trail autumn 2007

Documents

meloche monnex insurance

auto insurance program

alumni achievements

z i n ea u t u

td meloche monnex home

u of aand

group home

university of albertathat