Shawnigan Lake School - Yearbook (Shawnigan Lake, British Columbia Canada)

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DARRELLJOHN FARRANT HEADMASTER ELECT

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DEDICATION The Rev. Canon William Hamilton Horace McClelland M.B.E., M.A. Not many men would or could have served the school more willingly or more loyally than Horace McClelland. The years between his arrival on staff in 1967 and the present have been some of the most eventful and difficult in Shawnigan ' s history. For Horace they have been years in which he has been called upon to fill many administrative roles: throughout as Chaplain; on two occasions as Assistant Headmaster; as Acting Headmaster and, finally, as the 7th Headmaster when Hugh Wilkinson relinquished that position in 1975. To all these he has brought energy and dedication. Indeed the McClelland Wilkinson years have witnessed important additions - among them the new tennis courts - and renovations to our older buildings. Moreover, today, the school has the largest enrolment in its history. Born in County Armagh, Horace McClelland was educated at The King ' s Hospital and Trinity College, Dublin. Always keen on sport, he played cricket for Trinity and rugby, his favourite game, for Palmerston while holding the curacy of St. Anne ' s and Christchurch, Leeson Park. In 1951 he joined the Royal Army Chaplains Department of the British Army and served in Cyprus, Hong Kong and North Africa with many regiments including the Gurkhas, the Commandos, the 17th 21st Lancers and the Parachute Regiment, rising to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. He took part in the 1956 operations against Egypt and, in 1961, the Queen created him a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. It was, in fact, through an army friend, Colonel John Lake, a former Head of School, that Horace McClelland first found his way to Shawnigan. In dedicating this edition to Horace McClelland the editors of the Stag would also like to pay tribute to Sheila McClelland and to express our gratitude for her hospitality, help, interest and support which she too has so wholeheartedly given the school. To both we wish many more years of happy and rewarding association with Shawnigan.

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THE ADDRESS OF THE HEADMASTER ELECT TO THE OLD BOYS ' DINNER FRIDAY - MARCH 30th., 1978 I have had the pleasure of speaking at various dinners, but this is the first time that I have been invited at a distance of 6,000 miles. I arrived in Vancouver yesterday and so perhaps am still suffering to some extent from the effects of jet-lag, but am none the less delighted that this function fitted so exactly into my present schedule. I have particularly wanted to meet a large number of Old Boys during my visit and this is an ideal opportunity. My first visit to Canada was last August at the invitation of the Search Committee, and I would like to compliment the Board of Governors for the thorough and thoughtful way in which they prepared the candidates for the responsibility which one of them would be asked to assume. I think some detail of their approach would be of interest. The Deputy Chairman came to visit my wife and myself at our home in Edinburgh last July and spent the whole day in our company, having a chance to see us in our own environment, accompanied by our two children and surrounded by the colleagues and pupils with whom I was working. This gave Hugh Wilkinson a chance to see how similar to Shawnigan Merchiston is, and to know that my experience would be relevant to the new post, and this also enabled me to find out a great deal of information about Canadian education in general and Shaw- nigan in particular. Shawnigan was a school which I knew by reputation, especially for its sports tours in Great Britain with rugby and athletics teams as well as by its many distinguished appearances at the Royal Regatta at Henley. The next phase was an invitation to Shawnigan in August, and again a thoughtful and essential feature was that this was also extended to my wife. The decision to uproot all one ' s connections with a native country and settle in a new land is one of the biggest of one ' s life and I could never have made it without the advice and support of my wife. I was deeply honoured to be offered the appointment by the Search Committee and I well remember a vital and thoughtful afternoon in Vancouver when we jointly agreed that we should be delighted to accept. In taking the position at Shawnigan I am aware of how much I have to learn and how much assistance I shall need. Canada is a country that as yet I know little about but here again, as part of their thoughtful approach, the Governors arranged an extensive tour of the province for us last summer which enabled us to gain first-hand experience of some of the areas the boys come from and to meet a number of people closely connected with the work of the school. The hospitality of these kind people - Governors, parents, Old Boys and general well-wishers - was absolutely regal. We were de lighted with the warmth and sincerity of the Canadian personality and most heartened by the obvious surge of goodwill for the school. We had two spells in Vancouver and memorable visits to the Cariboo and the Okanagan, flying from Vancouver to Quesnel and then driving from there to Kelowna and so back to Vancouver, and thus in a short space of time we managed a remarkably full acquaintance with the province of B.C.