Mel Stories and Reminiscences

Story entries will be added as they are received. All who knew Mel are welcome to share via the guestbook form.

total eclipse - totality image by Gunjan Sinha

Memories of Prof. Mel Stauffer, contributed by Hoang Anh Tu (Lavie) Nguyen, Ph.D. student at the University of Saskatchewan

I am exceptionally grateful and honoured to be a student of Prof. Stauffer. He taught me Structural Geology in my first semester at USASK, so it was Fall 2014. I was and honestly still am a bad structural geology student. I was so nervous when I did my lab final exam, and I thought I failed the lab and overall the class. I was so overwhelmed and cried so much when I saw Prof. Stauffer. I have always been thankful that he gently calmed me down, looked through my final lab exam and showed me that I did ok. He also encouraged me to not get discouraged and to focus on the final lecture exams. 

Over years, I love every time I interact with Prof. Stauffer. He remembers my name, recognizes my face and has often checked on how I have been doing whenever we have opportunities for conversation. One time after presenting my research in plate tectonics, Prof. Stauffer came to see me and congratulated me. He also asked me to share the animation of plate tectonic studies with him, so he could shared with first-year students and inspire them. I really regret that I kept forgetting to share the animation with Prof. Stauffer. Last year, when I presented my final presentation in front of everyone in the department, Prof. Stauffer said: "Lavie, you have come far", and he showed his delightful smile. Then, just last August, when Prof. Stauffer saw me in the office, he also checked on me and kindly asked how I felt about my PhD and provided me his sincere advice about my upcoming journey after PhD. 

As I am typing and sharing these memories with you, I am honestly tearing a bit and truly truly thankful to God that I am one of Prof. Stauffer's students. He really is a legend, and more importantly, he is a caring and sincere teacher. Prof. Stauffer has always tried to be present in every seminar and provided encouraging feedbacks to students. 

Memories of Mel by John Pearson, P.Geo.

I have many memories of Mel over the many years that I knew him as a professor, mentor and friend. My condolences to his family.

My first recollections are of Mel are in 1969 when I took my first structural geology class. He wasn’t like any of the other professors I had in my first year at university. I remember him coaching the Ore Gangue Hockey Team in 1969 and 1970 and in his ‘Stoned Fossil’ costume for the Ore Gangue Halloween Party.

A more recent memory comes from my grandson. A couple of years ago, my grandson’s girlfriend’s first year geology first year geology professor was Mel. One day she said to him – “you taught my boy friends father”, Mel replied, who is your boyfriend’s father – Brett Pearson – ‘Heck’ Mel said “I taught your boyfriends grandfather.”

Somehow in 1976 I was accepted into graduate school to do an M.Sc. It was a mapping thesis with Fred Langford as my advisor with Mel and Les Coleman on my Committee. I was part way through it when I got a job offer to be the Resident Geologist in Creighton SK. I continued to send in drafts of my thesis while I was in Creighton and Fred always sent them back with more red ink than black. In 1979 Fred went on sabbatical so Mel became my Advisor, with his guidance and support I was able to submit and defend it. I will be forever grateful to him for doing that.

By being in Flin Flon/Creighton over the 20 years we lived there I had many occasions to see and visit Mel. I remember some of his research projects, one with Les Coleman where they were doing seismic surveys across the Reynard Lake Pluton. On another occasion I was able to visit with him when he set up the Flin Flon Field School for upper year geology students. At the time they camped in tents at the Denare Beach Camp Ground, technician Jerry (I don’t recall his last name) was in charge of gettng the students etc. fed. It was usually in late August and early September so there were some pretty cold nights. In later years they abandoned the camping and stayed at hotels in Flin Flon.

Bonjour Mel submitted by David Boulesteix [David stayed with Mel and Shan twice during visits to Canada to use the Canadian Light Source in 2023 and 2024 during his PhD studies in France]

Here is the Frenchy and little Titan boy traveling through our magnificent Saturnian system took a little detour to this blue planet to land in the garden at Mel’s and Shan’s house (as flowery as the garden at Versailles and stocked with succulent vegetables cooked by star chef Shan!).

My first expedition at the age of 25 (with some 60 years more for you, my dear meteorite mentor) brought us together by a happy coincidence named Joyce. You were as active as a little boy wanting to discover the world, and just as amazed by the natural world around us, especially those showers of shooting stars so dear to our hearts. The Perseids gave us magnificent shows, accompanied by the most succulent of dishes (no, not spaghetti!!!): ice cream!

Our boisterous discussions in the kitchen about Canada and all those incredible countries you visited, as well as about our dear friend Trump, gave us some memorable sleepless nights. Thank you for your warm welcome, for the discussions and lessons you gave so generously and free of charge that teaching was in your DNA! Thank you to Shan and you for discovering Saskatoon and sharing your family's travels in Canada and around the world. Your stories lit up thousands of stars in my eyes, and in 1 month I'll be heading back to my Saturnian system with wonderful stories to tell future generations.

Thank you Mel, our incredible Saturday night party and Halloween prankster! Your costumes took us into another world, both comical and frightening, depending on the degree of make-up added J

Will keep you in mind every time I come back to Earth, especially in your little country unique among the numerous environments present in the solar system.

My Fond Mel Memories by Chantal Strachan-Crossman, University of Saskatchewan Department of Geological Sciences

He considered the photocopier his evil nemesis. There was no time that Mel went into the photocopier room and you didn’t hear swearing. The thing hated Mel and no matter what he was doing, it would jam. And then I would hear this voice “Chantal, can you come here?” 

I loved Mel’s stories. He would come into the office and talk about one thing and next thing you knew, he had launched into some great tale either about the days of old in the department or about his most recent cross-continent adventures. Nothing held him back from investigating things that interested him!

Mel had recently acquired a tattoo. It was of a dinosaur, of course. I have visible tattoos and so as soon as he got this one, he immediately started to talk to me about tattoos: ideas and colors and does it hurt more in different areas and that he was pretty sure he was going to get another one. It was an unusual but really cool thing to share with someone in their mid-80s!

My nickname for him was “Melly-Mel” (I have no idea why) and I would greet him as such, enthusiastically, every time he came into the main office. And his automatic reply, every time, with just as much enthusiasm, was “Jello!”

Mel was truly a special, one of a kind human and I will miss him. See you later, Melly-Mel. <3

Reminiscences by Professor Sam Butler, University of Saskatchewan Department of Geological Sciences

I was, of course, heartbroken by the news of Mel’s passing. It is hard to imagine the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Saskatchewan without Mel’s presence. I am consoled to hear that Mel went quickly and in the presence of the person that he loved most. On reflecting, I am mostly very grateful to have had Mel in my life these last 20 or so years. He is a role model for me in how to lead a life well-lived.

I first got to know Mel when he and I were assigned to co-teach Geology 108/121 (Introductory Physical Geology). Mel introduced me to subtracting 1/4 of a mark for every wrong answer on a multiple choice test with 5 choices which is statistically the correct thing to do though many people don’t realize it. Mel’s love of teaching geology was obvious from the fact that he continued to do it for twenty years after he had retired. On one occasion when I was Department Head and Mel was teaching as a sessional lecturer, I remember learning of the considerable efforts that he had made to accommodate students who needed make-up exams. When I mentioned that he was doing more than was required he told a story from when he was an undergraduate. His first wife had recently had their first child and they were both exhausted and he slept through his alarm and was late for a math exam. The professor of the math exam would not give Mel any leeway and Mel did not do as well in the class as he would have liked as a result. Because of that event, Mel swore that he would always treat his students with compassion and remember that they had lives beyond his classroom. It really impressed me that Mel stuck to that conviction even sixty years later.

Another fond recollection that I have of Mel is that he considered any money that he made from working as a sessional lecturer to be “fun money” and fun for Mel was buying tektites and meteorites on Ebay. One day, roughly fifteen years ago, Mel came busting into my office with his usual energy and asked if I wanted to model tektites. I had to surreptitiously Google “tektite” to remind myself what they were. That day started a multiyear collaboration in which we investigated tektites and explained how they came to have such interesting shapes. Mel had a keen eye for detailed observations and patience and enormous interest in geology that allowed him to notice things that most others would miss. Mel provided measurements from the hundreds of tektites that he had purchased as well as from Ebay sellers that he contacted directly. Later, Mel would make special trips to the British Museum of Natural Sciences, to the Smithsonian and to the University of Texas to measure more tektite dimensions. With Mel providing the observations and the measurements from thousands of tektites, and with the help of other collaborators including Gunjan and Ray Spiteri in Computer Science, we published a couple of papers explaining tektites shapes and we currently have a manuscript in preparation. The expertise that I gained as a result of these projects in modeling spinning liquid drops later proved useful in other areas of my research.

The main office in Geological Sciences and the Museum of Natural Sciences at U. of S. are often contacted by members of the general public looking for help in identifying rock specimens or having found “meteorites”. When I was department head, and when Erica was with the museum, we would often ask Mel to follow up with these requests. Mel was fantastic and he would go well out of his way to meet with people to see their specimens. I remember that Mel said that of the hundreds of claimed meteorites that has been brought, only one was an actual meteorite – the rest being “meteowrongs”. Mel was unfailingly diplomatic, however, understanding that people were genuinely excited about being part of a discovery and always kindly informed them of the true nature of the samples.

I will also always remember Mel for his sense of adventure. I did not know Mel during his days conducting field work and leading field schools but even in his later years, he was always keen to head out to the field on a science-related expedition. He and Gunjan went searching areas of known meteorite falls on a number of occasions. Also, when contacted by members of the general public about geologically-related anomalies on their properties, Mel was keen to head out to investigate. Mel enjoyed the scientific contribution and the service to the public involved in these activities but I also think that for Mel they were also simply fun. It is the energetic sense of fun and adventure, as well as his caring and compassion, that Mel carried right up to the end of his life that I find inspiring and will seek to emulate.