The Faculty’s most significant undergraduate student award has been established in honour of Phillip Tindle (ApSc 49) and his wife Katherine (BA 48).
“Please, call me Taddy,” Katherine says. “I’ve gone by that nickname my whole life.”
In their top-floor Vancouver apartment with gorgeous views of forests and mountains, Phillip and Taddy recently talked about their lives at UBC, Phillip’s career in forestry, and the importance of this new student award.
“We met in grade 10 English at Lord Byng,” Phillip says. “We both went to UBC, and dated all through first and second year. At the end of second year, we got engaged when I gave Taddy my fraternity pin. I couldn’t afford a diamond, you see!”
Back then there was no faculty of Forestry; it was a department within Applied Science. One of Phillip’s professors was Malcolm Knapp, who taught courses in logging, wood technology and forest products. Knapp was also Taddy’s father, so Phillip worked hard to stay on his good side.
Malcolm Knapp was instrumental in the negotiations that resulted in UBC acquiring a research forest in 1949. Two years prior, Phillip had assisted the BC Land Surveyor to outline the boundaries of this forest near Haney, which would later bear his father-in-law’s name.
Immediately after graduation in 1949, Phillip and Taddy were married and Phillip began working for a small lumber company. He and Taddy began to build their family as well, welcoming Jan, Mark, Kim and Jill over the following decade.
Later, Phillip became a partner in Ralph S. Plant Ltd., a lumber wholesaler, where he spent most of his career. He was responsible for selling lumber to every US state except Hawaii, and so spent about six weeks a year on the road, including in the then-segregated South. “I remember one time visiting a client first thing in the morning, and they started their day with a prayer meeting. All the white people were on one side of the room and all the black people were on the other.
“Our business was based on the spoken word,” he says. “We didn’t have the internet or even faxes, so the phone and face-to-face meetings were our main tools. We developed strong relationships with our customers this way, and I’ve been lucky to keep in touch with many former clients.”
Nevertheless, it was pretty stressful work. “We would buy 30-40 railroad cars of lumber and send them out across the country,” he says. “Then we would get on the phones and try to sell them all before they reached their destinations.”
In 1980 Phillip was honoured as the first-ever Lumberman of the Year by the BC Wholesale Lumber Association.
The Phillip A. and Katherine Tindle Forestry Award will provide over $7,000 annually to support and recognize an academically strong student with demonstrated leadership skills and involvement in the community.
Phillip and Taddy support the emphasis on well-rounded students. “Leadership skills and community service are qualities we need as a nation in order to be successful. The world is highly competitive, and so we need expertise. But we also need leadership to make things happen,” they say.