Stuart Houston stands out in Saskatchewan

Stuart Houston stands out in Saskatchewan

Postby Oscar » Sat Jul 29, 2017 11:46 am

A history of success: Stuart Houston stands out in Saskatchewan

[ http://thestarphoenix.com/life/bridges/ ... skatchewan ]

Sean Trembath, Saskatoon StarPhoenix Published on: June 28, 2017

Stuart Houston is fascinated with Saskatchewan’s history and a lifetime of dedication to his passions has made him a part of it.
“I just think he’s one of the most remarkable men that’s ever lived in Saskatchewan,” J. Frank Roy, a collaborator who has known Houston more than seven decades, says.
Houston is an accomplished radiologist, but is perhaps better known as the most prominent member of Saskatchewan’s bird banding community. He and his wife Mary have banded more than 150,000 birds, covering almost 200 species.
He is also an author, having written 12 books of history and hundreds of other articles in publications medical and otherwise. There’s at least one more book on the way, despite his 90th birthday coming later this year.
His decades of work in various fields have earned him a huge number of awards, from a Governor General’s Award when he graduated high school in 1945 to a Saskatchewan Order of Merit to the Order of Canada, where he was inducted as an Officer in 1993. A full list of his recognitions is far too long to lay out here.
Houston is proud of his accomplishments. He has a very sharp memory and can list them all. But at the same time he is thankful. He is a firm believer in synchronicity, the fortunate coalescence of circumstances that leads to great things.
“I bumbled into statistically improbable situations every time I did something,” Houston says.
Houston was born in 1927 in North Dakota, where his parents were both medical doctors, but the family moved to Yorkton a year later.
It was there he acquired his love of birds, thanks largely to a succession of women. The first was his mother, who made sure he was always on the go, even after he broke his leg in Grade 5.
“She believed that idleness was sinful. This was part of my upbringing,” Houston says.
When he turned 12 years old, two of Houston’s aunts gave him a copy of Birds of Canada. They’d split the cost, Houston says, because both thought the $3.50 price tag was too much for one person to spend on a 12-year-old.
That book began his ornithological education. He would spot birds in the area, learn their plumage and their songs. But it was one he couldn’t find in the book that set up the meeting that truly solidified his passion.
One day Houston spotted a gathering of birds on his lawn eating dandelions. When he couldn’t identify them, his father told him to go see a local botanist, Mrs. Priestley. After identifying the birds as goldfinches, Priestley invited Houston and a few friends to start accompanying her on her weekly walks around the area.
For two years he spent Sundays with Mrs.Priestley, taking notes of all the birds they observed. Finally she suggested he type up the list.
“We’d seen 185 species, which seemed to us pretty good,” Houston says, although he now calls it “pitiful, in retrospect.”
Regardless, the list and the map hand drawn by Houston on the cover inspired an entire column in the Winnipeg Free Press. The column included an address where readers could send 10 cents for their own copy. And they did, along with letters of praise and questions about other birds from the Yorkton area and elsewhere.
“Here was adulation and praise,” Houston says.
Not long after this he got his first taste of bird banding. Ducks Unlimited, still a fledgling organization at the time, was looking for people to band ducks at 10 cents each. Houston convinced them to give him a permit, despite him being three years under the intended age limit of 18.
The first year he banded 556, earning $55.60. The next year it was more than 1,000. Finally in the third year he did more than 2,100. The pay had raised to 20 cents a band by that point.
“I was making more money than any of my friends by the third year, and I’m still in high school,” Houston says.
Stuart Houston once worked with Farley Mowat banding birds and owns a field guide Farley sent him.
After high school Houston knew he wanted to follow in his parents’ footsteps and become a doctor.
“My parents were leading people in the community. They had social standing,” he says.
He got his M.D. from the University of Manitoba in 1951, but the majority of his career was spent at the University of Saskatchewan. He worked his way up through the ranks, eventually becoming the head of the department of medical imaging in 1982. He retired in 1996.
It was while doing medical research that Houston went through another fortunate set of circumstances and was led toward another lifelong passion, the history of the Franklin Expedition.
Houston was researching an abnormally high rate of hip dislocation among First Nations women. One of the theories surrounded the swaddling techniques the women used. In looking for information about this, Houston caught word of a diary written by Robert Hood, a member of Franklin’s ill-fated expedition. The diary purportedly included descriptions of First Nations life in the early 1800s.
At first Houston’s pleas to find out who owned the diary were unsuccessful. But later, after he had helped produce a film about his research into the hip issues, he got a name. By coincidence, Houston’s film was scheduled to screen in Vancouver, which happened to be where the secretive diary-holder lived.
Houston was able to meet the man and transcribe the diary. The experience eventually led to his first book on the Franklin Expedition, To the Arctic by Canoe. He would go on to write two more books about the expedition, along with nine others on birds and medical history.
“I’m not a great writer. Here’s where my wife comes in again. I would write the facts and Mary would spruce it up,” Houston says.
J. Frank Roy, who is collaborating with Houston on his next book, Birds of Saskatchewan, and has edited many of Houston’s previous works, said Houston is a tireless researcher and collector of knowledge.
“Their house had three floors, and every floor was in danger of collapsing from the weight of books,” Roy says.
Alongside all his other work, Houston has continued banding birds to this day. His total of 155,000 bandings in incredible on its own, and he also holds records for the most turkey vultures and great horned owls banded. His wife Mary is herself a record holder as well, having banded 5,385 Bohemian waxwings – more than the next three competitors combined.
On top of his own banding, Houston has been instrumental in spreading the practice in Saskatchewan.
“His motto always was, ‘Every bird needs a band,’ “ Marten Stoffel, a longtime banding colleague in Saskatoon, says.
According to Stoffel, anyone in Saskatchewan who does any bird banding is almost certainly connected to Houston in some way. Houston is generous not only with his knowledge and enthusiasm, but his money.
Stoffel says the Houstons lived quite frugally, but used the money they saved for their bird banding efforts. If you were going on a banding expedition with Houston he was paying for the supplies, no questions asked.
“He almost became insulted when I tried to pull out my wallet one time,” Stoffel says.
Houston says this will be his last summer banding birds. He and Mary sold their house, where they did a lot of the work in the back yard, and at almost 90 it’s getting more difficult to read the small numbers on the bands.
This is not to say he has regressed to the sinful inactivity his mother warned against. Houston still does 10 or more chin ups every day and swims five or six days a week.
His focus now is on Birds of Saskatchewan, an ever-expanding book he admits he should have started on years earlier. The ambitious project seeks to outline everyone since the Franklin Expedition who has played a notable role in Saskatchewan’s ornithological history.
“I was always interested in history,” Houston says.
Co-editor Roy says the book is a tremendous balancing act. It’s difficult to include everyone who deserves it without letting the whole thing balloon to a size that would make it too expensive for anyone to buy.
Such an exhaustive collection, focused on history and birds, two of Houston’s lifelong passions, will be an appropriate stamp at the end of a long, illustrious career for Houston.
Roy says all of the awards and recognition Houston have received are well-deserved, and were earned through hard work.
“I think he’s tried very hard to be a good person,” Roy says.
Marten Stoffel expresses similar sentiments, summing it up in the rarified terms Houston’s historical muses have previously inspired.
“In this province there is never going to be another Stuart Houston,” Stoffel says.
Oscar
Site Admin
 
Posts: 9079
Joined: Wed May 03, 2006 3:23 pm

Return to Other

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 5 guests

cron