UBC honoured some of its most outstanding alumni and saluted varsity sports
stars of the past at the 1997 UBC Alumni Achievement and UBC Sports Hall of
Fame Dinner Oct. 23.
The Alumni Awards recognize 10 individuals for their outstanding achievements.
Alumni award recipients were: Nobel Prize winner Michael Smith (DSc ’94),
Lifetime Achievement Award; Malaysian business leader Dato’Lim Say Chong (MBA
’65), Alumni Award of Distinction; clinical pharmacist Louanne Twaites (BSc
Pharm ’53), Blythe Eagles Volunteer Service Award; New York investment firm
partner Jacki Hoffman-Zehner (BCom ’88), Outstanding Young Alumnus; former Lt.-Gov.
David Lam (LLD ’88) and his wife Dorothy, Honorary Alumni Award; Education Asst.
Prof. Thelma Cook (BEd ’58) and Zoology Prof. Geoffrey Scudder, Faculty Citation
Award; law student John Cameron, Outstanding Student Award; California lawyer
Kent Westerberg (BA ’84, LLB ’87), Branch Representative Award.
The UBC Sports Hall of Fame inductees included four individuals and one team.
Lionel Pugh was recognized by UBC as a builder for taking a mediocre track
and field program and turning it into one of the country’s best.He arrived at
UBC in 1964, at the start of UBC’s “golden age” of track and field. During his
23 years as coach, UBC won four national championships and a total of 25 Canada
West titles in cross-country and track and field. Fourteen athletes from his
teams represented Canada at the Olympics and the majority of today’s UBC track
records were set while Pugh was coach.
The 1945/46 men’s basketball team,coached by Bob Osborne, was also honoured.
The team was the runaway winner of the US Pacific Northwest Intercollegiate
Conference, triumphing over such high-ranking schools as Washington State, the
University of Washington and the University of Oregon. The team’s record included
a famous victory over the Harlem Globetrotters. The ’45/’46 T-Birds were the
first Canadian basketball team to be crowned champion of an American intercollegiate
league, making it one of the top teams in the Northwest.
Other inductees into the Sports Hall of Fame included Thunderbird quarterback
Dan Smith (1974-1978); Frank Sealy (1955-1962), soccer and cricket; Jim Bardsley
(1930-1937), basketball, tennis; and Bill Holowaty (1979-1985), ice hockey.
More than 800 people attended the awards dinner.
Keynote speaker at the event was UBC President Martha Piper who was introduced
by diplomat John P. Bell, former Alumni Award of Distinction winner and ambassador,
Canada’s Year of the Asia Pacific.
The dinner was hosted by Haig Farris, president of the Alumni Association,
and Bob Philip, director of Athletics and Recreation.
