QUB Medical Graduates 1969- 40 Year Reunion!
The 40th anniversary of Queen’s medical graduates 1969 was held from 16th – 18th September 2009 with the Radisson Hotel on the old Belfast Gas Works site as the centre of operations. This reunion was attended by 67 graduates and 41 accompanying persons making a total of 108 delegates. Interestingly 15 of the accompanying persons were also QUB graduates.
As over 80% of the classmates were on e-mail, the organizing committee had been able to get opinions and suggestions for the reunion to help with planning the event. As a result it was found that approximately 70% of the “year” had retired or were about to retire and very few wanted to have a medical scientific session at this reunion. In its place, events were organized in and around Belfast with one session of talks held in the hotel on the Thursday morning.
The Wednesday afternoon events had been organized by Ann Smylie (nee Thompson). The first event was a guided tour of the Titanic Quarter taking in the Titanic Dock and Pump house. This was followed by an opportunity to see Belfast from the vantage point of the top of the Belfast Wheel in the grounds of the City Hall. We were very fortunate for these two events in that the weather had been dry and mild for Belfast in September. On Thursday evening we had a drinks reception followed by an enjoyable supper in the Titanium room of the Radisson Hotel. This was followed by a slide show (updated to CD) of a compilation of photographs taken during those student days of 1963 – 1969. The cine film based on Frank Pantridge’s cardiac ambulance that had been made and first shown when we presented the show for the Dean’s Birthday party in our 5th year as students, had it’s 10 yearly airing – this time on DVD. No one seems to be able to recall what happened for the rest of Wednesday evening/night except that there were a lot of sore heads on Thursday morning.
The Thursday morning session was chaired by Denis Connolly. Lorna Mairs gave the first presentation of illustrated talk about her involvement with the Burma Children’s Fund. Jimmy Douglas followed by describing his experience of working in St. Helena. This was also illustrated with numerous photographs. Peter Brown then told us how to spend our retirement lump sum on building an eco-friendly home. Peter has retired to the English Riviera in Devon. Our guest speaker at this session was Prof. Richard Clarke who described the important milestones in the history of the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast.
On Thursday afternoon, delegates had a choice of activity. A large party took the opportunity to visit the Somme Heritage Centre in Conlig. Norman Campbell had the good sense to book a coach to take us there so that no one would get lost. After a look around the museum of First & Second world war artefacts we had a guided tour through the Home Rule Crisis, recruiting, training of soldiers and finally to the front line trenches. Here, the Battle of the Somme was recreated in an audiovisual presentation. The visit concluded with a talk by Ian Adamson who described the role of the 16th (Irish) Division and the 36th (Ulster) Division in the Somme and the work of the Somme Association in providing research and organizing commemorations and battlefield tours.
The alternative activity on Thursday afternoon was to take a bus tour of Belfast on an open topped double decker bus. We were very fortunate to have chosen what must have been the warmest day in September as normally the weather is not conducive to this type of travel. The tour was organized to drop us off at RVH for a 45 minute guided tour of the hospital in order to see the changes that had been made on the RVH site since 1969 and also to see what had become of all the places we remembered so well in our student days. After the Royal visit the delegates joined the next red bus to complete the tour of Belfast. The return journey from Castle Place was completed on foot taking in the Crown Bar en route back to the Radisson Hotel.
The highlight of this reunion was to see the Great Hall at Queens filled with over one hundred delegates for our official anniversary dinner. Our congratulations go to Agnes McKnight for choosing an excellent menu and arranging the harpist to play before dinner. Stanley Roberts was our invited guest to propose the toast of “1969 QUB Medics” with a reply from Ken Hambly. Sam Moore proposed the toast of the guests and accompanying persons and this was responded to by Andrew Pike (husband of Judy Davis). Again Norman Campbell had arranged for a coach to take us all back to the Radisson hotel where the crack went on for another few hours.
The concluding events of this reunion on Friday were a choice between a tour of the Royal site for those who could not attend on Thursday and a golf competition at Malone Golf Club. Clive McConnell won the men’s prize and Noeni Bryars won the ladies prize with the best gross prize going to Peter Dick.
Aside from the organized events it was good to see so many old friends from 40 years ago and catch up on each other’s experience of life. Some had suffered serious health problems, others had lost their partners and others had suffered tragedy in their life. Some had changed careers and many of us were in the early months of retirement and not quite accustomed to the change in lifestyle. Alas the time was all too short.
I have been greatly encouraged by the positive feedback from so many of those attending this reunion. Some of you have been asking when we will have another one. All I can say for now is keep watching the QUB alumni website.
All delegates at the conference did receive a copy of the 64 page souvenir yearbook. If anyone who did not attend the reunion would like a copy please contact me at dr.sam.moore@btinternet.com
Finally, I would like to extend my thanks to Jacqui McCormick, Lisa Ramsey and Adele McMahon of the Development and Alumni Relations Office at Queens for their help to me in organizing this reunion and also to Brian Horgan of QUB Hospitality Services for his guidance and supervision of our anniversary dinner in the Great Hall. I would also like to thank the staff of the Radisson Hotel for accommodating us for the two days of the reunion. Last, but by no means least, I am greatly indebted to the help from the members of the committee who helped me organise this reunion. They were, John & Noeni Bryars, Denis & Pat Connolly, Norman Campbell, Agnes McKnight, Clive McConnell Tom Quaite and Ann Smylie.
