Bob Dick was born in Vernon in 1940. He graduated from Vernon High School in 1958 and then attended UBC where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1963 and a Bachelor of Laws degree in 1966. He then moved to Prince George where he articled to Hubert King, Q.C. Bob was called to the Bar in 1967 and became a partner in the Prince George law firm of Wilson King until he retired from practice in 2014.
Bob was retained as City Solicitor for Prince George from 1976 to 2009, and throughout his career was elected or appointed to numerous committees of the Canadian Bar Association and the Law Society of B.C. In 1986 Bob was appointed Queen's Counsel.
In 1991 he was elected President of the Law Society of B.C. Additional appointments included Governor of the Law Foundation, Chairman of the first City of Prince George Design Advisory Board, Director of Forest Alliance of BC, and a founder of both the Prince George Oldtimers Hockey and the Prince George Over 50 Hockey Associations.
Bob was a member of the Prince George Astronomy club. The club had obtained a grant to commission a 24-inch mirror to build the most powerful telescope in northern Canada - this would enable research of the northern sky that no other observatory could do. Canadian Airlines flew the mirror from California to Prince George at no cost to the club. The club used the top of a farm silo as a dome for the observatory and a metal culvert as the tube of the telescope. The first observatory was built on Tabor Mountain, but later it was moved away from the lights of the city to its current location on Tedford Road near West Lake. At the request of the club, Bob incorporated the Prince George Astronomical Society so that it became a legal entity. That club has now become the Prince George Branch of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada.
Maureen, the only child of Tom and Grace (nee Smith) Dilworth, was born in 1940 in the old Prince George hospital. She attended a one-room school in Aleza Lake until Grade 5, and then completed her schooling in Prince George. Music, the junior church choir, and Eleanor Black's Glee Club were a big part of her early years. While in high school she worked part time in the record bar at Prince George Electric.
In 1958, after graduating from the old Prince George Secondary school she went into training at Vancouver General Hospital and earned her Registered Nurse certificate in 1961.
With a twinkle in her eye Maureen said, "In 1960, another student nurse talked me into attending a fraternity party. I didn't feel like going but I'm glad I did because that was the night I met Bob and we started our wonderful 60-year romance."
Bob and Maureen were married in Prince George in 1963. Bob was entering law school, and during the summers he had a good paying job as a roller-operator for a paving company. The plan was that Maureen would work as a nurse until Bob graduated in 1966. However, those plans changed in 1965 when their first baby arrived and Maureen became a stay-at-home mom.
When they moved to Prince George in 1966 Maureen would have returned to nursing, but part-time nursing was not permitted at Prince George Regional Hospital. She volunteered for the hospital auxiliary from 1973-1989, became a charter member of the White Spruce City Chorus of Sweet Adelines in 1981 and sang with them for 30 years. She was a long-time member of Day Ladies Golf at the Prince George Golf and Curling Club.
Bob and Maureen have two children and four grandchildren: their son Bobby and his wife Val and their two sons Thomas and Ryan; and their daughter Katherine and her husband Bill Keates and his two sons Billy and Chris. Both families live in Toronto.
When Bobby and Katherine were growing up in Prince George, they spent countless summer days at the family's cabin on Cluculz Lake.
Bob and Maureen are true soulmates - they golf together and dancing together has been a big part of their life from the day they met.
They concluded by saying, "Living through this Covid-19 pandemic has been made easier by being with someone you love, but even more so with someone that you really enjoy spending time with. After 60 years together we cannot imagine anyone else that we would rather isolate with."
