Robert James Glendinning

Robert James (Bob) Glendinning was born in Deloraine, MB, in 1931, son of Dominion Bank manager Robert Arthur Glendinning and his wife Vera (nee Geddes). He moved with his parents and 2 younger sisters to Selkirk, MB, in 1939.

He graduated from Selkirk’s Devonshire Collegiate in 1948, then attended United College and graduated with his BA in 1952. He worked for the Royal Bank in Winnipeg for two years but left the bank to take an M.A. degree (University of Manitoba, 1959). Then, keen to see the world, especially Europe, he obtained a job as teacher’s assistant in a high school in Marburg, Germany. After a year in Marburg he returned to Winnipeg where he met the love of his life, Joyce Marie (Jo) Thordarson, a Social Worker. They were married in September 1957.

In 1959 the couple moved to Freiburg, Germany, where they spent the next three years, Bob working on his PhD and teaching English at the University of Freiburg, and Jo looking after their two daughters. Their second daughter, Lori Sigrid, was born in Freiburg. The family returned to Winnipeg in 1962, and Bob, after completing his PhD at the University of Freiburg, spent the next 34 years teaching German language and literature at the University of Manitoba, retiring in 1996.

Bob and Jo had five children: Susan Lisa (Randy Kendall), Lori Sigrid (Raymond Gariepy), Lesley Kristin (William Ens), Signy Lois, and Christopher. Bob had 3 passions in life: family, music, and literature, in that order.

He also liked to joke about his 3 mottos: 1) always buy high and sell low, 2) anything worth doing is worth overdoing, and 3) if there are 2 says of doing something, always try the harder way first. Bob lost his beloved Joyce Marie to cancer in 2009, a severe blow. Two years later he moved into Winnipeg’s Lindenwood Manor, where he made many new and valued friends, and greatly enjoyed his gig playing clarinet in the band for hymn-sing every Friday morning.