Alain Guerard was introduced as our speaker today, to give his classification talk by his club sponsor, Dave Panabaker. Alain described himself as being a very lucky person all his life. He thanked Joe Hrankowski, whose reclassification talk he heard and that prompted him to make some notes so he wouldn't forget something important that he wanted to say.
Alain was born and raised in Montreal, and they had a good life, good schools and good friends. He said that other than some summer trips to the farm, he never left the "Island", and was very happy. When he was 16 he decided that he wanted to join the Canadian Armed Forces, and became a cadet destined for the infantry. However, 5 years at the Royal Military College and poor eyesight resulted in him graduation as a logistics officer.
He got married to Joanne after graduation, and they have been together for 52 years. They have two children, their daughter has been a police officer but is now studying for a degree in education. Their son is a geologist in Calgary. Most importantly, they have 4 grandkids. His career took him to many locations around this country and he retired from the military in 1995 as the DCO of the School of Logistics.
\Upon retirement, he found a job at KPMG in supply chain management and has continued to work in that field over the past 20 years. He has been involved in larger projects with firms such as Pfizer, with the Canadian Blood Service, and overseas with fuel logistics in Sudan and container loads of relief supplies for the Ukraine. His work is gradually tapering off, but he still gets calls and puts in about one day a week. He has volunteered at AJ Loan Cupboard over the past year, and both the Esplanade and Co-op Place. He descibed himself as a "WYSIWYG" guy, "what you see is what you get.
He was thanked by Past District Governor Sandy Mackay, and presented with a Paul Harris Fellowship, our tradition for new members and we look forward to Alain's ideas and energy in the club for years to come.
