AlumNotes

Read more details on these alumni achievements in the Alumni & Friends section of King’s website: www.ukings.ca/alumni

70s

Rev. Robert David Price, BST’71, has retired from active ministry with the Anglican Church after 51 years of ordained service. Trained in Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR) he will continue to do trauma recovery work with people who suffer with substance abuse disorder. Price is also exploring the impact of quantum physics and evolution upon spiritual understanding.

Judy White, BA’79, recently retired from the Florida Department of Education. Over 14 years, she held several positions, retiring as chief of the Bureau of Exceptional Education and Student Services.

80s

Rev. Canon David Fletcher, BA’81, retired from parish ministry at the end of February. He served the Nova Scotia parishes of Port Morien and Louisbourg (where he was ordained a priest in 1986), New Waterford and Dominion with Reserve Mines and Lantz, where he served for over 31 years. Fletcher has moved to Halifax. Filmmaker John D. Scott,’88, had his film, Elizabeth Bishop and the Art of Losing, premiere at FIN Atlantic International Film Festival. The film was 10 years in the making and recounts Bishop’s journey through loss. Focused on the creation of Bishop’s poem, One Art, Scott believes that’s the poem which cemented Bishop’s legacy as one of Canada’s greatest poets.

Illustration by Emma Fitzgerald

Matt Aronson, BA(Hons)’01, has been elected to the position of city councillor for District 7 in Westmount, Quebec. It’s not Aronson’s first time in office—he served as KSU president in 1999-2000. “Everything I know about representing constituents, I learned from my time at the KSU,” notes Aronson. “I look forward to putting those lessons to work in my new role.” He will also continue to practice law during his four-year term. Catherine Ellis, BA(Hons)’93, co-chaired Ryerson University’s Standing Strong (Mash Koh Wee Kah Pooh Win) Task Force, which addressed the work and legacy of the university’s namesake, Egerton Ryerson. The Task Force has recommended the university be renamed, in addition to supporting educational initiatives and activities that advance decolonization and reconciliation on campus.

90s

Roger Thompson, BA(Hons)’91, is now a research fellow with the Centre for the Study of Security and Development at Dalhousie University. Currently teaching civics and Ethics in Science Fiction Films at Kyung Hee University in South Korea, he hopes to return to Halifax sometime this year.

Lana (Mitchell) MacEachern, BJ(Hons)’97, recently marked eight years as a library technician with the Nova Scotia Health Authority (NSHA). Her roles have included training staff to use electronic patient record software, supporting the NSHA Covid-19 Hub, and creating e-learning modules for a new critical care paramedic program. MacEachern and her husband, Brent, live in Caribou River, N.S. Their son, Jonah, attends the Sobey School of Business, Saint Mary’s University.

Rev. Dr. Andrew O’Neill, BA’98, has been appointed to a half-time, tenure-track position as assistant professor of pastoral theology at Atlantic School of Theology (AST). He has taught courses at AST for the past 11 years and has served as a graduate student supervisor.

On January 22, 2022, Dr. Christopher Elson, BA(Hons)’86, King’s Carnegie Professor of French and Dr. Kate Scarth (assistant professor of Applied Leadership, Culture and Communications and chair, Lucy Maud Montgomery Studies at the University of Prince Edward Island), welcomed Lucie Maxine Elson into their lives. A beautiful baby girl, Lucie was born at the IWK in Halifax.

Michelle Axworthy, BA(Hons)’07, has joined the Halifax partnership of the law firm Cox & Palmer. Axworthy works closely with her clients in all areas of family law.

Rebeccah Love, ’10, and Mitchell Cushman, BA(Hons)’08, are two of the producers of the feature-length film Lessons in Temperament. Cushman initially developed the script as a stage play with the writer and performer James Smith. Both film and play examine what it’s like to grow up in a neuro-diverse family. Smith, one of four brothers, tells the story by exploring the art and science of piano tuning. Matt Fegan, BJ(Hons)’05, has been promoted from vice-president, operations, with the Halifax Wanderers Football Club to the club’s sports director. This is a new role in which he is responsible for off-field duties and improvements to the club.

The short film Parlour Palm by independent filmmaker Rebeccah Love, ’10, is now streaming on CBC Gem. The film follows an overworked lawyer as he attempts to care for his partner who’s suffering from a manic episode induced by anxiety over climate change. Marco Chown Oved, BA(Hons)’05, was part of a team of Toronto Star reporters that received a National Newspaper Award (NNA) in the business category for a series of articles showing that Covid deaths in nursing homes were far higher in for-profit facilities than non-profit ones. The team also found for-profit long term care chains employed fewer staff and accepted government subsidies while paying out millions in dividends and executive bonuses. This is Oved’s second NNA.

Christina Turner, BA(Hons)’10, recently received her PhD in English Literature from the University of Toronto. Turner’s doctoral dissertation examined how contemporary works of Indigenous literature respond to legal definitions of Indigenous rights in Supreme Court of Canada decisions. She began a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Manitoba in August 2021.

Stephanie Duchon, BA(Hons)’13, received a certificate with honours from Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) in the program Cool Climate Wine and Viticulture. She is now working at local wineries as part of their vineyard teams and hopes to travel to the old-world wine regions to learn more. Eventually Duchon will make wine in Nova Scotia.

Musician Thomas McCallum, BA(Hons)’14, released his first full-length album, Many a Long Hour, and toured it across the Maritimes in the fall of 2021. Many a Long Hour can be streamed on all major platforms.

Karla Mendes, MJ’14, has completed an extensive and complex research project which has been published on Mongabay, a U.S.-based non-profit conservation and environmental science news platform. The report investigates the damaging effects of the palm oil industry in the Amazon, including deforestation, pollution and human rights violations.

Launched in 2020, Story Hunter Podcasts have just released their 50th episode. Produced, written and voiced by Catherine Fogarty, MFA’18, the series examines the history and mystery of famous crimes involving Canadians. Recent episodes have featured celebrities like the Vancouver-born Dorothy Stratten, a Playboy Playmate who was murdered in 1980, and Brantford, Ont., native, Phil Hartman, who achieved great success as a comedian on Saturday Night Live and was murdered in 1998. Taylor Simon, BA’19, is pursuing a Master of Education at Trent University and developing wildlife and conservation educational programming for Aspen Valley Wildlife Sanctuary in Ontario. A runner-up for the Natural Curiosity Suzuki Award for Excellence in Pre-Service Environmental Education, she’s currently teaching in Ontario. Of the Foundation Year Program (FYP), Simon says, “FYP provided me with the writing and critical thinking skills I use as an educator and a master’s student and I am excited to pass what I have learned to future generations.”

Karli Zschogner, BJ’18, is training in Yellowknife for her new position as a CBC video journalist in Inuvik, also in the Northwest Territories, where she’ll be responsible for radio, TV and web news stories. She’ll be covering the Beaufort Delta Region in the western Arctic and her work can be seen on CBC North.

Last Fish, First Boat, a first film for Jen-

nifer Thornhill Verma, BJ(Hons)’02,

MFA’19, screened in several film festivals last year. The animated short, co-produced by Verma with illustrator/animator, Kat Frick Miller and Canadian Geographic filmmaker-in-residence, Matt LeMay, tells the story of the early ’90s cod fishery collapse and how fisherman Eugene Maloney turns the end of the fishery into a new beginning— boatbuilding. It’s adapted from Verma’s 2019 book, Cod Collapse. You can watch the film on the Canadian Geographic website. Thornhill Verma has received a Canadian Council for the Arts grant to adapt another story in her book into an animated short. Working with Miller and LeMay, Unsettled is a tale of leaving the outports when communities were relocated.

Philip Moscovitch, MFA’19, wrapped up season 2 of D’innombrables voyages, the French-language podcast of the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21. The podcast, produced by Moscovitch and hosted by author Kim Thuy, highlights stories of immigrants, past and present and their multifaceted contributions to Canada. Moscovitch is also co-host of the books podcast Dog-eared and Cracked, with his fellow bibliophile known simply as Jay. Old friends with very different tastes, for each episode the two recommend books for each other and then sit down and discuss them, with sometimes surprising results. Evany Rosen, BA(Hons)’10, received a 2021 Writers Guild of Canada Screenwriting Award nomination for her writing on comedy sitcom New Eden.

Gillian Turnbull’s, MFA’17, feature article on student loans in Canada is on the cover of Maisonneuve’s winter edition. In “Debt Trap,” she examines why student loans have become such a burden and how the system needs to shift. Now a mentor in the MFA program, she’s also the host of Further Reading, a podcast about the craft of writing from King’s MFA program (read all about it on pg. 10!). There are now 12 episodes available anywhere you subscribe to podcasts.

IN MEMORIAM

Susan (Price) Barrett, (BA(Hons)’78), October 2021 Cindy Belyea, (friend of the college), March 27, 2021 Derek Brown, (friend of the college), November 9, 2021 Brian Burnell, (friend of the college), September 14, 2021 Kim Cameron, (BSc’68, DCL’10),

November 30, 2021 Carol Ann Charlebois, (DCnL’14),

December 31, 2021 Michel Deguy, (DCL’16),

February 16, 2022 Thomas “Neville” Elwood, (friend of the college), April 30, 2021 Richard Goldbloom, (friend of the college), November 19, 2021 James Golding, (1959), March 6, 2021 Wayne Hankey, (BA(Hons)’65 and Inglis Professor),

February 6, 2022 Cecil Hebb, (BA’50, BSc’53),

February 18, 2021 John Honderich, (DCL’15),

February 5, 2022 Donald Johnston, (DCL’99),

February 4, 2022 Marian (Huggard) Lines, (BA'63), November 2021 Elizabeth (Cordes) MacCara, (BA’51), March 29, 2021 Katherine MacDonald, (friend of the college), January 17, 2022 Guy MacLean, (friend of the college and former dean of men), October 29, 2021 Alexa McDonough, (DCL’95),

January 15, 2022 David Morris, (1963),

May 29, 2021 David Murphy, (friend of the college), February 24, 2021 Margaret (Harris) Myles, (BA’65), June 30, 2021 George Phills, (BA’56),

September 14, 2021 Anne “Nan” Robertson, (student), November 13, 2021 Phoebe Roper, (friend of the college), April 2, 2021 Donald Sobey, (DCL’13),

March 24, 2021 Harry Steele, (friend of the college), January 28, 2022 Pearl (Mauger) Whittier, (1959),

September 30, 2021 Marjorie "Budge" (Archibald)

Wilson, (1946), March 19, 2021 John Yogis, (friend of the college), November 23, 2021

Up to February 23, 2022

AENEAS AND ANCHISES RELIEF RESTORED

AS THE FACILITIES TEAM prepared campus for the return of students during the summer of 2021, one section of the Bays’ façade received special attention. It was the historic bas-relief sculpture installed above Middle Bay, depicting Aeneas fleeing the burning ruins of Troy and carrying his father, Anchises on his back. The scene comes from The Aenid, the Latin epic regularly studied in the Foundation Year Program. The same scene is found on the Alumni Association’s seal. Dating to 1861 when King’s was located in Windsor, N.S., the stone sculpture was a gift from the Alumni Association to the college and was originally placed in the gable of Convocation Hall.

When fire destroyed the main building of the Windsor campus in 1920, Convocation Hall was spared. At the request of Canon Vroom and the alumni, the sculpture was brought to Halifax in 1930 and incorporated into the new campus above the entrance to Middle Bay. At the time, Canon Vroom wrote to the Alumni Executive that the sculpture would remind the King’s community of the alumni’s help rebuilding the college—an act that echoed the assistance and self-preservation that are expressed in the sculpture.

Restoration work was undertaken to clear years’ worth of atmospheric residue from the limestone sculpture’s surface and its structure was stabilized. Stonework forming the niche around the sculpture was also cleaned and repaired. Now fully restored, the sculpture once again symbolizes the strength of the Alumni Association and the values and education that unite generation after generation of current King’s students to the alumni who came before.

TOP LEFT: Photo depicting restoration work BOTTOM LEFT: The restored relief sculpture TOP RIGHT: The sculpture is visible in this 1910 photo of Convocation Hall in Windsor, N.S. Today this building is listed in the Register of Canada’s Historic Places. It presently houses the King's-Edgehill School Library and the area where the sculpture was located has been bricked over BOTTOM CENTRE: Alumni Association seal drawing, 1850: featuring the motto “Nec nate tibi comes ire recuso” which translates to “I am ready to go with you, my son, as your companion”, from The Aeneid, Book II, line 704 BOTTOM RIGHT: Alumni Association wax seal used in 1849

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT & THANKS

On December 31, 2021, Janet Hathaway officially retired as the King’s librarian and archivist—for real this time! Arriving at King’s in 1994, Janet retired the first time in 2015. She was called back as a consultant through 2016 and in 2018 returned as interim librarian, until recently when Tracy Lenfesty arrived to assume the role (see pg. 21).

Although Janet would eschew even this brief spotlight, we close this issue with our gratitude and thanks on behalf of the college alumni—many of whom worked for Janet as students—for the history, ephemera and treasures she so fastidiously researched, catalogued and stored. We acknowledge the support she has given to the editors of Tidings, providing content and archival photos like the ones in the preceding story of Aeneas and Anchises, year after year. Hats off to you, Janet. The Alumni Association joins your King’s colleagues in wishing you well.