Head and shoulders image of Richard Ernest Rashley, Assistant Professor, Department of English, from 1969-1974.

Image of Dr. George W. Rea, Bacteriology, seated in front of a microscope.

Head and shoulders image of Alexander Reisman, acting head, Department of Music.

Bio/Historical Note: Alexander Reisman was born 11 October 1909.and graduated from the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester, New York, and earned degrees of Bachelor of Music, and Master of Music with further study at the University of California at Los Angeles. Reisman was both a cellist and arranger, and performed as a cellist with major orchestras and chamber groups. He was assistant professor of music at the University of Saskatchewan in the 1960s. Reisman was conductor of the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra from 1960-1963. He played with South Bay Chamber Music Society, Inc., performing several concerts in 1964, much of their repertoire consisting of Classical composers such as Beethoven, Mozart, and Schubert. Five years later, he returned to the SBCMS, this time as a member of the Lyric Arts String Quartet, in a program ranging from Franz Joseph Haydn to 20th-century American composer, Samuel Barber. As an arranger, he re-worked Johann Michael Haydn’s “Trio No. 1 in G” into a wind quintet, and boiled down Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “Valse sentimentale” for cello and piano. A performance of this latter work can be heard on the Nathaniel Rosen/Doris Stevenson 1994 release, Orientale. Reisman died 24 January 1999.

Head and shoulders image of Dr. Jake Rempel, Department of Biology, 1933-1970.

Bio/Historical Note: Having lost both parents and an older brother during the conflict and typhus that swept Mennonite colonies during the Russian Revolution in 1919, Dr. Jacob G. Rempel (b. 1903) and his brother David (b. 1899) emigrated to Canada, arriving in Rosthern, Saskatchewan, in July 1923. They spoke German, some Russian, but no English; and had the equivalent of $1.25 Canadian in funds. By 1928, however, Dr. Rempel had secured a three-year scholarship to the University of Saskatchewan, from which he graduated with the Governor General's Gold Medal and high honours in Biology in 1931. He joined the Biology department that year as an instructor and earned his MSc by 1933. He took a leave of absence in 1936 to attend Cornell University, earning his PhD in 1937. He remained with the U of S for the rest of his career, becoming a full professor by 1953 and being named Rawson Professor in 1962. Dr. Rempel retired in 1970. He made lasting contributions to science in several research areas, beginning his career with the study of the midge Chironomus hyperboreus in Prince Albert National Park. This led to work on chironomid (fish fly) taxonomy. Dr. Rempel then turned to biting flies: first to the ecology and control of blackflies, which adversely affected cattle populations; and then to mosquitoes, which were vectors of the virus causing the western equine sleeping sickness (encephalitis) which occurred as a pandemic in the late 1930s. Dr. Rempel closed off his distinguished research career with classic studies in insect embryology. He studied the development of the bertha army worm, two species of beetle, and the black widow spider. His last major contribution, The Evolution of the Insect Head: The Endless Dispute, was published a year before he died (1975). It clarified an issue that had elicited twelve different theories. Dr. Rempel contributed more than fifty publications. He won many honours. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1956, and received the Centennial Medal in 1967 “in recognition of valuable service to the nation.” In 1971 he received the Gold Medal of the Entomological Society of Canada. Dr. Rempel was president of the Entomological Society of Saskatchewan and of the International Conference on Diseases of Nature Communicable to Man. He also served for ten years as associate editor of the Canadian Journal of Zoology, and for a similar period on the Advisory Panel on Entomology of the Defence Research Board of Canada. After his retirement, he moved to Victoria, but remained active in research until just before his death on 30 May 1976.

Head and shoulders image of Dr. Jake Rempel, Department of Biology, 1933-1970.

Bio/Historical Note: Having lost both parents and an older brother during the conflict and typhus that swept Mennonite colonies during the Russian Revolution in 1919, Dr. Jacob G. Rempel (b. 1903) and his brother David (b. 1899) emigrated to Canada, arriving in Rosthern, Saskatchewan, in July 1923. They spoke German, some Russian, but no English; and had the equivalent of $1.25 Canadian in funds. By 1928, however, Dr. Rempel had secured a three-year scholarship to the University of Saskatchewan, from which he graduated with the Governor General's Gold Medal and high honours in Biology in 1931. He joined the Biology department that year as an instructor and earned his MSc by 1933. He took a leave of absence in 1936 to attend Cornell University, earning his PhD in 1937. He remained with the U of S for the rest of his career, becoming a full professor by 1953 and being named Rawson Professor in 1962. Dr. Rempel retired in 1970. He made lasting contributions to science in several research areas, beginning his career with the study of the midge Chironomus hyperboreus in Prince Albert National Park. This led to work on chironomid (fish fly) taxonomy. Dr. Rempel then turned to biting flies: first to the ecology and control of blackflies, which adversely affected cattle populations; and then to mosquitoes, which were vectors of the virus causing the western equine sleeping sickness (encephalitis) which occurred as a pandemic in the late 1930s. Dr. Rempel closed off his distinguished research career with classic studies in insect embryology. He studied the development of the bertha army worm, two species of beetle, and the black widow spider. His last major contribution, The Evolution of the Insect Head: The Endless Dispute, was published a year before he died (1975). It clarified an issue that had elicited twelve different theories. Dr. Rempel contributed more than fifty publications. He won many honours. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1956, and received the Centennial Medal in 1967 “in recognition of valuable service to the nation.” In 1971 he received the Gold Medal of the Entomological Society of Canada. Dr. Rempel was president of the Entomological Society of Saskatchewan and of the International Conference on Diseases of Nature Communicable to Man. He also served for ten years as associate editor of the Canadian Journal of Zoology, and for a similar period on the Advisory Panel on Entomology of the Defence Research Board of Canada. After his retirement, he moved to Victoria, but remained active in research until just before his death on 30 May 1976.

Head and shoulders image of Father André Renaud, O.M.I., who founded the Indian-Eskimo Association of Canada in 1957.

Bio/Historical Note: Concern over high turnover of teachers in northern communities, and in particular the high drop-out rate for First Nations students, led to the establishment of a special course, first offered in the summer of 1961. EDIND 357, “The School Program in Indian and Northern Communities.”, was offered in conjunction with the College of Education. The first instructor was Father André Renaud (1920-1988), OMI, who had been seconded from the Oblate Fathers’ Indian and Eskimo Education and Welfare Commission. Renaud was appointed to the Order of Canada in 1973. Renaud died in Saskatoon in 1988.

Head and shoulders image of Dr. Don Rennie, acting Head, Department of Soil Science.

Bio/Historical Note: Dr. Donald Andrews Rennie was born in 1922 in Medicine Hat, Alberta and raised on the family farm southeast of Gull Lake, Saskatchewan, where he took his public and high school education. His first job was as a clerk in the Bank of Nova Scotia from 1940-1942. Dr. Rennie served as a Flight Lieutenant in the RCAF from 1942-1945, flying with the 407 Coastal Squadron on anti-submarine patrol. Following the war he completed his BSA (Soil Science, Sask.) and PhD (Wisconsin). Dr. Rennie accepted a faculty position in the Department of Soil Science of the U of S in 1952, served as head of the department from 1964 1980, and director, Saskatchewan Institute of Pedology. Dr. Rennie was appointed dean of the College of Agriculture in 1984 and remained until retirement in 1989. Dr. Rennie died in 2007.

Head and shoulders image of Dr. Robert (Bob) A. Rennie, Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, and Director, Student Counselling, and Dean of Students.

Bio/Historical Note: In 1967, as part of the administrative reorganization precipitated by the implementation of the one-university, two-campus concept, the Board of Governors created the position of Dean of Students. The Dean was to be responsible for student counselling, the Student Health Centre, and the operating philosophy of student residences. Problems in the area of student-University relations were to be referred to the Dean's office for study and recommendation. R.A. Rennie, who was Director of Counselling and Student Affairs from 1958-1967, served as the only Dean of Students from 1967 until his death on 30 Aug. 1973. With the creation of the University of Regina in 1974, the position of Dean of Students was made redundant.

Head and shoulders image of Dr. Robbie Robinson, Assistant Professor of Surgery, and specialist in general and thoracic surgery.

Bio/Historical Note: Dr. Clayton L.N. (Robbie) Robinson was born on 28 April 1919 in Chapeau, Quebec and raised on a farm at Meath, Ontario. Educated in the Ottawa Valley towns of Pembroke and Renfrew, he graduated early from Queen's Medical School in 1943 and volunteered for the Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserves, serving on Atlantic convoy escorts as a Surgeon Lieutenant. Later in the war Dr. Robinson joined the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy and he travelled to Ceylon for three months. After the war Dr. Robinson demonstrated anatomy at the University of Toronto under Dr. J.C.B. Grant and wrote Grant's biography in 1993 for the Canadian Medical Association. His medical training in thoracic surgery continued in Vancouver and England. Dr. Robinson was appointed to the Department of Surgery, College of Medicine, at the University of Saskatchewan in 1958 and worked at University Hospital. He was president of both the Canadian Thoracic Association and Saskatoon Medical Association in 1965. Dr. Robinson moved to Vancouver in 1966 and worked primarily at Vancouver General, Shaughnessy, and St. Vincent's hospitals. He also was professor of surgery at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Robinson died on 13 November 2011 in [Vancouver] at age 92.

Head and shoulders image of Dr. James Rollins, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology.

Bio//historical note: Dr. James Rollins was Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, from 1 July 1963 until his death on 18 Sept. 1964.

Elevated progress shot of construction of Qu'Appelle Hall (men's residence}; Little Stone School and Emmanuel College in background.

Bio/Historical Note: Originally known simply “Student’s Residence No. 2,” the name “Qu’Appelle Hall” was first mentioned in the minutes of the Board’s executive committee in September 1916. Designed by Brown and Vallance as a men’s residence, construction began on Qu’Appelle Hall in 1914 but was sporadic. Delays meant that some building material was subject to the war tax, an additional 5%; and over the winter of 1915 frost damaged the swimming pool, another of many unforeseen expenses. The building was finally completed in 1916, at a cost of $250,000. It included a swimming pool, with lockers purchased from the YMCA, and the dining hall was immediately put to use as a gymnasium–facilities “rendering the Physical Training, which all must take, a pleasure not a penance.” As well as student quarters, Qu’Appelle Hall was used to provide office space and a place for a museum. Normal School (Education) used the first floor; some language classes were also taught there. In 1917 part of the building was used by Emmanuel students while returned soldiers studying Engineering used their building; and in the 1930s, the COTC was quartered in the north end of the Qu’Appelle Hall basement. The building was used for classes and offices until construction of the Arts building in 1960. In the early 1960s the Board of Governors decided that “there should be accommodation on campus for at least one-third of the out of town students,” and authorized an addition to Qu’Appelle to house another 60 students–an increase of 50%. The $731,000 addition, designed by Izumi, Arnott and Sugiyama, was completed in 1963.

Elevated view of structural cement in place and men working on exterior stonework of Qu'Appelle Hall, the men's residence.

Bio/Historical Note: Originally known simply “Student’s Residence No. 2,” the name “Qu’Appelle Hall” was first mentioned in the minutes of the Board’s executive committee in September 1916. Designed by Brown and Vallance as a men’s residence, construction began on Qu’Appelle Hall in 1914 but was sporadic. Delays meant that some building material was subject to the war tax, an additional 5%; and over the winter of 1915 frost damaged the swimming pool, another of many unforeseen expenses. The building was finally completed in 1916, at a cost of $250,000. It included a swimming pool, with lockers purchased from the YMCA, and the dining hall was immediately put to use as a gymnasium–facilities “rendering the Physical Training, which all must take, a pleasure not a penance.” As well as student quarters, Qu’Appelle Hall was used to provide office space and a place for a museum. Normal School (Education) used the first floor; some language classes were also taught there. In 1917 part of the building was used by Emmanuel students while returned soldiers studying Engineering used their building; and in the 1930s, the COTC was quartered in the north end of the Qu’Appelle Hall basement. The building was used for classes and offices until construction of the Arts building in 1960. In the early 1960s the Board of Governors decided that “there should be accommodation on campus for at least one-third of the out of town students,” and authorized an addition to Qu’Appelle to house another 60 students–an increase of 50%. The $731,000 addition, designed by Izumi, Arnott and Sugiyama, was completed in 1963.

Looking southwest at Qu'Appelle Hall (men's residence), taken from the Bowl; Saskatchewan Hall at left. Note that landscaping of the Bowl had just begun.

Elevated view of the Interns' Residence (later renamed the Hantelman Building), looking northwest. Downtown Saskatoon in background.

Bio/Historical Note: A residence for interns was built behind Ellis Hall, a residence for nurses, between 1961-1963. Izumi Arnott Sugiyama, architect, designed the building.