bout de papier, Vol. 15, No. 3 (1998) — Fall 1998 // Automne 1998, pp. 36–37
Tom was born in Toronto on June 22, 1941. After he received his BA at York University in 1963, he studied at the Sorbonne in Paris and then returned to the University of Toronto. He joined the Department of External Affairs in May 1965 and, following “basic” training in Ottawa, was sent on a series of postings (Islamabad, 1966-68; Kingston, 1970-73, Washington, 1976-80; Nairobi, 1980-83), interspersed with assignments to the Information, Security and Intelligence and Middle East Divisions in the Department in Ottawa.
After he returned from Nairobi, Tom was named Director, and later Director General, of the Personnel Administration Bureau in the Personnel Branch. From 1988 to 1992 he served as Minister at the Canadian High Commission in London and, following a brief stint in Personnel Branch as Acting Director General of the Personnel Administration Bureau and a short assignment in Cuba, he was appointed Vice-Commandant of the National Defence College in Kingston, Ontario, serving there in 1993/94. From 1994 to 1996 he was National Coordinator for the Chemical Weapons Convention National Authority.
In September 1996, Tom was named Consul General for Canada to Seattle, where he served with enthusiasm and courage until his death.
As with many colleagues in the Department, paths traverse the same territory even when they don’t cross. Our assignments in the Personnel Branch, and to Pakistan and London always gave us a benchmark for comparisons. We also shared a love of golf, fishing, good jokes and wine, subjects to which — with the exception of the latter — I could turn in latter-day conversations during Tom’s long and courageous struggle with his cancer.
Golf, in many ways defined our friendship and gave insight into his character. Tom and I played golf together for over 20 years; we played in England, Ireland, Myrtle Beach in South Carolina, Washington, DC, Seattle and here in the Ottawa Valley. We played as partners and as opponents. But either way there was always camaraderie because Tom liked people, all sorts of people. And this was the way he was at work as well. He liked his staff and they liked him. He had a genuine open-door policy that extended beyond his office — to his staff parties, luncheons at home and to his softball team.
His style on the golf course was somewhat unorthodox — what I often described as “the caddy lunge.” But as in all the things Tom did, orthodox or not, it got the job done. Tom also asked for advice and listened to people. When we had finished discussing an especially tricky shot on the golf course, the various options and their associated risks, Tom’s final question was always “OK, now what’s the RIGHT thing to do. “ And that’s how he operated at work too – not necessarily the easiest road or the politically correct one, but the RIGHT one. This wasn’t always an easy path to follow but that’s what he did and he was admired for his courage. Tom wasn’t afraid to take a stand.
But what I remember Tom for most of all was his sense of humour — not only in our exchanges of jokes that spanned all the years (recently enhanced through MITNET and SIGNET), during all those lunches (he loved to eat and did so at incredible speed!!) or throughout all those golf games, but also in his ability to see humour in every situation. This was brought home to me after our golf trip to Ireland in the late 80s. Tom and an Australian journalist friend had come from London and I had come from Canada with another journalist who, at that time, was the editor of one of Canada’s most influential newspapers. We played golf for a week on some of Ireland’s finest courses, travelling around the countryside in a rented van, returning to a small village outside Galway each night where we greatly enhanced the local economy, especially that of the local pub. About a week after I got back to Ottawa, I got a phone call from the Canadian journalist who said that, although he had really enjoyed the golf, he had especially enjoyed the camaraderie and never laughed as much as he had during that week. Even during the last few years, when Tom was sometimes a bit down, I could always get him to refocus by starting handicap negotiations, telling him that chemotherapy was only worth one handicap shot whereas working in the Department gave anyone a minimum of three: he would immediately pick up the challenge and we would be off on discussions that left medical conditions behind.
He was also a fierce competitor on the golf course not giving up until the final shot was played. And that’s the way he dealt with his cancer: fighting it all the way, never giving up. It meant that for an extra three years Mary Ellen, Christopher and Michael had the love of their husband/father, the Department kept one of its “finest” and I was lucky enough to have had his friendship and companionship.
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 15, No. 3 (1998) — Fall 1998 // Automne 1998, pp. 36–37. Read the rest of this issue →
