The Premier of Saskatchewan and Mrs. Romanow requested the pleasure of my company at the 14th investiture of the Saskatchewan Order of Merit.
Would I go? You bet. On the appointed day, I had my hair done and set out for Regina. The investiture was slated for 6:30 and we were to be seated by 6:20.
In his remarks to the five who were invested, the Lieutenant Governor spoke of their service and also their example.
And, indeed, they do present an example to the rest of us of what can be done if we will only do it. Matters of sex, race and physical handicap were not barriers to their success. I suspect that they were never even an issue.
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Isabelle Butters of Weyburn worked her way up the ranks of the Weyburn Co-perative Association from office assistant to general manager. She was alderman and mayor of Weyburn. She worked tirelessly for a number of community groups and today is the president of the provincial Heart and Stroke Foundation.
Dr. Constantine Campbell came to Canada from Jamaica at age 21. He did his degrees in Ontario and Saskatchewan and spent most of his working life as a scientist with the Agriculture Canada research station at Swift Current, where he built up an international reputation as a dryland farming expert. His research has helped make dryland farming more productive.
Law professor Roger Carter played a decisive role in opening the legal profession to aboriginal people. When he started a summer program in 1973 to prepare aboriginal people for the study of law, there were four lawyers of aboriginal ancestry in Canada. Today, there are 600, two-thirds graduates of his program.
John Green emigrated to Canada from Britain in 1935 when he was 20. In 1945, he began a career as legal advisor with Saskatchewan Government Insurance, moving up to become general manager in 1973. He has been active in the Canadian Bar Association, the Scouts, United Way, Canadian National Institute for the Blind and Lions Club. Mr. Green has been blind since he was a young man.
Savella Stechishin, 95, is a leader in the Ukrainian community. A journalist and author, she was the first Ukrainian woman to graduate from the University of Saskatchewan and the first to receive a home economics degree. She initiated the Ukrainian Women’s Association of Canada in 1927 and was co-founder of the Ukrainian Museum of Canada.
It was a night to be savored.
