Page 14 - NJC Magazine Spring 2017

The
First to Step
Outside
Each September, nervous but excited teenagers embark on the Orientation Trip via transatlantic flight from Canada, and after snoozing for a few hours, they wake up to the spectacular Swiss landscape. Upon arrival, they explore the sunny, picturesque Italian speaking city of Locarno, followed by a few days in the great outdoors in German speaking Grindelwald before being whisked away to their new homes in Neuchâtel only five short days after disembarking in Zürich. But Peter Hebb ’57, the first student recruited by founder Leonard Wilde to study at Neuchâtel Junior College, has very different memories of his voyage to Neuchâtel.
In 1956, Hebb and his 42 classmates met in Montreal and sailed to Liverpool before taking the train to London for two days. From there, the group took an overnight boat to Holland and then took the train to Neuchâtel via Cologne and Heidelberg.The voyage took two weeks - one week on the boat and another week to reach Neuchâtel by train. One thing hasn’t changed - Hebb says that after picking up their textbooks and moving into their pensions, his class headed to Grindelwald for orientation!
Peter enjoyed spending afternoons at the Touring Hotel, which was the place for pommes frites and beer. The Beaulac had not been built yet. He has fond memories of what he and his classmates affectionately referred to as the“cheery Swiss” - ironically named because they were, in fact, not cheerful at all – who were perhaps a little bit shocked by the presence of these Canadian teenagers in their small town in the late 1950s. He remembers one of his female classmates running to the lake in Bermuda shorts and bobby socks one Sunday afternoon, shocking the locals with her bare knees showing.
After his time in Neuchâtel, Peter went on to study commerce and business administration at the University of British Columbia before moving to Toronto to work on Bay Street. Later, he took a hiatus from the investment world to purchase a furniture manufacturing business with a fellow NJC alum, with whom he restored antiques and made custom furniture.
He had a successful career managing a conglomerate of companies coast to coast in Canada. Hebb says that while working with exports, he frequently travelled to Europe and was able to draw on his language and travel skills learned as a student at NJC.
Peter has stayed active in alumni affairs throughout the 60 years of NJC’s existence, and has been back to visit the school over ten times. In 2008, Peter kindly served as the guest speaker at graduation, and, suitably, he gave out the Leonard Wilde Award that year. Most recently, he was in Neuchâtel in September 2016 for homecoming weekend, to mark 60 years since having first set foot in Neuchâtel. It was NJC’s honour this past October to ask Peter to give the toast to Leonard Wilde at the 60th Anniversary Gala in Toronto.
Carmela Reyes
Communications Coordinator
1210 Neuchâtel Junior College Magazine
The Class of 1957
Peter Hebb ’57