UBC Reports | Vol. 48 | No. 12 | Oct. 10, 2002

Royal Couple Repeat Visits to UBC

This was their fourth time

This year’s Royal Visit was not the first the Royal Couple has made to the UBC campus during the past 50 years of The Queen’s reign. In October, 1951, the then Princess Elizabeth and HRH, The Duke of Edinburgh arrived in time for Homecoming festivities and watched their first Canadian-style football game in Thunderbird Stadium.

In July, 1959, The Queen opened the new Faculty Club on campus. The University took advantage of that trip to announce the newly funded HR MacMillan Scholarship for graduate students.

In March, 1983, The Queen again visited UBC. Her Royal Highness and Prince Philip visited several of the university’s significant sites including the Museum of Anthropology, the Asian Centre and the Health Sciences Centre Hospital.

Ground Crews Worked to Royal Deadline

Fresh paint and clean walls greet the Queen

By Kate Jobling

Despite the flurry of activity on campus during the past few weeks, The Queen’s visit was treated like the visit of any other dignitary or, indeed, similar to what is done for congregation.

“We have not been doing anything that we don’t normally do except perhaps moving up the schedule on the repainting of the lamp posts and removing some of the more obvious campus graffiti,” said UBC Facilities Manager, Doug Napier. “We’ve also dedicated more bodies to working the north end of the campus, which is where the Queen’s visit to campus was focused.”

“Quite frankly, there’s not much we had to do to the campus. The cleanliness of UBC grounds on any given day is still much better than any public plaza in London,” said Napier.

For many of UBC’s almost 40,000 students, the Queen’s visit was business as usual. No buildings were shut and no classes were cancelled.

Performers from Many Nations Entertain the Queen

Dancers, singers and Girl Guides part of the Royal Pageant

By Kate Jobling

More than 600 performers from 12 different arts groups celebrated The Queen during HRH’s recent visit to campus. The performances represented a number of nations including Africa, Japan, Ireland, China, Bali and Canada’s First Nations.

Vancouver-area Girl Guides and UBC-based artists also performed. But, it was the exotic acts that won the hearts of the campus crowd. From the Musqueam Warriors to the Strathcona Chinese Dance Company, fast-paced, high-energy music and dance ruled the day.

The Masabo Culture Company, a group of traditional West African performers, filled the air with driving rhythms as they took centre stage and performed the Senoufo rite of passage and celebration of a boy from youth to manhood through a leopard mask dance called Boloye'.

Taiko drummers beat out their version of celebration as Japanese youth from the Chibi Taiko group honoured The Queen. The University’s Gamelan Ensemble performed a ceremonial Balinese fanfare composed in a traditional welcoming style. (The music was composed by UBC’s Assoc. Prof. of Music, Michael Tenzer.) Hundreds of Girl Guides draped with flags flanked the Queen as she made her way through the crowd in a brief walkabout.

The performance ended with more than 250 chorale singers - from the Magee Secondary Chamber Choir, the Mountain Secondary School Choir, the UBC Choral Union and the University Singers - singing a rousing rendition of Canada: This is My Home - a patriotic piece that was composed and written for Expo ’86 by Bob Bradley and Brian Gibson.

HRH, The Duke of Edinburgh Meets Faculty and Students

The Duke briefed on West Coast environment issues

By Kate Jobling

While the Queen and crowds watched performers outside, HRH, The Duke of Edinburgh spent some time in the Walter C. Koerner Library meeting with faculty and students from UBC’s Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability.

The Duke was told about the human impact on Vancouver’s rapidly growing and expanding region through a presentation on the effects of intensive agriculture, construction of impervious surfaces and the subdivision of rural properties throughout the Lower Mainland.

HRH also was shown a model presentation on the impact of technology and globalization on west coast fisheries, which predicts the effects of prolonged fishing on a particular species and the consequences of other species groups within the food web.

A third presentation focused on the coastal zone being transformed by the invasion of exotic plants and animal species, which has altered the natural ecosystem. The Duke was told that some marine mammals are among the most contaminated animals in the global marine environment.

The presentation included information about B.C.’s coastal communities and how they are looking at economic alternatives, including ecotourism, to replace their current resource-dependent economies.

The Queen’s Dedication

Queen dedicates bronze book as a tribute to literacy

By Kate Jobling

During her UBC visit, the Queen unveiled a bronze book commemorating her visit as part of the Royal Jubilee celebrations. The bronze depicts the Jubilee Emblem, the B.C. Coat of Arms and the UBC Crest and it dedicates the naming of a special room in the Queen’s honour in the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre. The bronze book will be on permanent display in the room.

Ornamental Bronze Limited, a 75-year-old, Vancouver-based company that specializes in memorial and dedication plaques, created the bronze for the Queen’s dedication. The Company has developed statues and projects for Vancouver City Hall (the Captain Vancouver statue), the Gastown Clock, the Coat of Arms for the B.C. Parliament Buildings in Victoria and numerous plaques around UBC campus.