College of Agriculture and Biosciences 1969 (50 years) Graduate Reunion

Nineteen Graduates from 1969 came to the reunion banquet on Saturday, January 12th, plus one came to the Friday get together but not the banquet. Not too shabby for a bunch of 72-year-olds. There could have been more but some never answered their emails, a  few said they had been to Saskatchewan in January and had no intention of repeating it.  But at least three flew in from Arizona, Mexico, and Hawaii just for the occasion.

Picture courtesy Jo Hammond.

The only girl in our class flew in from Kamloops. Her husband had to stay home to mind cows as they cowboy for neighbouring ranches since they retired. Less stressful than owning the cows.

What a great time catching up on all the intervening years. Some hadn't seen each other for 50 years, some 10 years, since the last reunion. I was at our 30th in 1999. The stuff we did in college had improved over the years with the telling and retelling.  Today, any of it would have got us expelled from the University.

One of the highlights of the banquet was introducing two graduates from 1939 (80 years) and 1943. They were 102 and 103 respectively. They looked healthy enough to make the next 10-year reunion.

The annual reunions are organized by Saskatchewan Agricultural Graduates Association (SAGA). Any graduate can attend but the focus each year is on the 10, 20, 30, etc. year grads. Next year the 50-year grads will be from 1970. SAGA has a program for 65 years and older grads who do not have to pay registration.  There were quite a few '54 and '49 grads plus the two centenarians.

On Saturday morning a number of us toured the new (opened in October) Beef Forage Centre of Excellence about 20 minutes east of Saskatoon.  It replaced and combined several aging facilities including the old feedlot where I did some of my MSc research work which had been built in 1962.

This three-minute video gives a pretty good overview of the new facility:

In my life, I have never wanted to relive one minute of it or be younger.  Once was enough.  But when I saw that new research facility and heard about the work being done and that could be done, I wished I was 40 years younger.  I would have signed up for a PhD program immediately. But it is a new generation that will have all the fun and that is OK.