PEOPLE I'VE MET: A FLASHBACK

In the capacity of Media Relations Director for the Insurance Bureau of Canada in 1982, Dick was a key organizer for Toronto's first Insure Run for the Heart, a half-marathon event that featured Canadian Olympian Diane Jones Konihowski as the official starter. In the above photo Dick surprized the then pregnant national star athlete with the presentation of a special T-shirt bearing the presumptuous and forward-looking words "Competitor 2000 Olympics" to be ideally given to her first born child at a suitable time in the future.

A renowned world-class pentathlete, Diane was the 1978 Commonwealth Champion and number one in the world. She won gold at the 1975 & 1979 Pan-American Games and was a medalists for three Canadian Olympic teams, specializing in pentathlon events such as shot put, sprints and long jump. She was the Chef de Mission of the 2000 Canadian Olympic Team in Sydney, Australia. She since became a member of the Order of Canada, the Saskatchewan Sports Hall of Fame, Canadian Olympic Sports Hall of Fame, and the Alberta Sports Hall of Fame and Museum. She is part of the Class of 2020-21 to receive the Order of Sport in Canada’s Sport Hall of Fame honor and only recently retired as long-serving director of Fund Development and Communications at Distress Centre in Calgary. She holds a Bachelor of Education degree from the University of Saskatchewan, and honorary Doctor of Laws Degrees from the U of S and Brock University. She has worked as a national team coach, University instructor, Calgary Sun columnist, and for CBC Edmonton AM and CBC TV Calgary.

Diane is is married to former Canadian Football League player John Konihowski and would ultimately become the mother of two beautiful daughters (as fate would have it, neither one becoming a competitor in the 2000 Olympics) and grandmother to three.