Black History Month – My first day at Veterinary College

My first day at Veterinary College

On my first day at the Ontario Veterinary College in 1963, the President of the Veterinary Student Union gave us a “Welcome to OVC” talk. Carlton Gyles lectured us on the importance of arriving at lectures and labs in white shirts and ties, on the seriousness of study, on respect for others and of our profession. Then with the mildest of grins he explained he was going to teach us our school song, something that exemplified what we were about to embark on and where we were going. Standing at attention, he sonorously declared:

Live horse, dead horse, sick or stiff,

Cut em up, rip em up what’s the diff

Humerous, tumourous, blood and gore,

OVC forever more.

“Here’s an interesting guy”, I thought, “With a great voice.” The four years of my senior vet students at OVC had already voted Carlton Gyles, from Jamaica, as their President. On that first meeting with him it was obvious why.

During 1963-64, when I was a freshman and Carlton was a final year student, over coffee in the cafeteria he introduced me to Jamaican history and explained why he considered his country’s Prime Minister, Alexander Bustamente’s conflict, you could say ‘war’ on the Rastafarian community so dreadful. (The Jamaican government apologised for its behaviour but only seven years ago.)

My fellow students had recognised Carlton’s intelligence and natural leadership skills by electing him Student President but that apparent lack of discrimination towards him didn’t reflect what Canada was like at that time.

In the decade before I started my veterinary studies there was an unwritten veto on Catholics or Jews becoming vet students. Women were restricted to three per class. And the only reason there were Blacks at OVC was because OVC was the ‘local’ school for the British West Indies. My fellow students from Guyana (still called British Guiana), Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago and elsewhere were all scholarship students.

After Carlton graduated as a vet he stayed on at OVC where he is now Professor Emeritus Carlton Gyles, one of the world’s most respected contributors to understanding how Escherichia coli causes disease in animals and people, especially in children. It could be that he has saved as many or more childrens lives than almost any other vet. During his career he has been Dean of Graduate Studies at the University of Guelph (where OVC is located), Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Veterinary Journal and a Founding Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences. To me as a new student Carlton showed me that you can be a scholar and a gentleman, and politically active and informed on history and a participant in events. I’m not the only Canadian vet student who modelled my career on what I learned from this under recognised leader in Black veterinary history.

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