This year we celebrate 150 years of the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) at the University of Guelph! Aggies have been called upon to show their Aggie pride today by sharing photos in our iconic leather jackets or other Aggie wear with the hashtag #OAC150.
What is an Aggie you ask? Well simply put we are students who studied agriculture at the University of Guelph. However, we are much more – we are a strong network of friends who we can count on in good times and bad. We share a passion for agriculture from before the farm to beyond the table. We are taking leadership in producing food for a rapidly increasing population facing huge challenges from climate change to economics and politics.
I come from a long line of Aggies on both sides of my family tree – my great great grandfather, Nelson Monteith https://www.oahf.on.ca/inductee/hon-samuel-nelson-monteith/ , graduated in 1890 – exactly 100 years before I began! My dad, brother, uncle, and many cousins were all Aggies.
Becoming an Aggie was one of the best decisions I ever made. Not only did I thoroughly enjoy my time on campus (we Aggies do know how to have a good time!); I made lifelong friends that still get together every year for a reunion and meet up anywhere from the Royal, the Food Terminal, agricultural events, or a classmate’s winery 😊
My degrees (B.Sc.(Agr) and an M.Sc.) led me through a gratifying career and ultimately to creating Fraberts with my husband, Chef Derek. My boss and mentor who first introduced me to the Ontario Food Terminal when I worked at a farm market as a teen was also an Aggie.
OAC has evolved from humble beginnings 150 years ago as the Ontario School of Agriculture and Research Farm on a 550 acre farm in the south end of Guelph to a global leader of scientific knowledge and applied learning.
#producenerdfacts The Yukon Gold potato and millennium asparagus were developed at the OAC!
