About The Author
Alex Duthie grew up in a poor fishing village in Scotland. He was an adventurous child and got into trouble, causing accidents to himself, but nothing serious, just like any other child. He was a happy child and developed some skills early.
His education was mediocre for the first few years. He was friendly with a sheep farmer’s son, and they were not too interested in schoolwork. This changed when a new schoolteacher, named Swannee, joined his school and took an interest in him. He flourished from then and excelled in the mathematical fields.
There were very few jobs available for this type of expertise, except for an apprenticeship in a factory, in a town three miles from his village. He progressed well in all the manufacturing departments and was promoted to the Tool Design Office, where he also did well. This provided him a promotion to the Product Design office, which was the ultimate goal for him.
During the manufacturing apprenticeship, he was mandated to further his education in the evenings, and ultimately in a technical college, educating students for eventual acceptance as Professional Engineers. Alex excelled here as well.
After four years into his five-year apprenticeship, a new personnel manager interviewed Alex, asking about his career plans. Alex had never considered his career; he was just pleased he had this job. The manager explained that Alex had demonstrated a tendency towards new challenges and advised that he change industries every five years. In five years, he would learn all he needed to know about that industry and would become bored with repetitive work and no new challenges. Alex followed this advice and had a very successful career.
Shortly after Alex completed his apprenticeship, he got married to Alice and moved to her country village. After they married, they had two boys, both born in Scotland.
Because there were few opportunities for engineers’ work in the Northeast of Scotland at that time, in the late 1950s, Alex and Alice decided to emigrate to Canada. Alex arrived on the South Shore of Montreal in early 1959, and his family followed a few months later.
Alex arrived in Montreal, Canada in February of 1959. He was hired for a position in a design office, starting two days after he had landed. He worked in fourteen different industries, in high positions, reporting to Presidents or equivalents. In one large company, he had all thirty-four technical people reporting to him. Some of his personal work was granted patents, him being named in one of them.
After one year in Montreal, Alex and his family moved to Saint John, New Brunswick, where they had two more children, both girls. They now had a perfect family, two boys and two girls.
In 1972, when his oldest son was fifteen years old, he died after running a few miles. He was training for his football. The next year, 1973, Alex’s oldest daughter also died, having collapsed while playing street hockey with her friends. That was a terrible time for Alex and his family.
In November 2020, Alex got a call from his remaining daughter, telling him, “Thank you for my birthday card, but you got it all wrong. I am 58 years old, not 57”. The next day, Alex got a call from his grandson telling him that his mother had died while doing laundry. Alex still has his remaining son, and they have an amazing relationship.
At ninety years old, Alex is still playing golf twice each week in the playing season, May through October. He has a very happy life, with his second wife, in a small Ontario town on the Lake Huron shore. He has a great-grandson, whom he adores.
