Ron Currie
Ronald Charles "Ron" Currie (born 5 October 1947) is a retired high school mathematics teacher from Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada.
Early life
Currie was born in Winnipeg, Ontario on 5 October 1947, to Jack Currie and Lucy Currie.
In 1954 his family moved to Port Arthur.
Currie's father Jack was employed as a heating oil salesman, but with the natural gas pipeline having recently been completed, it was clear that the added safety and lower cost of natural gas would lead to its replacing heating oil in all houses.
At some point prior to 1962 Jack jumped ship and moved to become a natural gas salesman. In the early summer of 1962, the natural gas company assigned him for some reason to North Bay, so the family sold the McKibbin Street Home that Ron grew up in, and they moved to North Bay. That summer, Ron had a great time. That summer and the following school year he spent a lot of time with Edwin Snook's son and that son's friend, and he also studied and completed his Grade 8 piano, and joined the high school band, playing flute. Ron was completing his Grade 10 school year. The following summer, in 1963, the family moved back to Port Arthur, living in a rented home 1 block south of Bay Street on Hill Street South. Ron presumably rejoined PACI in the fall for his Grade 11 school year. He didn't really ever see the Edwin Snook family again after that one year in North Bay.
He attended Pine Street School, Port Arthur Collegiate Institute [1], and Victoria College [2] at the University of Toronto [3].
Later life
In August 1981, on Manitoulin Island, he married Mary Ann Newman. Witnessing their wedding were just two people: Buzz and Linda.
They had two children:
- Michael Bruce (born 1982)
- Carolyn Edith (born 1985), a medical doctor based in Hanover, Ontario married to Maxime Trottier, with two twin boys, Cole and Bentley, born 31 December 2017.
Career
Currie graduated from Victoria College at the University of Toronto.
He began his teaching at the Special Education department of Sir Winston Churchill High School in Thunder Bay in September 1976.
Currie was a teacher at Sir Winston Churchill High School around 1980, where he met his future wife, Mary Ann Newman.
He opted to switch to teaching Mathematics around 1984, which prompted a switch to neighbouring school Hammarskjold High School.
He took a sabbatical for the 1987-8 school year to live with his young family in Dijon, France to learn french. Upon his return he started teaching mathematics in French in addition to English.
Currie taught his own son Michael calculus in 2000.
He retired from teaching in June 2006 while still teaching at Hammarskjold. On his retirement, a tribute was posted to the school's website:
Mr. Currie--the entertaining oh so talented Math teacher who forever kept his students on the Math Quest! As we unleash this amazing man, we wonder if the world is ready for his wit and talents! Love you Mr. Currie.
— Hammarskjold High School website
Family
His grandparents had much larger families than what was typical in subsequent generations. Excluding self and siblings, whereas his son Michael has only 4 paternal and 8 maternal cousins, Ron has 9 paternal and 10 maternal cousins, 58% more.
Later life
He continues to live in Port Arthur (since amalgamated as Thunder Bay) to this day.