Kingston, Ont. (June, 12, 2009) - It was a family reunion of sorts yesterday at the Physical Education Centre on campus as Forbes Pritchard from Australia was able to see the trophy donated by his late grandfather Thomas Jenkins.
The Jenkins Trophy is awarded annually at Queen's to the top graduating male athlete of the year dating back to 1930.
Story appearing in the Kingston Whig Standard:
Donor's grandson 'staggered' by Jenkins Trophy
It was a trip to see a family jewel, a trophy shrouded in mystery.
For Australia resident Forbes Pritchard, laying eyes on the splendid Jenkins Trophy -- awarded to the top male graduating athlete in academics and athletics at Queen's University -- yesterday represented a special moment for his family.
The Jenkins Trophy was donated by Pritchard's grandfather Thomas Jenkins, a Torontobased art dealer who never lived in Kingston and never attended Queen's, in 1930. Jenkins died in 1931, less than one year later.
"I'm staggered," said the Toronto-born Pritchard, who is back in Ontario to attend a Grade 8 class reunion, 50 years after he graduated from his elementary school.
"I saw the pictures (before he came to Kingston), but I just can't believe the grandness of it ... We just don't know what (Jenkins') thinking was (when he donated the cup)."
Pritchard's road to Kingston is quite a story in itself.
In 2005, Pritchard's cousin, James Pritchard, a retired, 32- year history professor at Queen's, saw an episode ofAntiques Roadshow,a CBC program in which appraisers travel around Canada, which featured the Jenkins Trophy.
Pegged as a finely crafted English champagne cistern with solid silver made prior to 1896, the trophy, featuring elaborate handles that resemble Zeus-like characters, was estimated to be worth $30,000.
James informed Forbes, who moved to Sydney, Australia, from Montreal in 1975 with his Australian- born wife, of the news and it piqued the interest of the now 63-year-old, who knew nothing about the trophy. Neither, for that matter, did Forbes' brother or sister.
With his class reunion in Toronto on tap, Pritchard wasn't about to waste an opportunity to become the first member of his family to see the trophy in Kingston.
"Those girls (Jenkins had four daughters, including Forbes' late mother, Ruth) wouldn't say a bad word about their father, but they never said anything about this trophy," said Forbes Pritchard, a father of four and a soon-to-be grandfather who met his wife, a social worker, when she was on business in Montreal.
"How do you work that out? They tell every other story about him. We've gone over this the last three years, saying, 'Why?' The answer is 'I don't know.' "
That hasn't stopped Pritchard -- who worked in computer sales (he graduated from then-Ryerson Polytechnical Institute in Toronto with a major in computers, which "in the 1960s was pretty sexy") and in the tax office for the Commonwealth government before retiring (he was "tired of chasing the baddies") -- from trying to uncover Jenkins' link to Kingston.
He has discovered that Jenkins, who ran the Jenkins Art Gallery and Emporium and had deep ties to the Ontario Conservative Party, had clients in Kingston whom he stopped to see when travelling between offices in Toronto and Montreal.
The family has found a letter from Jenkins to one of his daughters in which he said he was making a stop at Queen's.
"(Jenkins) never went to Queen's (as a student), but he obviously had friends here and he wanted to do something (for the school) late in life," James Pritchard said.
"Or else he had something he couldn't unload."
Added Forbes: "It's a very curious thing. And, then, what's interesting is the university doesn't know much about it either."
What Forbes Pritchard does know is that Jenkins was a devoted family man who raised his four daughters after his wife died of breast cancer in 1918.
"Those four girls looked up to him in awe, partly because of that," Pritchard said.
Pritchard, who has a subtle Australian accent, will enjoy some true Canadiana while making his visit.
Dubbed Captain Canada at the rink in Australia where he still plays ice hockey twice a week, Pritchard has been invited to a friend's cottage in the City of Kawartha Lakes tonight.
"I'll be there before the puck drops at 8," said Pritchard, referring to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup final between the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins.
While watching the biggest puck-game of the season with his buddy will be a treat, it certainly won't compare to yesterday, a unique, memorable occasion.
"It's marvellous, isn't it?" Pritchard said with his eyes fixed on the cup won by names like footballers Larry Mohr and Ross Francis, hockey player Paul Stothart and rower Doug Hamilton. "It's a link to someone who was held in great reverence by my mother."
See the full story by the Kingston Whig Standard at:
http://www.thewhig.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1609642