Elsewhere, the summer of'oo was the summer of Woodstock, the Ofiicial Languages Act, the opening season ofthe l\'ilontreal Expos, and Neil Armstrong walking on the moon. On the University of Prince Edward Island’s two campuses, it was the summer of an— ticipation, harried planning, and meetings, meetings, meetings. On Ronald Baker’s very first day back on PEI at the beginning of]une, he met with the two old universities’ administrators, boards, and

student associations, and the new university’s department chairs.

(He jotted down some notes and epigrams for such meetings. At the top of the list: “Even a shotgun wedding usually has a honey—

moon“) One of the president’s first discoveries was that because UPEI would not technically exist untilJuly I, not a single dollar had been provided for it. He phoned the Minister ofEducation with his dilemma. Could we have some money? Would $1 million do to start? Yes. As it turned out, the government could only raise $500,000 that Friday. Upon picking up the cheque, Baker realized that neither he nor UPEI possessed a bank account. Comptroller Dennis Clough deposited the cheque in his own account for the weekend.“

With no Senate or Board in place, Baker enlisted others who were around that summer to help make decisions. He called on St. Dunstan‘s and Prince of Wales’ final student governments to speak for student interests. And he relied heavily on the new department chairs. This worked out extremely well for UPEI. Earlier that spring, Prince of Wales and St. Dunstan’s professors had met together as departments — l'listory with History, for example — and selected a chair for each newly merged department. h'lany of the elected chairs became leaders of the university community for decades to come: people such as Father P. W. P. Bolger from History, Doris Anderson from Home Economics, Owen Sharkey from Psychology,

Verner Smitheram from Philosophy, John Smith from English, Re—

48 "lll’l‘il Origins A Baker papers" vertical file. folder 1, item (>3, Plil Collection. 49 Ron Baker tells this story in a \‘ideo thank you delivered at lll’l‘il linmders‘ Day, 2000.

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