In the December 30 Messenger, there was a story about James Wheeler Davidson. Our good Canadian Rotary friend, Lolita Wiesner, read the story and provided the following response:"Mount Davidson has a really interesting backstory. It was officially named in 1935 after James Wheeler Davidson (1872-1933), a prominent Calgarian of international stature, but somehow a mistake was made and the name never appeared on government maps. The omission wasn’t noticed until 2003 when a group of Rotary Club members made plans to climb the peak. The Geographical Names Board of Canada was contacted and Mount Davidson was finally put on the map. Rotary Club members and friends led by Robert Lampard subsequently organized a trip up the mountain on August 2nd, 2003 (only a few actually hiked all the way in, most were helicoptered into the upper Waiparous Creek Valley). They built a cairn, placed a capsule with Rotary Club paraphernalia and a summit register, held a formal meeting, and even drank champagne up there! For the full story, see this article on Peak Finder. Note that the first recorded ascent of Mount Davidson was by Frank Campbell and Karl Nagy on October 22nd, 1988.
"There's more here, including photos of the mountain:
https://www.spectacularmountains.com/canada/ghost/davidson-waiparous/
"Bob Lampard and his wife Sharon also winter in Mesa at Leisure World, and we tried to get together this fall when we were down there but our brief time in Mesa was too hectic. Bob is a member of Red Deer Rotary, which was the first Rotary Club here."
In later exchanges with Lolita, we learned she had shared our December 30 Messenger with Bob and Sharon Lampard. They provided information to correct and clarify information contained in our original story.
- James Wheeler Davidson died in Vancouver
- He formed the Colombo and Hong Kong clubs and set up the TaiPei club although he gave the chartering credit to the Japanese member on the RI Board.
- He became a dual citizen in 1923, when Canadian citizenship first became available.