So, sometime in 1986-87 I started teaching live-interactive telecourses on the Knowledge Network. The Network was very different then and North Island College had several telecourses telecast on it by a few instructors, me included. I’ve already posted a blog about my experience doing that work. You can check it out here:
One thing I didn’t mention in my 2018 post was the selfless dedication of one of my friends, Roger Loubert, to me and to my courses on the Knowledge Network. He “worked the phones” for the phone-in segments of the courses every two weeks during the academic year and he did it with no expectation of pay or reward. He died at Crossroads Hospice in Port Moody of complications from prostate cancer on July 3rd, 2021. He was just a little older than me. You can read one of his obituaries here.
Roger and I go back to the 1970s. He had come to BC from New Brunswick. I don’t recall any of the details of his migration, but he ended up in Maillardville, a small French-Canadian community in Coquitlam established in 1909. Fraser Mills, on the banks of the Fraser River needed sawmill workers who weren’t “Oriental” but were at least White and who could strike break if needed. The fact that they spoke French was a minor irritant, but they were also Catholic, and that proved a little more problematic because they wanted their own church building if they were going to stay.
Maillardville was were I grew up and it was to remain a French-Canadian community for many years, until the late 1970s. It has remnants of French culture and still has two French-based Catholic Churches. The assimilation rate is over 95% now so you’ll find that most people in the community speak English exclusively and intermarriage has made it more and more difficult to call families French-Canadian anymore. That’s not to be lamented, that’s just the way the world works.
Loubert (that’s what I always called him) thought Maillardville was special, a microcosm of Canada. He invented something called Information Maillardville and rented a room in a building at the busy corner of Brunette Avenue and the Lougheed Highway to store all of his Information Maillardville (stuff) documentation, and there was a lot of that right from the beginning. He eventually moved his stuff to a warehouse in Vancouver around Manitoba and 8th. He lived there too of course. No running water, no anything. Just lots of paper and stuff. He moved it again later to various locations in Coquitlam and environs. After he died, it was left to his friends to clean it up. He would never have given up or gotten rid of his stuff while he was still alive.
Loubert was certainly an eccentric. His eating habits back when I first met him were unusual. His girlfriend at the time was Dutch and she was more hippie than eccentric. I don’t think that veganism was as common then as now but they were both vegans. They cared not an iota about what anybody thought about them. He subscribed to the ‘mucusless’ diet, a diet originated by a German ‘naturopath’ and ‘alternative health educator’, Arnold Ehret, who died in October 1922 at age 56 from a fall and head injury while walking along a sidewalk. He had moved to Los Angeles by then to prey on gullible Californians, I assume. His diet has been thoroughly debunked as ridiculous although it’s sadly still around. Loubert swore by Ehret and carried his book around for some time. Loubert was crazy like that, but he was not insane.
At one point while living in the Port Coquitlam area he adopted ten husky dogs and named them after each Canadian province. I can’t remember how that turned out. I can assume that he fed them before he even fed himself. He was like that. Eventually he got a job driving a school bus. That would have given him time to devote to his cultural and social activities. He was involved in a number of organizations in Coquitlam and adjoining municipalities. As I note above, he died still in possession of his ‘stash’ of Information Maillardville stuff and whatever else he managed to accumulate, which was substantial by all accounts.
Loubert was big on festivals and celebrations, at least when I knew him. He was always trying to organize Festival Maillardville. It never did materialize from what I remember. He could never get buy-in from the parishes in Maillardville (with their parish halls), but there were other festivals in which he could participate like Le Festival du Bois held this year at Mackin Park in early April.
I was a student at Douglas College in New Westminster from 1971 until 1973 then at Simon Fraser University from 1973 until 1980. Loubert and I had intermittent contact after that, especially after Carolyn and I moved to the Comox Valley with the kids in 1983. In 1974 or so I took time off from my studies to work on a project called Plan Maillardville. I was in my third year of my Bachelor’s degree but I was hired to be the project sociologist because not only was I from the area, but I was bilingual. Loubert was delighted by my work on the Plan Maillardville. He was frequently in my office, chatting it up.
For a few years after 1983, Loubert and I, like I said, had only intermittent contact. However, when he found out that I was going to be on the Knowledge Network, that really piqued his interest again. He was always fascinated with radio and TV because of information, of course. So, we met and discussed his participation. He was delighted to be involved.
I had NO budget from North Island College for much of anything except props. Of course the College paid for my transportation and hotel costs, but not much towards the production of the telecourses. So Loubert’s offer to work for nothing was a godsend. During my broadcasts he sat in the control room to take the phone calls during the twenty or so minutes at the end of the hour program we allowed for that. That was every two weeks. He loved to talk on the phone and always used the occasion to chat people up. He was always very sociable on the phone from what I gather.
Loubert was always game to help out. I appreciated him for that. He was definitely one of a kind. Unfortunately I never had the opportunity to thank him again for his dedication to our work on the Knowledge Network. This is not a substitute for that, just a small token of my appreciation.
Roger Albert - Always a Sociologist: Now Living With Myeloma 