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Dr. Chuji Hiruki was born June 16 1931 in Fukue (Japan) where he was raised and spent his childhood. He received a B.Sc. and Ph.D from Kyushu University. His focus of research and interests with plant pathology centered on chemical inhibition of Tobacco Mosaic Virus (TMV). In 1958 he won a Fulbright research fellowship enabling him to study plant biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin. After completing a post-doctoral fellowship (1964-66) he came to Edmonton in 1966 and accepted a position at the University of Alberta as a plant pathology professor. Over the course of his long research and teaching career, he excelled in the study of plant mycoplasma research. Dr. Hiruki became a worldwide authority on plant diseases caused by viruses and mycoplasmas, and an international consultant on biotechnological and agricultural issues. Given his expertise in the identification and classification of plant disease, he was invited to present papers at the 8th International Congress on Plant Pathogenic Bacteria in Versailles, France and the 9th International Congress on the International Organization of Mycoplasmologists at the University of Iowa (1992). From 1966 through to his retirement in 1996 Dr. Hiruki taught undergraduate and graduate students at all levels in the Department of Plant Pathology, wherein he served as Chairman of the graduate studies program. He also served on a number of university committees including the President's Biosafety Committee, Central Research Fund Committee and numerous faculty and department committees.

Dr. Hiruki was recognized with many awards and honours for his work in plant pathology, including the McCalla Professorship, American Phytopathology Fellow, Royal Society of Canada Fellowship, University of Alberta Distinguished University Professor, Canadian Phytopathological Society Fellow, J. Gordin Kaplan Award for Excellence in Research and Canadian Phytopathological Society Outstanding Research Award. He retired in 1996, but remained active in plant pathology research. In 2018, Chuji was conferred the Order of the Sacred Treasure, Gold Rays with Rosette, an award of appreciation from the Emperor of Japan to those who have made distinguished contributions to their field.

Following retirement, he researched the history of his hometown of Fukue and continued his involvement with flowers as the vice-president of the International Camellia Society.

He was also recognized by the City of Fukue with a Distinguished Citizen Award.

Dr. Hiruki passed away November 15th, 2021.

Ivan Lysiak-Rudnytsky was born in Vienna, Austria on 27 October 1919 to Pavlo Lysiak, a lawyer and politician, and Milena Rudnytska, a politician, writer and women's activist. Rudnytsky studied history and law at the University of Lviv (1937-39), the University of Berlin (1940-43) and completed a PhD at Charles University in Prague (1945). He later attended the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva (1946-51) and Columbia University (1951-53).

Rudnytsky is considered a leading international scholar of Ukrainian history. He was a professor of East European and Ukrainian history at the University of Wisconsin in Madison (1953-54), La Salle College in Philadelphia (1956-67) and became a tenured professor at the American University in Washington, DC (1967-71). In 1971, Rudnytsky moved to Edmonton where he taught Ukrainian and east-central European history at the University of Alberta. While at the University of Alberta, Rudnytsky helped establish the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (CIUS) and became an Associate Director from 1976 to 1980.

Rudnytsky has authored over 200 historical essays, commentaries and reviews in Zhinka (1937-38), Natsiia v pokhodi (1939-40), Biuleten’ Tsentrali NOUS (1943-44), Ukraïns’ki visti (1948-51), The Annals of the Ukrainian Academy of Arts and Sciences in the U.S., Lysty do pryiateliv, Suchasnist’, and several other periodicals and Western academic journals and books. A selection of his writings were published as a collection in Mizh istoriieiu i politykoiu (Between History and Politics, 1973) and posthumously in Essays in Modern Ukrainian History (1987) and Istorychni ese (Historical Essays, 1994). Rudnytsky edited Drahomanov: A Symposium and Selected Writings (1952), a large volume of Osyp Nazaruk’s letters to Viacheslav Lypynsky (1976), and the conference papers Rethinking Ukrainian History (1981). He also contributed to Entsyklopediia ukraïnoznavstva (Encyclopedia of Ukrainian Studies), Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopaedia and the Encyclopedia of Ukraine. Rudnytsky primarily focused his work on Ukrainian history, and also wrote of the relations Ukrainians had with their Russian, Polish and Jewish neighbors.

Rudnytsky had two children, Peter and Elizabeth, from his first marriage. At a 1968 conference of the Canadian Association of Slavists in Calgary, Rudnytsky met his future wife Alexandra Chernenko, a literary scholar and poet. They lived together in Edmonton from 1971 until Rudnytsky’s death on 25 April 1984.