The Passing of Michael Tad Edmunds, University of Toronto’s First Director of the Information Commons

21Feb24

Michael Tad Edmunds (Nov. 5, 1941 – Jan. 13, 2024)

Michael Tad Edmunds, husband, father, grandfather, friend, colleague, neighbour, singer, photographer, student of McLuhan, and the builder and first director of The Information Commons, died at Mt. Sinai Hospital on Saturday, January 13, 2024, from Small Cell Lung Cancer (SCLC). He was 82. The doctors said that even though he had quit smoking almost fifty years prior, this cancer was caused 100% by smoking (he had grown up with lots of second-hand smoke and smoked as a teen until into his thirties before he finally quit forever). He was diagnosed with stage four cancer in March 2023 and given the difficult news that the aggressive cancer was not curable. Nevertheless, Michael maintained an attitude of optimism and managed to enjoy himself in the time he had, and even be happy. His hope was to gain as much time to live and be with his family and friends as possible. He was especially grateful to wife Carol who accompanied him on each step of his journey, Cousin Frank and neighbour Mike who drove him to and from most of his appointments, and Bernie who made many Sunday night dinners for him and his family.

Michael was born in the USA (Detroit, Michigan) to Gertrude (nee Sterbenz) and Charles Edmunds who had migrated from the coal mines of California, Pennsylvania to the assembly lines of the Ford Motor Company in Detroit. His father was of Welsh ancestry and his mother of German.

Michael was predeceased by his younger brother Terry Oliver, whom he greatly missed. Michael in turn is terribly missed by his wife of 58 years, Carol, his sons Roland, Matthew, and Jason, and his partner Danni Dickson, and his grandchildren Madelyn Rose, Rowan Lark, and Leif Parker Llewelyn.

Michael grew up in southwest Detroit. His difficult childhood became more challenging when his father died of a heart attack when Michael was only eleven. Michael and Terry lived with an aunt for six months in California, Pennsylvania and attended school there; in the summer, they returned to Detroit. Since money was scarce, Michael got a job selling newspapers on a corner and called out “News, Times, Free Press” every night until he sold out, and then went home with a box of cookies for himself and Terry.

After high school, Michael attended Wayne State University (WSU). To pay the tuition, he did various jobs, and got government loans. He worked as a house painter with an uncle, a shipping clerk, an assembly line worker at Ford Motor Company, and did some lighting for Wayne State University T.V. productions. While he was at the Ford Motor Company in the summer, another worker heard him singing on the line and said, “If I had a voice like that, I wouldn’t stay here,” but Michael would not explore his musical talent until later in his life.

Michael majored in speech and media and graduated from WSU with a Bachelor of Arts degree, and a Teaching Certificate; he got a job teaching English and Speech in a high school in southwest Detroit. After a day of teaching, he and some other teachers would regularly play basketball with the students. Michael always said that in another life, he would have loved to have been a basketball player.

While studying at WSU, Michael met Carol Schultz and on September 24, 1966, they married. They lived on campus and experienced firsthand the racial unrest of the summer of 1967, hearing machine gun fire all night and seeing tanks roll by their front windows. They were both working as teachers and decided to save their money and move to Toronto, Canada, where they had visited Carol’s Cousin Frank. On August 1, 1971, they packed up their two cars, a Plymouth Valiant and a Dodge van, and drove to the border and immigrated. Michael got a job at the Media Centre at U of T. He had a keen interest in U of T because Marshall McLuhan worked there.

Michael and Carol began their family in 1972 with the birth of Jason, and then Roland in 1975, and Matthew in 1980. During those years, Michael got a Master of Education at OISE (now part of U of T). Michael yearned to do something more challenging and to make a better income for his family, so he regularly applied for jobs at other institutions. In 1981, he was offered a position at the University of Victoria in B.C., which interested him because they planned to build a production studio to augment their Media department. He and his family moved to Victoria, but a sudden budget cut removed the planned production unit that had been the main attraction for Michael. After four months, they returned to Toronto.

Michael was able to negotiate a return to the Media Centre and eventually started working at a new position as a producer/director in the production centre (something he had wanted to try); however, they would not find stability yet.  Soon there was a big re-org at the university and Michael lost his job because the production centre was going to be cut, but eventually Michael was chosen to become the Director of the new Media Centre. Michael said he spent several anxious weeks and did a lot of running with his gym friends to stay calm between the time of losing his job and getting a better job.

During the time he worked at U of T, Michael usually spent his lunch hours working out with weights with a small group of friends. On alternate days, they would run or do circuits. Afterwards, they would have soup and sandwich together. Michael enjoyed this a lot, and it was a good mid-day break.

He enjoyed his new job and had his own style.  Colleague Robert Fysh said that “as a boss, he recognized the skills, talents, and interests of his staff and once we were assigned a task would let us achieve the set goals with only the necessary supervision.” Antonio Mendonca echoed that when he said, “His style of management was hands-off, delegating things rather than micromanaging. He saw the big picture ahead of others, always keeping a critical eye on perspectives and perceptions as challenges came along.” He was flexible and his confidence in people helped them to work with enthusiasm and creativity.

Michael gradually became interested in computers and electronic classrooms. According to colleague Robert Fysh, “…Michael had the vision to recognize that emerging technologies would be a force for change in the educational environment. He promoted and instituted the use of technologies that we take for granted…” He applied what he learned as well as his knowledge of the work of Marshall McLuhan to this field. In the summer of 1994, he was working with a small, new committee, TFELS, The Task Force on the Electronic Library System and made many important contributions, as shown by internal emails and memorandums. Many reports and meetings led to the decision to create an information common.

Michael was chosen to lead a team to build an information common in the library. The project was called Get It Done. Michael would be the Director of the new Information common, of which there was only one other in North America. As he had no real models to look at, he would have to make it up as he went along, but that is what he had done for most of his life, so he was the right person for this job. It began one of the most intense periods of his career.

Finally, in September 1995, The Information Commons opened, and Michael began his work. Sian Meikle and Marcel Fortin, current directors said, “Michael led the formation of the Information Commons, and he provided wonderful vision as its founding director, from 1995 to 2010. His leadership guided the university community through the suddenly burgeoning role of technology in our lives, and what a herculean task that was! In those early days of the internet, we all had everything to learn, and nothing to use…” (Marcel also commented on Michael’s “great sense of humour”, which he would appreciate.) Michael enjoyed the work immensely; it was interesting and creative and allowed him to see some of his ideas come to life. The Information Commons changed many things and was a huge contribution to the life of the university.

Besides work, Michael enjoyed spending time with his family and friends, going to the cottage in summer, fall, spring, and even winter. He was also fascinated by the work of Marshall McLuhan – he had met him, taken a course with him, and read books and articles. However, what gave him the most joy was music, and particularly singing. As a child he had loved music, singing, and dancing. At school, he was chosen to learn the violin, but his father could not stand to listen to him practicing and made him quit. Later, as a teen, he and his friends often gathered in storefronts (for the acoustics) and sang harmony, and popular doo-wop songs. In his thirties he took guitar lessons and sang, but in his early fifties, after a friend who played the violin for the Canadian Opera Company heard him sing and noted his unique timbre, he began taking voice lessons and performing as a solo singer, in musicals, operettas, and choirs with a community theatre group, or sang popular music in various venues. He was especially good at singing rhythm and blues type songs. Various professionals praised his musicality and rich, warm tenor voice. When he auditioned for Opera in Concert, Robert Cooper listened to him and then asked, “Who are you?” surprised that he had never heard of him before. He loved to perform and connect with people in an audience. One can see/hear him sing Spring Is Here with the Mississauga Brass Band by googling Michael Edmunds Spring is Here, or on his YouTube channel – Mepicks/youtube/Spring Is Here (which leads us to another one of his interests).

While at U of T, Michael was Producer/Director of hundreds of educational, archival, and promotional videos for many departments, like the Centre for Medieval Studies and the Department of Italian Studies, and some for science, such as one on the discovery of penicillin. After retirement, Michael continued to explore his interest in images, and was inspired to make and post videos of Jason’s band, The Lazy Devils. Michael filmed, edited, and enhanced the videos and posted them on his Mepicks/youtube channel.

Shortly before Michael retired, he and Carol bought a house at the northeast edge of Peterborough near Trent University. They started going there every weekend and for weeks at a time over Christmas and in the summer and were able to be with family and grandchildren. They all (adults, grandchildren, and dogs) often walked on the Trent Trail with its varied terrain of meadows with swallows, to ponds with beavers, to forests with porcupines – fields, hills, ridges, valleys, and thick forests made for a challenging hike, especially in winter. Later Michael and Carol took over the care of Danni’s dog, Mick, and back in Toronto, they often walked in the forest at Cedarvale.

     Michael was a positive, joyful, optimistic, fun-loving, and flexible person. He was very accepting of different ways of doing things, felt deeply and usually with kindness, and understanding. After Michael’s diagnosis of cancer, the life he had known exploded, but his bravery and leadership regarding it, helped his family to navigate their new present and future. Toward the end of his life, he said several times that he was amazed and happy with what he and Carol had created. He had time to say important things to everyone in his family, and in the end, he showed his Welsh ancestry; and as per the Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas, he did “not go gentle into that good night.” He had things to do, and he wanted more time, as who would not? His family loved him, and he is deeply missed every day.

There will be a celebration of Michael’s life in the spring. Email Carol (carol_edmunds@hotmail.com) to be notified. If you wish to donate to a charity in Michael’s name, please contact Princess Margaret Foundation, by calling 416-946-6560 and donate to Lung Cancer Radiation Therapy Research Fund where Michael’s very kind doctor (Dr Rahman) and another doctor are involved in research on SCLC.  Carol selected this charity because only 15% of all lung cancers are caused by this very aggressive small cell lung cancer, so not much research has been done on it.

 

 

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Tags: communication, culture, education, McLuhan Centre, media, Obituary, Toronto, university