Alumni

The Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry’s 2018 Alumni Award recipients

AUTHOR

KIRSTEN BAUER

PHOTOS BY

JOHN ULAN AND RYAN WHITEFIELD

Marcia Boyd

’69 DDS, 2018 DISTINGUISHED ALUMNI AWARD

UAlberta professor emerita and former dean of the Faculty of Dentistry at University of British Columbia. National and international steward to the field of dentistry and dental education. Agent of many ‘firsts’ in organized dentistry. Holds countless awards, honorary degrees and membership in the Order of Canada

Charles Lee

’90 BSC(SPEC), ’93 MSC, ’96 PHD, 2018 DISTINGUISHED ALUMNI AWARD

President of the Human Genome Organization (HUGO) and director of the Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Key player in the discovery of structural variation in the human genome, opening the door for new genetic tests and paving the way for modern genomics

Ronald Moore ’80 BSC, ’86 MD, ’91 PHD, ALUMNI HONOUR AWARD

Scientific director of the Surgery Strategic Clinical Network within Alberta Health Services and Mr. Lube Foundation Chair in Uro-Oncology. Improving care for urological cancers and renal transplantations

Barbara Romanowski

'71 BSC(MED), ’73 MD, ALUMNI HONOUR AWARD

Clinical professor of infectious diseases and public health advocate. Key player in establishing HIV Edmonton, Edmonton’s Sexually Transmitted Infection clinic and the development of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine

Lindsay Linden Crowshoe

'93 BMEDSC, ’95 MD, ALUMNI HONOUR AWARD

Founding director of the Elbow River Healing Lodge and director of the undergraduate Aboriginal Health Program at Cumming School of Medicine at the University of Calgary. Advancing Indigenous health by developing culturally informed health practices with Indigenous communities, creating guidelines and policies for practitioners and transforming medical education

Brenda Walker ’71 DENTAL HYGIENE, ALUMNI HONOUR AWARD

Chief administrative officer of the College of Registered Dental Hygienists of Alberta. Lobbyist, advocate and driving force for advances and self-regulation in the field of dental hygiene

Lisa Hartling ’90 BSCPT, ’10 PHD, ALUMNI INNOVATION AWARD

Developed—with Shannon Scott, ’06 Phd, Nursing— TREKK (Translating Emergency Knowledge for Kids), a knowledge mobilization initiative to digitally pool as-it-happens medical knowledge to improve emergency care for children

Yachiyo Yoneyama ’43 DDS

AUTHOR

TAYLOR LAMBERT

Harry E. Bulyea, the first director of the U of A’s School of Dentistry, painted a portrait of Yachiyo Yoneyama.

THE FIRST WOMAN TO GRADUATE FROM UALBERTA’S SCHOOL OF DENTISTRY ATTENDED WHEN THE CANADIAN GOVERNMENT FORCEFULLY REMOVED AND INTERNED TENS OF THOUSANDS OF JAPANESE-CANADIANS

HERE IS AN excerpt from Taylor Lambert’s book Roots: Extracted Tales from a century of Dentistry at the University of Alberta, pointing out Yoneyama in the 1943 dentistry graduating class picture:

cropped haircuts of the white men who fill the rest of the frame. When Yoneyama began studying dentistry at the U of A, she was not the first woman—Fern Rideout had studied for a few years around 1920 before dropping out—but she would be the first woman to graduate. Born in Vancouver to Japanese parents who had emigrated to Canada shortly after marrying in 1914, Yoneyama was not only the sole woman in her graduating class, but also the only visible minority. She and (Dr. Harry E.) Bulyea (first director of the School) became friends, bonding over their mutual artistic passions: he painted a flattering portrait of her, and she drew a pencil sketch of him. Yoneyama’s older sister, Misao, was also at the U of A studying medicine, when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Less than three months later, the forced removal and internment of tens of thousands of Japanese-Canadians began. Their parents, their younger sister, Mitsue, and their younger brother, Yutaka, were forced to leave their farm.

Yutaka Yoneyama recalls that time:

By May, the licence plates from our car were removed; cameras, explosives and firearms were confiscated; and we were placed under curfew. Mom and Dad, especially Dad, were devastated by the evacuation order since their income would be minimal. Misao and Yachiyo still had another year to complete before graduation. Somehow Dad and Mom managed….

“I suddenly realized that I was considered one of ‘them’ and not one of ‘us.’”

(At a community meeting,) discussions centred around what had to be done in the event of an attack… the lights were turned down, and I was escorted out of the meeting. I was shocked and devastated. I suddenly realized that I was considered one of ‘them’ and not one of ‘us.’ The family, already separated from two daughters, was further split up: Mitsue was sent to a relocation camp near Hope, while Yutaka and his parents ended up working on a farm south of Edmonton, exploited by the landowners as prisoners of war. After two months of labour, they were paid a mere $30. Yachiyo left no letters or journals recording her school experiences, but it is fair to say that this was a difficult time to be Japanese-Canadian and one of the darkest moments in Canada’s history. She graduated from the dentistry program in 1943, then moved to Lamont, Alberta, to serve as the dental health officer in a rural clinic before she took a Guggenheim Fellowship in New York, and eventually settled in Toronto where she practised pediatric dentistry for decades. She died in 2013 at 96, after a long career and rich family life. Her achievement and distinction would often be held up in later, more-progressive decades as an important milestone in the history of the dental school. But the juxtaposing context of the concurrent injustice to her family has always been omitted, and thus not widely known.

“This was a difficult time to be Japanese-Canadian and one of the darkest moments in Canada’s history.”

Taylor Lambert is an Alberta journalist and author. His other books include Darwin’s Moving, Rising: Stories of the 2013

Alberta Flood, and Leaving Moose Jaw.

Roots: Extracted Tales from a century of Dentistry at the University of Alberta is now available in trade paperback for purchase online, at the U of A Bookstore and Audrey’s Books in Edmonton. All proceeds go to support Dentistry for Life fundraising campaign.