Yesterday, I was looking at the latest list of recipients of the Order of Canada. Some names were there that you wonder why they hadn’t been nominated sooner: General Lewis Mackenzie, for example. There were a few that were pleasant surprises, such as musician Natalie McMaster and John Neville (probably best known as The X-Files’ Well-Manicured Man).

And then this name leaped out: Harvey V. Thommasen.

The name seemed familiar, and I didn’t know why for a few minutes. Then I remembered:

When I was working at the Information Centre on Aboriginal Health, collecting information on Aboriginal health research, Harvey Thommasen kept popping up as either an author or co-author of several research studies on Natives living in the Bella Colla Valley region of B.C. If you Google on his name, several dozen research links will pop up.

So does Dr. Thommasen deserve being in the Order of Canada? Certainly; most of his work is spent trying to improve the quality of health among our Native peoples, and his inclusion is a strong indicator that the government is taking the subject of Aboriginal health seriously.

And there are lots of people just like Dr. Thommasen in the Order, people who do important work but whom most Canadians probably never heard of unless the recipient was in a well-known field of expertise.

Here’s a challenge for you bloggers out there: have a look at the list of this year’s recipients. See if a name pops up that you yourself recognize but don’t believe anyone else will, and write an entry about them. You can link to them here via the comments page.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 25th, 2006 at 14:19 and is filed under Blogging, Odds & Ends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.