Educator, administrator.
Born at Wingham, Ontario on 17 October 1912, son of John Weir and Elizabeth Harris Vanstone, he obtained a teacher's certificate from the Stratford Normal School in 1932. He then attended the Ontario Agricultural College at Guelph, specializing in field husbandry, and received a BSA degree in 1936. He received a MSc from the University of Alberta (1938) and a PhD from the University of Minnesota (1940), both for working in plant breeding, genetics, and plant physiology. In 1940, he joined the staff of the Ontario Agricultural College, serving as Professor and Assistant Head.
In September 1952, he came to Winnipeg to become Dean of Agriculture at the University of Manitoba (1952-1965), and subsequently served as Director of the Science Secretariat for the Privy Council, Chairman of the Fisheries Research Board of Canada, and President of the Agriculture Institute of Canada. In 1961, he was inducted into the Manitoba Order of the Buffalo Hunt. He and wife Nora Gwendolyn Hiscocks had two sons.
He died at Ottawa, Ontario on 10 March 1991.
Ontario birth registration [Robert John Weir], Ancestry.
“Ontario man appointed new Dean of Agriculture,” Winnipeg Free Press, 30 July 1952, page 3.
Obituary, Winnipeg Free Press, 12 March 1991, page 32.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 5 November 2024
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