| Notes |
- Darrell was born in the Kelowna General Hospital while the family was living in Vernon. B.C. He had dark brown hair, bright blue eyes, and a slim, sinewy build. He was about 5'9" tall - taking after his mother's side of the family in height
and appearance. He lived in Vernon and then Kelowna until about 6 years of age when the family moved to Vancouver. He attended Kerrisdale Elementary school, Point Grey Junior HIgh school and McGee High School. While there he participated in
track and field and rugby.
He has always been very healthy except for a tendency to viral pneumonia. Subsequently he developed episodes of asthma from dust and infective agents in the later years. Only surgery was an inguinal heria repair. He also developed painful
osteoarthritis in his fingers, interfering with his surgical dexterity.
As a child, he was always into mischief - snitching fruit from the neighbour's yard, for eg. One time, he opened the back door of a school bus while it was moving and promptly fell out, and was rushed to the hospital. Another time, he was
knocked of his bike by a car. Then he took the end off a finger with his father's electric planer. He learned many skills in his father's workshop. I am sure he nearly drove his mother to distraction at times. He also gave his younger brother,
Robert, who was not athletic and more of an artistic temperament, a lot of teasing. However, they remain good friends though very different. Darrell has little artistic bent and is somewhat tone deaf. However, he has good rythmn and is a good
dancer.
As a youth, he was a boyscout. He learned to snow ski expertly, skiing at Grouse Mtn. and Mt. Baker.
At different times, the family had an old fishing boat they used for recreational purposes, a cabin at Pender Harbour and they spent many summers at Boundary Bay. He learned to love the sea and still enjoys ocean and freshwater fishing.
After graduating from high school, he attended UBC for pre-med and Medical School. During the early days at UBC, he spent his summers with the UNTD (University Naval Training) sailing up the BC coast to Alaska and also based in Halifax.
Once in Med. school, he spent his summers doing industrial first aid at remote camps - once at a logging camp at the far end of Harrison Lake and once at Ft. St. John, working on a gas pipeline.
While in university, he joined Psi Upsilon fraternity. He and Adrienne became "pinned" about 1957
After graduation from Medical school, Darrell interned at Vancouver General Hospital. At the end of that year, he and Adrienne got married. They headed east to Cleveland , Ohio for their residency training. This was their honeymoon. On the
way, at Banff, they stopped to look at a bear. Darrell had the window rolled down and was fiddling with his camera. Quietly, the bear came up and when no food was offered, put his claws through the window and racked Darrell's face, just missing
his eye. When they arrived at Cleveland, it was embarrassing to have all those scratches when everyone knew they had been on their honeymoon.
In Cleveland, Darrell successfully negotiated the pyramid system and in his fourth year, became chief surgical resident. At the end of that year (1962), he took a position as cancer researcher at MD Anderson Tumour Institute in Houston,
Texas. The family stayed there for 1 year, during which he was successful at getting his FACS (Fellow of the American College of Surgeons) and his Canadian surgical certification. They then bought a 28' Airstream trailer, packed up the 2 kids
and headed for Montreal where they lived 3 months while he took a cram course at the Montreal General hospital on how to pass the Fellowship exams. He was successful in attaining his FRCS ( Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons)- fall of
1964. In those days, it was a 'trial by fire'.
He was offered a position in the Underhill Clinic in Kelowna, B.C. starting in the spring of 1965. So they headed south again in the trailer down to Texas and over to California, where they parked the trailer and spent a month in Hawaii
with the Sherrin parents. After that, they headed for Kelowna and set up practice.
Those early days were tough as he had to do General Practice as well as surgery. He got home late in the evening, but time was always made for the children. About 1980, the specialists separated from the clinic and he worked out of his
office with two gynecologists and an internist.
They built a house on Poplar Pt. on Okanagan Lake and stayed there for about 20 years, then moving to a townhouse complex known as Sandhaven on Gordon Dr.
In the early days at Poplar Pt. the family had a Labrador mix male dog named Mica. He was a wonderful dog and won with Darrell at a dog obedience competition. He also was a great hunting dog as Darrell took him duck hunting to the prairies
a number of times. Eventually, hunting became distasteful to Darrell. Mica was eventually hit by a car and killed, but he was getting on in age by then. They also had a cat, Puff, who lived until 15 and then a cat, Kiki, who is now 15 and
living in Burnaby with Todd.
Darrell bought his first computer when PC's first appeared many years ago from the Radio Shack - a TRS-80. Both Darrell and Adrienne developed computer programming as a hobby and became quite proficient. Now (1996) they are enjoying e-mail
and the Internet.
In th early days in Kelowna, they purchased a condominium at Big White Mountain. Winter weekends and winter holidays were mostly spent there, skiing. The condo was sold in the fall of 1995.
Also, he played racquetball for a number of years, and then switched to tennis.
In the late 1980's he bought a 30' planing boat with two gasoline engines. It was stored at a marina up the south arm of the Fraser River in Richmond. The family enjoyed many trips up the B.C. coast fishing for salmon, crab and prawns as
well as exploring.
Darrell retired at 59 and spends his time playing slo-pitch, tennis, & duplicate bridge, does square and round dancing and works with his computers. He and Adrienne spend the winters in their park model trailer at Venture Out Resort, Mesa,
Arizona.
They have always had an RV since that first Airstream and continue to enjoy travelling and camping in that fashion.
They are both ecologically oriented, despair at the destruction of the planet, other animal species, and the forests.
Darrell dearly loves his children, although he was a tough father, and wishes they all did not live so far away. He is anxiously awaiting the birth of his first grandchild in April of 1996.
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1933 - Yes, date unknown
