The traditional territory of the Takla Lake First Nation is located in North Central British Columbia, and totals approximately 27,250 square kilometres. The territory is a rich environment of lakes, rivers, forests and mountains, bordered on the west by the Skeena Mountains and on the east by the Rocky Mountains. Today, the Takla Lake Nation is an amalgamation of the North Takla Band and the Fort Connelly Band, a union which occurred in 1959. Their traditional lands are the geographic area occupied by their ancestors for community, social, economic and spiritual purposes. Carrier and Sekani place names exist for every physical feature and place that they occupied. Each name reflects the significance of the feature or site and today provides them with historical information to the rich history and extensive knowledge of the land and resources owned by the Takla people. (for more information see http://www.taklafn.ca/nation/31/home )
The main function of the Task Force to Review Northern Post Secondary Education was to listen to the public and educators within the northern regions regarding the regional delivery of UNBC programs. At the time, people from across Northern BC were concerned that UNBC would be limited to Prince George operations, and would not represent or serve other regions of Northern BC. The Task Force met with 350 people through visits to Prince Rupert, Kitimat, Terrace, Hazelton, Smithers, Burns Lake, Vanderhoof, Quesnel, William's Lake and Dawson Creek. Telephone calls and letters resulted in further input. During the formal presentations and general discussion held throughout the four northern college regions (Northwest, College of New Caledonia, Northern Lights, and Cariboo College) the residents expressed tremendous support for UNBC. During each meeting, there was a range of expectations regarding program delivery. There were, however, themes common to all meetings, including : that UNBC plan for regional programs and services at the same time as the Prince George campus ; that there be more regional representatives in the governing council of UNBC ; and that UNBC develop innovative, non-traditional approaches to delivery systems, administrations, and educational partnerships in order to meet the needs of northern communities. The paper was submitted to Ministry of Advanced Education, Training and Technology 31 March 1992. UNBC issued a response 6 April 1992
Hermina Agnes Wessel was born to John Wessel and Agnes Henry (Hamana) in Gastown on June 20, 1878. Mr. Wessel who hailed from Amsterdam, Holland, came to Canada as a mariner travelling by way of Cape Horn. He worked at the Hastings Sawmill in Gastown which was then managed by a man named Richard Henry Alexander. He married Agnes, daughter of Henry and Catherine Hamana, recent Hawaiian immigrants to Canada, and together they had three children: Hermina, John Jr. and Sarah, of which Minnie was the eldest.
In 1879, Minnie moved with her parents to South Pender Island where her father was installed as a shepherd with James Alexander, brother to the manager of the Hastings Sawmill. Her mother left their family after the birth of Sarah, the youngest Wessel child. Her father soon thereafter divorced his wife and entered both Hermina and Sarah into St. Anne’s Convent in Victoria, while her brother John stayed with their father on South Pender Island. John Wessel Jr. died at the age of 10.
In 1889 John Wessel moved to Saturna Island to work for Mr. Warburton Pike as manager of the Pike Ranch. Upon graduating from the Convent, Hermina moved back with her father where she lived until her marriage to Hugh Taylor in Victoria on November 20, 1902.
At the time of their marriage Hugh Taylor had a freighting contract to carry supplies for the construction of the Dominion Yukon Telegraph Line. So for their honeymoon, the two rode horseback in the pack train from Ashcroft to Hazelton. Arriving in the late summer, Minnie Taylor remained in Hazelton while her husband went on to Telegraph Creek. The next year they built their log ranch house at Kispiox, Mr. Taylor became the local telegraph operator and together they taught themselves the Morse code. At the birth of their second child, this knowledge of Morse code allowed them to communicate with Dr. Wrinch at the nearest hospital through their local telegraph operator in Hazelton!
In the spring of 1919 Hugh Taylor was appointed to the staff of the Public Works Department of the Provincial Government and so the family moved to South Fort George. Upon their arrival they stayed in the Alexandra Hotel until their household effects arrived by train. In 1921 Mr. Taylor died of pneumonia.
Minnie Taylor and her family lived in Prince George until 1935 when she moved to live with her daughter Lucy and family in Grand Forks. During the war years she lived with her son Dixon and family in Chisolm Mills, afterwhich she returned to the Lower Mainland where she again lived with Lucy and family until her death on February 3, 1972. She was survived by four daughters (Mrs. Ellen Garland, Mrs. Violet Baxter, Mrs. Lucy Burbidge and Mrs. Virginia Woods) and two sons (Arthur and Dr. Hugh Taylor Jr.). She was predeceased by her two sons Dixon (1962) and Thomas (1944).
Hugh Taylor was born in Quebec on 28 November 1874 to Thomas Dixon Taylor and his wife Lucy E. Bourchier. Thomas Taylor, of Ottawa, was a civil engineer, who predeceased his son; Hugh’s brother, Lieutenant Colonel Plunkett (wife Florence) Taylor of Ottawa, was a manager of the Bank of Ottawa. His nephew Edward Plunkett (E.P.) Taylor was a renowned Ottawa businessman, thoroughbred horse breeder and racer. Hugh Taylor received his formal education in Kingston, Ont. In 1896, he moved west to British Columbia first settling in the Kootenay region where he was engaged in the construction of the Crow’s Nest Railway and then later went on to Vancouver. In 1901, Mr. Taylor worked as a packer with a Mr. Singlehurst, who was operating a mining property near Kitselas (a little village used as a port of call for riverboats which used to exist just before the Skeena Canyon). Hugh Taylor had the distinction of loading and safely delivering to the mine, an immense steel drum of great weight – a task which was considered impossible at the time. In 1902, he became Secretary to T.J. Phelan, who was District Superintendent of the Dominion Yukon Telegraph Line which had its headquarters in Ashcroft, BC. The following spring, he married Miss Hermina “Minnie” Wessel of Saturna Island, BC and came north with his bride, taking their honeymoon trip on horseback all the way from Ashcroft to Hazelton in order to continue his work on the Telegraph Line. Together, Hugh and Minnie had eight children: Ellen, Violet, Lucy, Dixon, Arthur, Tom, Virginia and Hugh Jr. After arriving in Hazelton, he became associated with Chas. Barrett & Co. and was in charge of their mule train. In the fall of 1903, he went to First Cabin (at the end of the wagon road) to work as a lineman with the Dominion Yukon Telegraph Line, where he remained for several years. Mr. Taylor also staked one of the first farms in the Kispiox Valley and spent a number of years there with his family. He later became an telegraph operator at Kispiox as well as its postmaster, and owner/operator of a local store and ranch. During the boom days, he ran a stagecoach between Hazelton and the Kispiox Valley and to points north up to First Cabin. In 1914 the Taylors moved to Hazelton, where Hugh Taylor took a deep interest in sports and was known for successfully defending goal for the Hazelton men’s hockey team. Later, the Taylor family moved on to Fort Fraser where Mr. Taylor again worked as a telegraph operator. In 1917, upon his appointment to the position of Assistant District Engineer of the Provincial Public Works Department, the Taylors moved to the department’s headquarters in Prince George. Four years later during the course of his duties on an out of town trip to Vanderhoof Mr. Taylor became ill; he was escorted back to Prince George, where he passed away a few days later on 5 November 1921.
Born in Longmont, Colorado on 10 March 1919, environmentalist and social activist Walter (Walt) Taylor devoted a lifetime in the U.S.A. and Canada to the cultivation of peace with justice. During World War II he served in work camps as a conscientious objector to war, but ultimately went to prison for his stand against conscription. He turned away from graduate study in Physics to take a Master’s degree in Human Development at the University of Chicago.
With four children in their family, he and his wife Margaret (Peggy) Taylor (b. Lewiston, Maine, 7 August 1916) worked in a variety of social services, but were always seeking opportunities to encourage a fundamental movement toward peace with justice and sustainable environmental stewardship.
In the 1960s Philadelphia Quakers sent Walt as their response to a request from the Seneca Nation of Native Americans for help in defending the oldest active treaty in American history, the Treaty of Canandaigua which had been firmly negotiated with the Seneca Nation in 1794. In spite of a great nation-wide protest, that treaty was violated by the construction of the controversial Kinzua Dam (1961-1965) on the Allegheny River which flooded 10,000 acres of land and displaced 600 Seneca families out of their traditional territory. After moving to Summerland, British Columbia during the Vietnam War, Walt continued his active interest in the concerns of First Nations peoples and even worked for the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs in the 1970s.
Beginning in 1973 and running for several years thereafter, Walt directed an innovative project called “Imagine Penticton” through which the whole community of Penticton was invited to imagine itself the way it ought to be and to join Walt and his staff in bringing this collective vision to fruition. Taylor was also actively involved with the South Okanagan Civil Liberties Society, the South Okanagan Environmental Coalition and the Southern Interior Ecological Liaison – venues which allowed him to further his passionate advocacy for justice, peace and environmental sustainability.
His time in the Okanagan region of B.C., also provided Walt Taylor with the opportunity to become heavily involved with the British Columbia Man and Resources Programme – a 2 year public participation programme sponsored and organized by the Canadian Council of Resource and Environment Ministers (CCREM). The Man and Resources Programme originated in 1961 when natural resource ministers from across the country met at the “Resources for Tomorrow” Conference to discuss a natural resources policy for Canada. At that time, public interest in resource issues was low, so the main results from that conference were strictly governmental and technical. Man and Resources was concerned with all aspects of the environmental problem – social, economic, ecological – but it also sought to involve all Canadians in its investigation; therefore one of the fundamental goals of this Programme was to enlist citizen participation to discuss the whole question of development and the use of resources and how that should be balanced against protection of the environment. This mandate was to be accomplished through two phases: Phase I was undertaken in 1972 when community representatives from across the province came together locally, then regionally (Delta, B.C., Sept. 23-23, 1972) and finally nationally (Montebello, Q.C., Oct. 29-Nov. 4, 1972) to take on the task of problem identification. In 1973, Phase II was undertaken which required citizen participants to identify solutions and alternatives to the problems identified at the national conference at Montebello in 1972. The provincial conference was held in Naramata, B.C., September 20-23, 1973 while the national conference was held in Toronto, Nov.18-23, 1973.
In 1982 Walt and his family moved north to Smithers, B.C. where he continued to dedicate his life to grass-roots level, political and environmental activism in the Bulkley Valley - Telkwa - Smithers area. For the next eighteen years Walt Taylor, and his wife Peggy, were actively involved with the Northwest Study Conference Society, the Skeena Round Table on Sustainable Development, the Waging Peace Society, Project Ploughshares – Smithers, the Smithers Human Rights Society, the Gitksan-Carrier Tribal Council, the Gitksan-Wet’suwet’en Tribal Council, the Telkwa Educational Action Committee of Householders, the Bulkley Valley Anti-Poverty Group, and the Smithers Social Planning Committee, to name a few, through which they promoted a wide range of social rights causes including global peace, human rights and environmental sustainability to peoples, organizations and communities throughout Northern B.C.
With the earliest pastoral care provided to north coastal peoples by missionaries travelling by canoe, technological development inevitably allowed for the introduction of the gasoline engine. “Glad Tidings” (built in 1884, sunk in 1903) was the first of these new ships built for the Rev. Thomas Crosby. Upon its demise, the “Udal” was constructed in 1908, only to sink a year later; followed by the launch of the first of the “Thomas Crosby” mission boats in 1912. These particular Methodist mission boats were named after the Rev. Thomas Crosby who had ministered to First Nations peoples throughout the northern coast of B.C. In 1874, at the request of Tsimshian matriarch Elizabeth Diex, and her son Chief Alfred Dudoward and daughter-in-law Kate Dudoward, the Rev. Crosby was sent to Port Simpson to establish its’ first Methodist mission. From this home base, Crosby supervised the establishment of ten missions throughout north coastal British Columbia and ministered to the Tsimshian of Lax Kw’alaams (Port Simpson), the Nisga’a, Haida and Gitksan until 1897. The “Thomas Crosby” I, II, and III served as the Crosby Mission to north coastal communities for the Port Simpson District of the Methodist Church right up to church union in 1925. Under the United Church, the Mission became a pastoral charge, first called the Queen Charlotte (Marine) Pastoral Charge and then renamed Central Mainland Marine Mission in 1929. The “Thomas Crosby” III, built in 1923 was under the pastoral charge of the Rev. Robert Scott. In 1938, this vessel was replaced with the more seaworthy “Thomas Crosby” IV (1938-1967) under the charge of the Rev. Peter Kelly only to be replaced once again by the “Thomas Crosby” V (1967-1991). After the de-commission of the “Thomas Crosby” V, the Central Mainland Marine Mission conducted all pastoral care via air travel.
The Thomas Crosby III and IV (the vessels believed to be featured in this particular photograph collection) operated between Lowe Inlet in the north and Smith Inlet in the south, with headquarters at Ocean Falls. She called at lighthouses, canneries, logging camps and isolated settlements. In addition to serving as a church and mission, she delivered the mail, served as a library and movie theatre, and functioned as a hospital and mortuary. A shovel and mattock were kept in a cupboard ready for any necessary burials. A visit from a Thomas Crosby was considered the highlight of the season for many isolated communities along the north coast.
Tommy Tompkins was a former RCMP officer who was best known for his television and film work in the northern Canadian wilderness. He appeared regularly on CBC Television, including the show "This Land" and had his own CBC television show, "Tommy Tompkins' Wildlife Country" which are available through the National Film Board.
“Tommy Tompkins’ Wildlife Country” was a short series of 13 half hour programs, featuring Tommy Tompkins, outdoorsman and environmentalist, which aired at various times on the CBC from January to December 1971 and then repeated from February 1972 to June 1974. “Wildlife Country” chronicled animal life in remote regions of British Columbia and the Yukon, and also documented Tompkins' own methods of survival and travel through the wilderness during the spring and summer seasons when he lived in the bush alone, travelling without a film crew and often acting as his own wildlife cinematographer for the series. This series was the spin-off of a successful television special called “Tommy Tompkins: Bushman” which aired on the CBC in 1970. The executive producer for Tommy Tompkins' Wildlife Country was Ray Hazzan and the producer Denis Hargrave.
In later years, Tompkins gave lecture tours for B.C. Hydro, Fletcher Challenge, and Alcan, where he showed his films. He travelled with his pet wolf, Nehani. Through his celebrity Tompkins gained sponsorship from McMillan Bloedel which allowed him to take his films, lectures, and conservation message to school children all over the Province of BC. It is estimated that some years he was able to speak to over 100,000 children. In 1974 Tommy Tompkins was named a Member of the Order of Canada for his work in focusing awareness on the natural environment.
Tommy Tompkins died in 1988 at the age of 68.
Tshimshian communities are in British Columbia and Alaska, around Terrace and Prince Rupert and the southernmost corner of Alaska on Annette Island. There are approximately 10,000 Tsimshian. Their culture is matrilineal with a societal structure based on a clan system, properly referred to as a moiety.
During a conversation in 1996, Eve Pankovitch and David Kerr, employees at UNBC, expressed to each other their concern regarding the absence of art on campus. A few months later they founded the Arts Council of UNBC and set out to respond to the need for art, including musical, visual, literary, performing and conceptual forms, on campus and to foster a relationship with the arts community in Prince George and the region. Since 1996, the Arts Council has initiated and collaborated on many projects including art exhibitions, talks by art professionals, University art acquisitions, poetry readings and musical performances.
UNBC's Centre for Teaching, Learning, and Technology unit, as it currently exists, was created in 2007. As a result of some internal restructuring, there was the creation of a Dean of Teaching, Learning and Technology and a Director of the Centre for Teaching, Learning and Technology. At that time, those positions were held by the same person, Dr. Heather Smith. In this new structure, Information and Technology Services (ITS), the UNBC Geoffrey R. Weller Library, and the CTLT all reported to the Dean. The Dean reported to the Provost. For a variety of reasons this restructuring was unsuccessful and in the fall of 2007, Dr. Smith resigned from the decanal position. Through this resignation, and with support of institutional allies, the decanal funding was guaranteed to the CTLT thus ensuring the ongoing funding of the unit. Dr. Smith stayed on as Acting Director of the CTLT until June 2008.
During this initial period, the CTLT had an Acting Director, a full time administrative assistant, and Elearning Coordinator, Grant Potter (hired in December 2007) and several student assistants who supported elearning. In addition, the Learning Skills Centre (now the Academic Success Centre) reported to the Director of the CTLT. The Director shifted their report from the Provost to a Dean of Student Success and Enrolment Management after her resignation as Dean.
In 2008, Dr. William Owen took over as Director of the CTLT and the staffing compliment stayed the same. He did gain an additional report as the Access Resource Centre began to report to him. At the time, he reported to a Dean of Student Success and Enrolment Management but this report also changed back to a direct report to the Provost.
In the spring of 2012, Dr. Owen took the position of Acting Dean of Student Engagement. Dr. Smith returned to again be Acting Director of the CTLT and she reported to the Provost. In negotiations that lead to Dr. Smith taking on the position of Acting Director it was agreed that Dr. Owen would ‘take’ the Academic Success Centre and the Access Resource Centre with him and bring them into the Student Engagement portfolio. It is also worth noting that between 2012 and 2017, there have been four different Provosts.
The University of Northern British Columbia's Conference and Event Services provides services such as accommodations, catering, meeting space, audio-visual, and conference management.
The UNBC Convocation Office is responsible for the organization of convocation events.
Educational Media Services provides state-of-the-art media services to the University community and offers options to improve teaching, learning and research methodology at UNBC. EMS offers full Media (Audiovisual) services to the University and Prince George Community.
The Finance Office is responsible for all administrative activities of a financial nature at UNBC.
Those responsibilities with a direct impact on student life include:
student fee assessment and collection
disbursement of all cheques including scholarship and bursary cheques
payroll for teaching assistantships and all student jobs
administration of research grants and fellowship income
The First Nations Studies Program at UNBC focuses on various issues: contemporary issues ; research methods (including oral history) ; First Nations languages and cultures ; land and resource use and environmental philosophy ; art and material culture ; religion and spirituality ; the state, gender and legal issues.
The Geoffrey R. Weller Library is located at the north end of campus. The attractive four-story building is currently the largest building on campus. One of the main architectural features in the library is the atrium, which fills the main working area with natural light. -
The Library is home to the Northern British Columbia Archives, which is devoted to the preservation of Northern British Columbia’s history. The Archives holdings include records of the Cassiar mining community, photographic and cartographic materials related to the development of transportation and communication links in Northern BC and the genealogical records of the Carrier-Sekani Tribal Council. -
The Library was named after one of the people most responsible for shaping the University’s initial development. Geoffrey Weller was the University's Founding President and held the position until 1995, when he returned to teaching as a Professor in the UNBC International Studies program. He was largely responsible for setting out the five major themes of the University – environment, northern studies, women’s studies, First Nations studies and international studies. Dr. Weller passed away in July of 2000 at the age of 58. The UNBC Library was renamed Geoffrey R. Weller Library in 2000 in honour of his memory.
The Office of Communications fosters the public image of UNBC by creating strategies, materials, and activities that promote the University. Their areas of activity include publications, alumni relations, official UNBC websites, media relations, and public presentations that aim to market UNBC's programs, research, and community connections.
UNBC memorandum from Chris Conway to All Staff identifies the 1992 Contacts Directory as the first edition of a document intended to provide an introduction to key individuals and organisations for new staff, and to provide a ready-reference for frequent contacts.
The Office of Regional Operations is responsible for the development and delivery of services to students at campuses across northern BC. Many services are provided locally, as well as over the Internet, via email or on the phone in conjunction with the Student Success Centre at the Prince George Campus. Regional Operations maintains three regional campuses, as well as an office at the Prince George campus.
The University Senate and Board of Governors – including all of the Board committees and most of the Senate committees – are supported in their activities by the University Secretariat. In addition, the Secretariat is responsible for the organization of major university ceremonies, especially the annual convocation and installations as necessary. The University Secretary is the Freedom of Information Protection of Privacy (FOIPOP) Officer for the University.
The UNBC President's Council is comprised of all of the University's senior administrators.
The Office of the Registrar is responsible for many aspects of a student's life. The Office handles undergraduate and graduate admissions, including assessment of transfer credit; registrations; records management, including student records, student appeals, and transcripts; and scheduling, including courses and exams.
In addition, the Registrar's Office interprets the collection and dissemination of information for the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, and prepares for production many University publications, including the Undergraduate and Graduate Calendars.
The UNBC Senate is a UNBC governing body and an academic authority for the institution.
The Senate is composed of:
(a) The Chancellor;
(b) The President, who shall be chair;
(c) the Provost;
(d) the Vice President, Research;
(e) the Director of Continuing Studies;
(f) the Deans of Colleges;
(g) the Dean of Graduate Programs;
(h) the University Librarian;
(i) 9 students;
(j) 4 Regional Representatives;
(k) 18 faculty members;
(i) 8 from the College of Arts, Social and Health Sciences,
(ii) 8 from the College of Science and Management,
(iii) 2 elected at large by all faculty members and librarians;
(l) 4 Lay Senators;
(m) 1 member to be elected by the governing body of Wilp Wilxo’oskwhl Nisga’a (WWN)
Update Magazine is the UNBC Magazine for alumni and friends of the university.
The United Church was inaugurated on June 10, 1925 in Toronto, Ontario, when the Methodist Church of Canada, the Congregational Union of Canada, and 70 per cent of the Presbyterian Church in Canada entered into an organic union. Joining as well was the small General Council of Union Churches, centred largely in Western Canada. It was the first union of churches in the world to cross historical denominational lines. Each of the uniting churches, however, had a long history in Canada prior to the 1925 union. Methodism in Canada, for example, is traced back to 1765 when Lawrence Coughlan, an Irish Methodist preacher, first came to Newfoundland. In Nova Scotia, beginning in the late 1770s, Methodists began migrating from England, an event which led to a revival of Methodist practice in this small territory. This influx of new religious ideology provided renewed energy to Methodist missionaries in their ministerial endeavours throughout British North America.
Along the north coastal areas of British Columbia, the Methodist mission found manifestation through several different portals: the provision of pastoral care via boat (such as the Thomas Crosby mission ships), regional medical services, and the provision of community ministry. In Port Simpson (now called Lax Kw’alaams) for example, Methodist medical mission work first began in 1889 under Dr. A.E. Boulton. By 1925 there were three Methodist Hospitals in the territory at Hazelton, Bella Bella and Port Simpson and in 1946 (post union) the United Church of Canada was asked to take over the administration of the Queen Charlotte City hospital.
Mission work throughout the territories was also fuelled, in part, by the existence of Hudson’s Bay Company posts. Not only did the existence of a post often lead to the organic development of an adjacent trading community to which to minister; with the inherent social problems resulting from the presence of, and commerce with, HBC Forts, the Church found opportunities to reach out to the surrounding population in an attempt to alleviate those social ills that resulted from common trading practices and bartered commodities. Fort Simpson was one such post - established as a fur trading post near the mouth of the Nass River in 1831 by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) as part of its Columbia Department. In 1834 the fort was moved to the Tsimshian Peninsula, about halfway between the Nass and the Skeena rivers; the village that grew around the fort later became known as Port Simpson (now called Lax Kw’alaams). In 1874, at the request of Tsimshian matriarch Elizabeth Diex, and her son Chief Alfred Dudoward and daughter-in-law Kate Dudoward, the Rev. Thomas Crosby was sent to Port Simpson to establish its first Methodist mission. From this home base, Rev. Crosby supervised the establishment of ten missions throughout north coastal British Columbia; while his wife Emma founded the Crosby Girls' Home in Port Simpson in the 1880s. This “Home” became part of B.C.'s residential school system in 1893 and was finally closed in 1948.
While the originating legislation created UBC on March 7, 1908, the first day of lectures was September 30, 1915. On September 22, 1925, lectures began on the new Point Grey campus. The enabling legislation are the University Act and the University Amendment Act, 2004. The university is the oldest and largest in British Columbia with two campuses in Vancouver and Kelowna.
The UNBC story began in January 1987, at a public meeting, held at the College of New Caledonia, on the possibility of extending degree-awarding opportunities in Prince George and on December 1, 1987, the Interior University Society (IUS) was incorporated under the Societies Act.
Important early support for the IUS was obtained from Bruce Strachan, MLA for Prince George South and Minister of State for the Cariboo Region, who saw the regional development potential of a northern university. This led to the commissioning of a study Building a Future of Excellence: a University of Northern BC ("The Dahloff Report"). On October 13, an IUS delegation was able to present the government with:
a petition signed by 16,000 voters who had paid $5 for the privilege;
letters of support from every town, village, city, regional district, hospital board, school board and Chamber of Commerce in northern BC;
an Angus Reid survey which indicated that 94% of northerners were in favour of creating the university;
the Dahloff Report indicating the feasibility, credibility and value of the university.
On November 1, 1989 the Government announced that Bruce Strachan, a clear advocate of the university of the north, had been appointed Minister of Advanced Education. On January 9, Minister Strachan made a formal statement that the government had accepted the IPG recommendations: that a university was to be established in the north with a main campus in Prince George. On June 22, the Provincial Legislature passed Bill 40, The UNBC Act, with all-party support. The Interim Governing Council then met formally for the first time on July 21. It was to act as both Board and Senate until such time as the University had gained the officers, faculty, and students capable of forming a senate.
Two dominant themes of early deliberations were site selection and the Presidential search. The latter began in June, and seven interviews were held in August and September. The outcome was the appointment of Geoffrey Weller, previously Vice-President Academic of Lakehead University. The IGC's site selection committee, meanwhile, had initially considered fifteen sites, but these were reduced to a shortlist of six sites for detailed study, and the Cranbrook Hill site finally carried the day when crown acreage was located with a fine view of the City.
In February 1992, the model of the Prince George campus was first unveiled, and in March, members of Convocation elected the University's first Chancellor, Iona Campognolo. The signing of the Memorandum of Understanding between UNBC and Forestry Canada occurred 3 July 1992 at the Coast Inn of the North in Prince George, BC. The MOU resulted in the establishment of UNBC's first research centre. The full opening of the University was delayed from September 1993 to September 1994. April saw the official sod-turning ceremony for the Prince George campus, conducted by BC Premier Mike Harcourt. This was followed in May with the largest and most prestigious event in the University's history to date - the Inaugural Convocation Ceremony, at which the formal Installation of the President and Chancellor took place. August 1992 saw the registration of the University's first students, when 70 students joined the "QuickStart" program. In November, interviews began for the appointment of the first 40 faculty members.
1994 saw the culmination of the years of planning and effort. In May, the first UNBC students graduated: six students from the "Quickstart" program received their degrees from the Governor General. In August, the Prince George campus was ceremonially opened by Her Majesty the Queen, at a nationally televised event which saw some 10,000 people visit the Prince George campus. In September, the University opened fully, with around 1,500 students enrolled. To commemorate the opening, a full-colour coffee-table book, "A University is Born", was published by the UNBC Press.
Ann Lorraine Walsh was born to Alan Barrett and Margaret Elaine (née Clemons) on September 20, 1942 and attended school in South Africa, England, Holland and Saskatchewan before her family finally settled down in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1953. She received her Bachelor of Education from the University of British Columbia in 1968 and soon thereafter moved to Williams Lake with her husband, John Walsh, where she worked in a variety of teaching positions including: classroom teacher, teacher-librarian, and college instructor at the former University College of the Cariboo (now Thompson Rivers University).
Ann Walsh had always wanted to write. She wrote her first book, Your Time, My Time, in 1982 after taking a short ten-day short writing course in Wells, B.C. with writer/poet Robin Skelton. Since then she has authored numerous books for children and young adults. Several of her historical fiction novels for younger readers are set during the gold rush in BC during the 1800s. She has also published a book of poetry, was the instigator and editor of three anthologies of short stories for young adult readers, and has done many readings and workshops for all ages. Walsh’s work for adults has been heard on CBC and has appeared in newspapers and magazines, both literary and glossy, around the world. She is a winner of the Canadian Children’s Book Centre Our Choice Award, the Forest of Reading Golden Oak Award, and was a Canadian Library Association Notable selection. She was also shortlisted for the Forest of Reading Silver Birch Award and the B.C. Book Prize.
Walsh is a member of the Writer’s Union of Canada (since 1990), the Canadian Children’s Book Centre (since 1986), the Federation of B.C. Writers (since 1984), Director Canadian Society of Children’s Authors, Illustrators and Performers (since 1990), The Children’s Writers & Illustrators of B.C. (since 1989) and is a founding member of the Williams Lake Writers Group (est. 1984).
Along with writing and teaching, Ms. Walsh was also a creative writing instructor at Island Mountain Arts in the summer of 1998; community correspondent for CBC Radio’s “Almanac” from 1992-1995 and served as convocation speaker for the University College of the Cariboo in 1994.
Ms. Walsh and her husband currently live in Victoria, BC.
Originally from the U.K., Geoffrey R. Weller was born in 1942. He graduated high school in England in 1960 and then spent an additional year at Ann Arbor High School in Michigan, graduating a second time in 1961. Weller pursued a BSc in Economics at the University of Hull, graduating in 1964, and a master degree in Political Science at McMaster University, completing a thesis titled “Some Contemporary American Views of Democracy and the Third World: A Critical Appraisal” in 1967. He went on to hold teaching positions at Bishop’s University (1965-1971) and Lakehead University (1971-1990). At Lakehead University, Weller also became the Dean of Arts (1984-1985) and Vice-President (Academic) (1985-1990). Over the course of his career, Weller obtained visiting professor positions at: the University of Minnesota, Duluth (1973), the University of Ottawa (1977-1978), and Simon Fraser University (1995) and taught a summer course at Laurentian University (1979). Over his teaching career, Weller taught courses in Canadian politics, public policy, and comparative politics. In 1991, Weller became the founding president of the University of Northern British Columbia and held this position until 1995 when he stepped down and began teaching in the department of International Studies.
Weller’s early research pertained to Canadian labor relations, working first as a researcher for the Federal Task Force on Labor Relations in 1967 and subsequently pursuing an academic research project titled "Trade Unions and Political Change in the Province of Quebec 1921-1972.” In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Weller’s research turned to health policy in Canada and worldwide. From 1975 to 1980, Weller worked on his doctoral dissertation at McGill University titled “The Development of Health Policy in Ontario.” Though he ultimately never finished this degree, Weller published several papers on similar topics during this time, including: “From ‘Pressure Group Politics’ to ‘Medical Industrial Complex’: The Development of Approaches to the Politics of Health” (1980), “The Determinants of Canadian Health Policy” (1980), “The Conflict of Values and Goals in the Canadian Health Care System” (1978), and "Hygeia Versus Asclepius: Conflict within the Ontario Health Care System" (1979). Other projects on health policy in the 1980s included Weller’s research on the Canada Health Act of 1984 and collaboration with his colleague Pranlal Manga on a project looking at politics and health care in South Africa in 1983. Weller continued to conduct research on health policy into the 1990s.
Overlapping with his work on health policy, Weller explored politics and development in the Circumpolar North. From the late 1970s to the mid-1980s, he engaged in several projects examining local government in the North and provincial ministries of northern affairs. Specific publications included: "Local Government in the Canadian Provincial North" (1980), "The Evolution of Local Government in Northern Ontario" (1980), "Provincial Ministries of Northern Affairs: A Comparative Analysis" (1982), and “Local Government Development in the Yukon and Northwest Territories” (1983). Later in the 1980s, Weller conducted research on politics in Ontario, publishing a 1988 paper titled “The North in the Ontario Election of 1987.” This interest in government and development in the circumpolar north reemerges in Weller’s work in the 1990s with an emphasis on economic development, seen in the publications “Regional and Economic Development in the Circumpolar North: early 90s to 2000” (2000) and “Economic Development Initiatives in the Circumpolar North: A Comparative Analysis” (1999).
Weller’s research interests in health policy and northern studies also overlap in many projects. Specifically, from 1983 to 1991, Weller’s research on health policy turned to examine health care in the circumpolar north. During this period, Weller held government appointments and community service positions on the Advisory Committee for the Health Promotion and Prevention Project of the Ontario Council of Health (1983-1984), the study advisory group for the Study on Health and Social Service Professionals in Northern Ontario (1989-1990), and the Thunder Bay District Health Council (1983-1988), on which he was also chairman (1986-1988). Research conducted in these roles dovetailed with academic research projects, including "The Politics of Health in the Circumpolar North” (1987) "The Delivery of Health Care to Underserviced Areas” (1991) and "Health Care Delivery in Northern Hinterlands” (1989). During this period, some of Weller’s research also examined the transfer of health care responsibility to Canada’s northern territories and local government among First Nations groups, specifically in his papers “Self-Government for Canada's Inuit: The Nunavut Proposal” (1988), “Devolution, Regionalism and Division of the Northwest Territories” (1990), "The Devolution of Authority for Health Care Services to the Government of the Northwest Territories” (1989), and “Health Care Devolution to Canada’s Territorial North” (1990).
Weller’s research in the field of northern studies also combined with research on environmental politics, higher education, and international relations. During 1981-1988, Weller collaborated with Douglas Nord on projects pertaining to environmental issues and politics in the Great Lakes region, including two research reports funded through the state of Minnesota and the Canadian Consulate-General in Minneapolis titled “Transborder Politics and Paradiplomacy: The Ontario- Minnesota Fishing Dispute” (1987) and “Canada and the United States: An Introduction to a Complex Relationship” (1987). Weller also pursued academic research in this area including a project titled “Water Politics and Policy in the Lake Superior Basin” (1988) and another collaboration with Douglas Nord "Environmental Policy and Political Support in Canada and the United States: A Comparative Analysis” (1981).
Also holding research interests in higher education, from the late 1983 to 1998 Weller explore aspects of circumpolar universities and their effect on the surrounding regions, resulting in publications such as “Universities, Politics and Development: The Case of Northern Ontario” (1988) and “Universities, Politics and Development: Northern Ontario and Northern Sweden” (1985). Weller’s interest in northern studies combined with international studies in research concentrating on foreign policy and security in the north. Publications in this area include “The Circumpolar North and Canadian Foreign Policy” (1989) and “The Arctic as an International Community” (1992). Weller also produced publications in the late 1980s through the 1990s dealing with security and intelligence in Canada and internationally.
In 1999, Weller was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Lapland based on his work on the circumpolar north encompassing Scandinavian countries and his research collaborations with Scandinavian scholars. Geoffrey Weller passed away in 2000. His legacy includes the establishment of the Lakehead University Centre for Northern Studies, the Northern Ontario Medical Program, and the Association of Circumpolar Universities.