Dr. William “Bill” Thomas Brownlee, PhD

52 Responses

1. Dec. 18, 2023

   Dear Colleen and Family:

   I’m sure Mr. Brownlee would understand (knowing that 13 + years have slipped away since his passing) of the need to call a ‘timeout’ on the field. (Having been a successful baseball player and all). I knew Mr. Brownlee (Bill if I may) on a totally different level.
   Allow me to explain.

   It was Easter Break (1976) at the Red Deer Public School District No. 104 Central Administration Offices, a Monday, and I had just transferred in from the Stettler School District No. 1475 to become part 2 of a two part Accounting Team. It was my first day on the job with my new employer. I walked into a Wine and Cheese Party in Progress !! Mr. Harold Dawe, the Superintendent of Schools, a position he had held for 24 years !, was retiring and Bill Brownlee (the Principal of Lindsay Thurber Comprehensive High School) was selected as his successor. 24 years as a Superintendent of Schools is unheard of today, a feat today perhaps never to be duplicated! And I now understood the need for celebration. I was 24 yrs. old at the time, soon to be 25 in June. I had little knowledge of Mr. Dawe’s history, soon to be legacy if you will. But that was about to change very quickly. One word surrounding Mr. Dawe was “respect” and that’s one trait that Bill had on his resume’, BIG TIME !! To use a modern phrase, “You can’t ‘download’ it, can’t buy it, can’t sell it, You have to EARN it ! I recall part of Mr. Bob Schnell’s (our Vice-Chairman of the School Board)(also a lawyer in our City) speech he gave during the presentation of a ‘gift’ to Mr. Dawe. He said; “If I had one-tenth of the RESPECT that this man has in this City and IN HIS field of expertise (Education) In This Province I would be a lucky man.” And Bill was taking the reins from this Man ! Continuity……Consistency……You Bet….We needed it then perhaps more than any other time as things were changing.
   One thing I don’t see, but once, in the ‘Memories of Bill’ is the word ‘integrity’. Bill was taking over from a well known and respected Educator with Decades of Experience in the Education field. The need for continuity and stability was paramount at this time of change for the top job at Red Deer Public Schools. And change was all around us. Bill brought integrity to the table in equal amounts similar to Mr. Dawe. Bill was a Human Resource type that could instill calm and boost morale in the darkest of circumstances. If I can give you but one example:

   The 1977-78 School Year. All September’s start out hectic as all Schools go through their start up procedures, but this one was going to be different. With September 30 looming as the month progressed, the 30 th being the “official student count day” on which all of our Funding grants are based on, for the year, from the Dep’t of Ed, we arrived for work Monday morning September 26 to news that there had been a MAJOR fire at Eastview Junior High School overnight. Our hearts sank immediately! So many decisions had to be made quickly on that day (that morning !) as hundreds of students, their families, and their teachers daily lives were affected. So many questions went through our minds and very few answers were being found until everything settled and the authorities had an opportunity to do their jobs. It didn’t take them long to determine this fire had help. How could someone…..? Why…..? Morale at Central Office as well as the whole City seemed to be in shock and disbelief with the outpouring of help coming from many, many sources. We were at an all time LOW if not lower. Mr. Bill Brownlee. was at the helm of our ship steering us through these murky waters, holding press interviews, directing staff department heads to reallocate some staff, maintenance and otherwise, even Parents were coming forward with offers to help in the cleanup. The community response was incredible!! It all had to be orchestrated ! Small armies of people began working 24/7 to get that School functioning again. A determination was made by officials that Eastview Junior High could still function in its own footprint if we turned some unaffected areas into classrooms. WHEN was re-opening was the next most asked question. But there was one other question still unanswered. RCMP had no initial leads on suspects. Days turned into weeks, still NO news, and then…..one morning……(I’ll stop here for a moment to describe one more thing in detail about our office layout)…… Bill’s office was down a long hallway to my right, second door on the left, with offices on both sides beyond that leading to an exit. I’m sitting at my desk in an open area (no dividers) where I can see down this hallway. Shirley and Gwen are behind me in separate offices, doors open, ahead of me is Susan and across from her Donna, forming an ‘L’ shape but with plenty of room to walk in between, and on the other side was Katie and Peggy’s desk’s. I very early on could gage Bill’s demeanour by the way he closed his hollow, mahogany sheeted hallway office door; a purposeful almost slam and you knew he was on a mission or he was displeased with something, a softer closure perhaps nearing day’s end, you knew he was preparing to leave for the day and pick up his children from School which he did daily. In any event that sound carried up and down this hallway unimpeded. It was mid-morning this day and Bill exited his office to the point you could hear the latch click upon closing (a different softer sound) making his way (everyone’s heads were down busy at their own stations) up the hallway (he was about to pull off the most useful combination of body language and sound of his voice I have never experienced before nor since) first stopping at Ray’s open office door, where he leaned in and said something to Ray. Then carried on to the open area between Susan, Donna’s and my desk, Shirley and Gwen behind me, in a slow methodical walk, left fist clinched (maybe his right too, I couldn’t see) (Bill had big hands a byproduct of years of manual labor on the Manitoba family farm) he uttered THREE WORDS in a lower tone than what we were used to….”THEY GOT ‘EM !“ Immediately
   the girls around me gasped in relief of this news, his left fist still pumping as if to put another exclamation mark on what he had just said !! He still had the entire rest of the office (we have a long single story structure) to go. In that ONE motion he had changed the morale in our office to a HIGH I had never felt before ! I think about that sequence from time to time. He knew EXACTLY what to do and HOW to do it !!! And it all started with the door.
   Our Men’s group at the Golden Circle often discuss and suggest each of us should make a list of the 20 most important people that have influenced our lives. Bill’s name is on mine.
   I would love an opportunity to sit down one afternoon with Colleen and family and share stories of days gone by. I can see this game being tied after ‘9’ (o’clock and the need for extra innings perhaps even calling the game on account of darkness to be finished the next day or future day). Like I said at the top of my note, I knew him on a totally different level. All the other “memories of Bill” here are 100 % true. It’s been too long.
   My “time out” is quickly nearing an end as I see the umpire is starting to make his way to the mound as I struggle for an appropriate ending, there’s only one that fits and it goes like this;
   “Service to others is the RENT you pay for your ROOM here on planet Earth and to you, Dr. William Thomas Brownlee, Ph.D., your RENT is
   “PAID IN FULL !!!”

   Respectfully submitted,

   Eugene Morrical
   Red Deer, Alberta

2. Hello Lorna,

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   Thank you