Editor’s Note:  What follows are two stories about the same event involving Dr Barton’s Chemistry Class in our first year, yet the recollections vary quite significantly from one another in several important aspects.  The first version is by Pete Avis and the second by Dwight Davies.  Why there might be such a variance was actually not that surprising to me.  I had seen first hand in a high school experiment how 30 students witnessing exactly the same event gave accounts that in some cases were quite different in even the most basic details. That probably only partly explains some of the differences between these two renditions.  Some certainly has to do with fading memories with age, where the brain has an intriguing tendency to fill in the blanks or somehow meld two different events in to one. But also Pete was an English Major and Navy (artistic license and never letting the facts get in the way of a good yarn) and Dwight an engineer and pilot, where precision is a requirement, not an option (the iron ring is a reminder that “close enough” is not good enough, except maybe in horse shoes and hand grenades). 

Their stories …

Pete’s Version - Barton, Blackboards and Ball Bearings

It was a snowy afternoon on a Thursday in early March of 1976 when Dr. Stu Barton’s Chemistry class opened its doors for the 1st Year cadets in the large amphitheater classroom in Massey Library at RMC.

That morning, as on most Thursday mornings, the Director of Cadets (DCdts) Parade had started at 6 AM which meant first year cadets were up at 4:30 AM preparing their parade uniforms.  Since it was still winter, big, black “Greatcoats” were the order of dress for the parade which were topped off by exotic Persian wool Astrakhan headgear and fuzzy winter mitts.  Given the blustery snow and cold, the parade went as one might expect ….  However, by the time of the last class on Thursday afternoon, many of our cadet heroes were out of gas and, alas, switched their learning lights off.  Astrakhans stuffed with gloves made for very good pillows!

Professor Barton had the dubious pleasure of teaching 1st Year Chemistry at this time each week. Luckily for the cadets, he was a wonderful, caring professor with a relaxed demeanor and a great sense of humour.  He was always fully capable of teaching this difficult subject – even while overcoming a significant stutter. (Many cadets were not aware that he loved to act out plays by Ibsen and Shaw on Kingston stages. Yes, Dr. Barton was known for his excellent playacting – uncannily, with NO stuttering.)

Alas, on this sleepy Thursday afternoon, Dr. Barton had chosen to teach the most advanced chemistry formula the class would encounter:  the dreaded and much feared Grignard Reaction!

This reaction was an important lesson in the formation of carbon–carbon bonds.  Dr. Barton warned that it was very complex and required great concentration to take in.  Well, only several keeners were actually awake to witness this marvel of chemical alchemy.  Among them was Tom Dressel.  Tom was a cadet whose academic prowess was only surpassed by his penchant for mischief.  It just so happened that during this very class he had in his pocket his preciousssss, silver ball-bearing that he carried for good luck.  As the professor was scratching his formulae on the immense board, Tom was gently caressing his good luck charm.

Dr. Barton, intensely focused at writing Grignard’s Reaction on the blackboard with a long piece of chalk, had his back turned to his slumbering students:

Suddenly, Tom sat up straight and impulsively decided that he might just liven up this otherwise uneventful afternoon class. With little or no thought of the possible consequences, he leisurely tossed the ball-bearing toward the front of the classroom. The small, metallic orb floated as if in slow motion through the classroom air, over the tussled heads of the snoozing Class of 79, and made its way to the surface of the very blackboard that Dr. Barton was writing on with vigour. 

 Then something happened that was not anticipated….

The six-foot portion of the blackboard on which Dr. Barton was writing EXPLODED into hundreds of tiny cubes of glass (not unlike the tempered glass of car windshields) which proceeded to leap, seemingly of their own volition, away from the wall and scatter across the floor!

 The class (all except perhaps Donnie Hawco and Pitter Bill Panter), jumped up in a singular drill movement from their reclining postures, collectively gasped, and then tried to understand what had just happened.

 For his part, Dr. Barton stayed in a fixed position in front of the blackboard – perhaps reluctant to disturb the evidence of this very remarkable event.  Looking at the piece of chalk in his right hand and then down to the tiny, glass cubes on the floor (and audible perhaps to those only in the front rows), the good professor exclaimed, “Holy F-F-F-F-F Fudge (or some other colourful expletive)!!!  How did I d-d-d-d-do that?”

After several moments of complete silence, Dr. Barton looked at the class and calmly said, “Class dismissed.”  Clearly, he was thinking, there was more of Physics to explain this phenomenon than there was of Chemistry.  But what?

Grignard’s Reaction had proven to be even more powerful than anyone could have dreamed and would not be forgotten.  The whispering cadets quickly shuffled out of the classroom already moving forward in the day and desperately hoping for a well-deserved thirty-minute nap before sports!

Editor’s Note: Dr Barton is shown in the banner photo discussing chemical formulas with OCdt Brain Graystone and UTPM Dale Godwin. Sadly Dr Barton has since passed away as has Tom Dressel. RIP.

 Dwight’s Version 2.0 - Dr Barton and the Exploding Blackboard

Having read the description of the subject event that was penned by Pete, I am left wondering if we can exist in alternate realities!  While our recollections match in that it was Dr Barton, in Massey Library basement, a ball bearing, and an exploding blackboard, the details are widely divergent. 

While I have no idea what the actual topic of dissertation was for the day in question, I can say that I had an excellent vantage point.  As one of the products of the Alberta education system, I was woefully behind in everything academically, so I had no choice: I sat in the very front row so that I had the best chance to hear and see what the professors were presenting, and had the least chance of surrendering to the siren lure of the Astrocan cushioned sleep…. 

Now Dr Barton’s technique to present his material to us was to enter the room, go directly to the blackboard without a word, turn his back to us, and start speaking while writing a long series of equations on the blackboard.  In that first year chem was so basic, it seemed that Dr Barton would leave the speaking and writing on autopilot and mentally head off to solve some really interesting issues.  This would result in his speech stalling out on a word, whereupon he would commence stuttering….and you could almost see him being pulled back into his body from some other universe…whereupon he would complete his sentence and carry on with the development.  Within a short interval he would again disappear, leaving his body speaking and writing, with the same result. 

On the day in question, I was seated in the front row, waiting for the professor to appear, and faintly heard something going on behind me in the upper rows, but did not see who was at play, and so will not throw any classmate under the bus!  Ha.  What I did observe was the impact of the ball bearing on the blackboard, which made a very loud crack, and instantly knocked a small hole in the safety glass.  These blackboards, to ensure that they were the most perfectly flat surface possible, were manufactured by producing immense sheets of safety glass and coating them with the matt black paint that creates the best surface for chalk. 

Now as most of you know, safety glass is engineered to fracture into small, many sided pieces, rather than fewer long sharp shards that could be hazardous.  In the case of the blackboard, the thin film of paint helped give the entire glass panel a tiny bit of residual strength, but was manifestly insufficient to permanently hold the panel in place, as the uncontrolled chain reaction of fracturing continued to weaken the structure.  You could literally hear it!  The fatally weakened glass panel sagged out from the wall several inches in the process, but miraculously stayed in place. 

Cue Dr Barton; he entered and walked up to the blackboard.  As he neared the board, he observed something that nothing in his existence had prepared him for: there was a small black hole in the board…..he approached it curiously, as one might a novel experiment, and carefully reached out with his finger to touch this new apparition.  The instant his finger touched the sagging board, the safety glass gave up, and with a huge whoosh, the entire board turned into a tsunami of small safety glass crystals that splashed down onto the floor and flowed past Dr Barton’s shoes and out into the room. 

Without any reaction that I could discern from my front row seat, Dr Barton simply turned slightly and walked to the next panel, picked up the chalk, and began speaking and writing with his back to us, EXACTLY AS HE ALWAYS DID.  The only thing that marked the class from that point on was the crunching from under Dr Barton’s shoes as he moved on the field of crystalline bits of glass, and the ongoing and random popping sound as the small pieces continued to split into ever smaller pieces, rather like popcorn going off.

 That’s my story and I am sticking to it!