A Brief History of the Lisgar Alumni Association

Through Lisgar's history there have been organizations of alumni both formal and informal. For example, there has been a group of alum football players who get together informally every year since the 1960s. They meet in a local restaurant for a visit and dinner. Their coach, the late Rene Charron, was always invited and usually attended. Lisgar friends and contemporaries are always welcome. A more formal group was the OCI Old Boys Organization. It had a formal structure with an executive and held an annual dinner at the historically famous Russell Hotel. The Russell was the Chateau Laurier of Ottawa in the years before the Chateau was built in the early 20th century. The Old Boys group was very active and was responsible for establishing academic prizes as well as athletic trophies at the school. This group was also responsible for planning Ottawa Collegiate Institute's Diamond Anniversary Reunion in 1903, the first really formal anniversary celebration recorded in the school's history. The Old Boys published the first history of the Collegiate for that reunion, which is still one of the best chronicles of Lisgar's first 60 years. So our current Alumni Association follows a long tradition.

Creation of the current Association in 1984 was suggested by Brian Mitchell (1982), then a very recently-graduated alum who was Head Boy in 1981-82, and a senior student, Diana Smallridge. They felt there should be such an organization through which they could keep in touch with the school and schoolmates after graduation. They approached the organizing committee of the 140th Anniversary Reunion and asked if they could advertise during the reunion weekend festivities to gauge support among the attendees for an alumni association. They put out a sign-up sheet for interested alum and received enough signatures to proceed. A number of local alum, along with some teachers, held the first meeting in the fall of 1984. An ad hoc executive group was formed to manage the organization and to build its membership. This original group included Jim Kerr (1962), Barb O'Brien (Brenagh, 1959), Betty Jane Marsh (Bolduc, 1960), Wayne Pointen (1959), Gerry Diamond (1936), Penelope Feather, Kathy Ullrich (1963), Brian Mitchell, and Diana Smallridge. The executive committee established an annual fee of $5 to cover the cost of mailing a newsletter to the potential membership. Employing the mailing list from the 140th anniversary, they sent their first letter of solicitation. Slowly, members began sending in their membership fees along with letters of support. Now it was time for the executive to work out its mandate. What was to be its mission?

Stained Glass Windows in the Heritage Wall

Our mission was never negotiated or assigned but rather evolved gradually through the Association's taking on of various projects in support of the school. Under the leadership of our first chairman, Jim Kerr, the first big event planned was the unveiling ceremony of the stained glass windows installed in the Heritage Wall. The money for the design and construction of both the special window frames and the stained glass windows had been raised by a lottery held during the 140th celebrations. In support, the then current student body assisted in selling lottery tickets throughout the community in the period leading up to the reunion weekend in May 1984. The newly created Alumni Association participated in selecting the designers and the Lisgar symbols used in the design. Alumni member Michael Edwards (1960) and his firm D. Kemp Edwards Lumber designed and manufactured the window frames for the project. The Principal, Mr. Glavin, found money in the budget to install the back lights as we only had enough to cover the frames and stained glass. The unveiling took place on Saturday, June 1, 1985. Much to everyone's disappointment only a few showed up for the occasion, but it was a very meaningful unveiling in spite of that. We were very pleased that Miss Meech attended. While we were disappointed on the one hand, we were delighted that the project had been carried out successfully. We had raised over $14,000 for the project and we had a beautiful heritage window in the school and a great subject for our fledgling newsletter. The project had taken almost two years to complete.

Our next major project was to give long overdue recognition to Lisgar's only alumnus ever to be awarded the Victoria Cross, in this case for bravery during the Boer War. With the enthusiastic assistance of the Third Dragoons, Lisgar's history department, and the grandchildren of the recipient, Sgt Edward Holland, the Association organized a ceremony in honour of his great achievement, which took place in the school auditorium with all students present. The school was presented with a plaque displaying a replica of Holland's Victoria Cross, and it was mounted in Lisgar's Memorial Hall. A framed print of the battle in which Holland won the Cross was presented to Lisgar by the Commanding Officer of the Dragoons whose home base is now CFB Gagetown where Holland's actual medal is displayed in the Dragoon's museum. This print hangs in the Library. Another great story for our newsletter!

The ongoing task of building the membership lists and mailing out two newsletters per year was being carried out by a dedicated executive committee that included Barb O'Brien her husband Brien O'Brien (1959), membership lists; Ken Medland (1980), newsletter editor; Jim Kerr, chairman; Doug Arrand (1961), teaching staff liaison; John Dunfield (1939), veteran's issues; Betty Jane Marsh, secretary; Gerry Diamond. As the late 1980s were approaching, the executive began looking ahead to the 150th Anniversary of Lisgar set to take place in 1993. We wanted the sesquicentennial to be a very special celebration. Brainstorming went on for months and out of this came plans to publish a book of the school's 150 years of history. There had been an attempt to write a history on the occasion of Lisgar's 100th anniversary in 1943, but it had been a failure largely due to the wartime situation. With this in mind, the executive felt it was time to do a top-notch history of the school. We approached alum Joan Finnigan-MacKenzie (1944) who not only had been the Editor of the Vox in 1943-44 but has also been a prolific and extremely successful author. We had very little money and no real knowledge of what this project would entail but a committee was formed to approach Joan and to give our executive leadership in carrying out this ambitious project. We were delighted when Joan agreed to edit the history book and give us the professional and the creative direction required. Pat Hood (Pearce, 1959) joined us as the copy editor on the book project. The history book was a very challenging project, demanding much time and energy in supporting Joan's work in researching interviewing alumni, designing, editing, etc. The biggest challenge facing us was raising the approximately $80,000 which it ultimately cost. When it was published in time for the Sesquicentennial, we were delighted to have made the deadline, but when we read it and began receiving the accolades from those who purchased it, we were even more delighted in a job well done.

Lisgar Collegiate Coat of Arms

Another major project suggested to celebrate Lisgar's 150th was to request an official Coat of Arms from the Chief Herald of Canada. This project was approved by the executive and fundraising began to pay the relatively high cost associated with producing a coat of arms. John Boehmer (1965), a history teacher at Lisgar, agreed to chair this project and entered into negotiations with the Chief Herald of Canada. As events turned out, this project would take a few years to complete. One can see the Association was very ambitious during the late 1980s and in the period leading up to the 1993 reunion.

The executive was gradually improving the quality of our newsletters under the capable editorship of Ken Medland, assisted by Pat Hood. After Ken Medland took a well deserved rest, Pat Hood took over and was newsletter editor until the spring of 2003. One can only imagine what it was like on the meeting night when we had to fold, staple, affix address label and stamp on 2500+ newsletters (lick and stick, we called it). We sat around the big table in the library for hours completing this task. In the 1990s, with our membership increasing and the newsletter being mailed to 4000 plus, we turned our attention to improving the efficiency of publishing and mailing. We purchased desktop publishing programs, and Lisgar students did the layout for our newsletter in a much more attractive and professional style. We employed a small company which specializes in inserting the letters into envelopes on which the addresses are printed from our computer- generated mailing list, and an excellent printer who prints the newsletters at a reasonable cost. The result is that we are producing a newsletter the alumni association is very proud of. We are especially indebted to Imran Haq (1990), Rizwan Haq (1991), Salman Haq (1994), Cameron Moreland (1998), Daniel Kekez (1999) and Avi Caplan (2000) for their creative desktop publishing skills applied to our newsletters while they were still students at Lisgar.

During the last five to ten years we have received help from members such as our treasurer, John Barclay (1953), who has done a wonderful job of getting our financial records and finances into shape. John has also invested the life membership fees wisely so the annual interest income is maximized to help finance the work of the Association. We could not survive without our Margaret Pippy (Lugsdin, 1952), membership and corresponding secretary. She took over from Marie Hutt, our first secretary who worked in the alumni office. In addition to the onerous task of maintaining the membership address lists, Margaret is the recording secretary of the Lisgar Fund and as such she records all donations and prepares the income tax receipts. Milton Shaffer (1936), whose experience, wisdom, and sense of humour kept the executive on course was a member for the last 15 years. Joan Chrysler Quain (1942) has served on the exec for the last 10 years at least. George Toller (1947), former Head Boy, has acted as our vice chair in the past and for a number of years has been our best cheerleader and ideas man. He was the liaison on establishing the Dorothy Bishop Scholarship, provides copious clippings and story material for the newsletter, and organizes the annual luncheon. David MacGougan, former librarian and music teacher, was the official archivist of the Association and the school until 2002, when Joy Heft took over. The archivist receives donated school memorabilia, documents, and other school artifacts, catalogues them, and stores them in the school archives. Recently we have been joined by younger alumni, Daniel Kekez and Avi Caplan, who have undertaken to establish this Web site. They are also developing new programs to allow more interaction with the Association through this Web site, and are helping the school, teachers, and clubs make use of our server.

The members of the executive most recently turned their attention to establishing a scholarship in Miss Meech's honour and to organizing a 160th Anniversary reunion. We are always ready to assist the school in any way we can when called upon, and attempt to apply your donations to the Lisgar Fund in the most helpful manner. Our first and foremost task is always to serve our membership. We are always in the market for new executive members who are willing to offer their time and talents. Ideally we would like to have two representatives from each decade, one from the first half and the other from the second. If you live in the capital region and would be interested in joining us please contact us or simply come out on the third Monday of the month to the library at 7:30 p.m. Telephone us at (613) 239-2478, fax us at (613) 235-7497, write us at the school or send an e-mail to alumni@lisgar.net. We will get back to you immediately.