Captain Robert Milton Culbert (1939-2019)

Bob Culbert, 1987

Dear Bobby was our first born boy,

A gift from heaven to enjoy.

We were so proud we had achieved

The trick of getting him conceived.

The verse above was written by Richard Milton Culbert (1908-1996) in tribute to the birth of his first-born child, Robert Milton “Bob” Culbert.

Bob Culbert (right) in 1996 with his father Milton Richard Culbert whom he referred to as “my great pal.”

Bob Culbert was the great-great-grandson of John Culbert and Mary Ward. Bob was descended from John and Mary’s son, Thomas Culbert who you know all about from this previous post.

Bob’s great-grandfather, Thomas Culbert (1846-1930) was a successful and well-liked representative of Carling Brewery. Thomas was also the proprietor of the Central Hotel in Granton, Ontario: an establishment frequented by the infamous Donnellys.

Bob Culbert was born 15 February 1939 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Two brothers followed: Peter Somerville Culbert and Michael Gordon Dunsmore Culbert.

Bob attended Islington Public School, University of Toronto Schools, and the University of Guelph on a Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) scholarship. He graduated in 1961 with a degree in Economics. That same year, he married his first wife, Catherine Moffat and they had three children: Jocelyn, Virginia, and Tom.

After graduation, Bob remained with the RCAF as a flying instructor; two years at Centralia just north of Lucan, Ontario, and two years at Gimli, Manitoba. 

Bob was a flying instructor on Tutor aircraft (the same kind used by The Snowbirds) at Gimli. Bob related a story to me:

The scene is the summer of 1966. One weekend I was to take a student on a cross-country training flight.  I decided to go as far as North Bay on the first leg and overnight.  I picked North Bay because my parents were at the family cottage on an island on Trout Lake, just east of North Bay.  In those days we had not installed a telephone on the island so I wrote ahead telling them what day I was coming down and at what time.  I told them that I would fly over the island to alert them I was in the vicinity, and then Dad could boat over to the shore where we parked the car and he could drive up to the airport to collect me for an overnight visit.

It was a brilliant summer day, so I flew down to the east end of the lake, descended, and made my approach westbound to fly past the island.  The devil was in me.  I went past the island at about 200 feet, doing about 300 knots.  As I hurtled past I could just see my parents and my 17 year old cousin who was visiting who were standing on the dock.  My mother got so excited she wet her pants!

In 1966, Bob transferred to Air Canada where he was employed as a pilot.

Bob remarried in 1987. He said, “I married Virginia Coleman with whom I had attended public school and dated several times in high school before her parents moved.  I lost track of her until meeting again in 1983 at the public school’s 150 year reunion; the rest is history.”

                  

Bob in 2014

Bob retired from Air Canada in 1996 after 30 years of service.  

During his retirement years, Bob enjoyed travelling from coast to coast with Ginny. They took a train trip through Canada’s Rocky Mountains, and enjoyed a 12-day tour of Newfoundland.

After 26 years in their Port Credit house, Bob and Ginny moved in 2017 to a retirement facility just six blocks from their home.

When Bob started experiencing health issues a few years ago, he exclaimed to me, “The Golden Years are a myth!”

“We are well enough, but I am waiting on treatment for pinched nerves in my back. Such are the consequences for

• about to turn 76
• 15 years playing squash
• 32 years playing golf, and
• 8 years flying aerobatics in the RCAF

and all this time I thought I was trying to avoid being a couch potato!"

Bob Culbert passed away suddenly and unexpectedly on 10 May 2019 age 80, following hip replacement surgery.

Bob Culbert (kneeling, front and centre) with other Culbert descendants and their families at the Culbert homestead (Poplar Farm) on the Coursey Line near Lucan, Ontario. Photo by Terry Culbert, November 2004.

Bob shared our enthusiasm for family history. I’m grateful to Bob for filling me in about his line of the family: the Thomas Culbert – Letitia Dempster branch.

Bob’s sense of humour shone through in his emails to me with subject headings such as Dad’s distant cousin, bowlegged Jessie.

Bob was happy to answer my endless family history questions. After one particularly long recollection of assorted ancestors and relatives, he said, “My head is swimming with this research, and I shall seek relief in a gargantuan tumbler of Forty Creek Premium Barrel Whisky abetted with Canada Dry.”

Bob paid a visit in 2017 to Woodland Cemetery in London, Ontario to visit the Thomas Culbert family’s burial site. Bob described this particular trip as grave-hopping.

Thomas Culbert's headstone is in Section P, Lot 167, SE. Thomas, his wife, Letitia, and five of their six children are buried at Woodland Cemetery.

Milton Thomas Culbert (1880-1911) was Bob’s grandfather. A geologist and mining engineer, Milton was well on his way to a brilliant career as the manager of the O’Brian silver mine at Cobalt, Ontario. His life was cut short at age 30 by post-appendectomy septicaemia in the days before antibiotics.

Bob often ended his email messages to me with one of his father’s many limericks or poems. And so I think it's fitting that we end this tribute with the complete text of “Our Bobby,” the poem Milton Richard Culbert wrote to commemorate the birth of his son, Robert Milton “Bob” Culbert.

Our Bobby

Dear Bobby was our first born boy,

A gift from heaven to enjoy.

We were so proud we had achieved

The trick of getting him conceived.

When he emerged, the doctor said,

He wouldn’t breathe: they thought him dead.

They tried and tried, he wouldn’t start;

The best he did was feebly fart.

But in a final frantic try,

They grabbed his heels and held him high,

Administered a mighty thump

Upon the newborn’s tiny rump;

And thereupon our little fellow

Started living with a bellow.

And in his mother’s biased view

He never quit till he was two.

His bright blue eyes and angel face

Gave promise he would grow in grace:

But when he was a tiny tot,

A tranquil toddler he was not.

I often heard my wife complain

That raising Robert was a strain:

“The other babies in their prams

Lie placid there like little lambs,

But Bobby throws off all his wraps,

And hangs down over by the straps

Until he’s half way to the ground:

So he can watch the wheels go round!”

Around the house he roamed the rugs,

Twisting dials, pulling plugs,

Yanking cords that closed the drapes,

And pounding pans to horrid shapes.

But put to bed our little demon

Would instantly begin his screamon:

His hollering went on and on

It seemed, almost until the dawn.

Did open pins cause his distress,

Or had he merely made a mess?

What was the trouble, what the cause?

Could it be colic, or the yaws?

Could he have ruptured in his nest?

No: all he ruptured was our rest.

We found what made him wail and weep:

Like his old man, he hated sleep.

Robert Milton Culbert’s Family Tree:

Ancestors:

John Culbert & Mary Ward (great-great-grandparents)

Thomas Culbert & Letitia Demptser (great-grandparents)

Milton Thomas Culbert & Laura May Yeo (grandparents)

Milton Richard Culbert & Gwenyth Mary Somerville (parents)

Descendants:

Jocelyn Culbert

Virginia Culbert

Tom Culbert