Lethbridge East Rotary honours Glenn Coulter on 50 years of service

By Lethbridge Herald on May 9, 2025.

Al Beeber
Lethbridge Herald

For five decades, Glenn Coulter has strived to make Lethbridge a better, more vibrant community through his involvement with the Rotary Club of Lethbridge East.

And he’s not finished yet.

Coulter was surprised on Tuesday night by club members when they honoured him for his long-time service to the club and community during their meeting at the Agri-Food Hub and Trade Centre.

“it’s been a wonderful ride over the 50 years,” Coulter told the crowd. “I hope it doesn’t end soon,” he says. “It’s been a lot of fun and we’ve accomplished a lot as a club, and I believe there’s a lot more we can do in the future.”

Joining him on the occasion was his wife Ghislaina who waited down the hall before making an appearance, that like the event itself, was a surprise to him.

During his 50 years with the club, Coulter has been involved in many accomplishments including the creation of the club’s annual agricultural scholarships for southern Alberta students pursuing a post-secondary education in agriculture.

Coulter had been in Lethbridge for barely a year when he joined the organization after coming here on April 18,1974 to work as a research scientist at the Lethbridge Research Centre. He’d left Cornell University with a PhD in reproductive physiology in animal sciences.

During his scientific career, his interest and passion were the development of practical technology to enhance the selection and  management of beef bulls to optimize their reproductive performance. He also spent 10 years as head of the Livestock Sciences Section of the research centre and for five years was assistant director.

He spent four years managing the intellectual property portfolio of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. He’s currently president of Integrity Intellectual Property Inc. and is involved with Calowry Inc., a Lethbridge-based pre-commercial food-technology company that has its vision marking and licencing a patent-pending low-calorie and low-carbohydrate product for flour-based baked goods and chocolate  products.

He also found the time, along with Ghislaina, to operate a fishing camp while doing Rotary work and serving on the board of directors of the Waterton Glacier International Peace Park since 1971. And he’s also chair of the Friends of the Galt Society.

With the Rotary Club, he played an instrumental role in the creation  of the first playground at the Sugar Bowl that was constructed in 1979.He also worked to establish the club’s fundraising Casinos for Youth program in an era when charities could actually lose money doing casinos.

Coulter served three terms as president of the club, which has about 25 members, current president Andrew Bronson told the meeting during a slide presentation of his history with the organization.

Coulter has also chaired the club’s foundation committee for a number of years and he’s usually involved with the Rotary’s annual highway cleanups and helps at the soup kitchen.

After the presentation, Coulter spoke of the importance of the ag scholarship. To him, the establishment of that scholarship program is one of  the club’s biggest achievements since he was sponsored to become a member by Robert Hironaka on May 1, 1975.

“It’s just amazing to see our youth community in agriculture and what it can do,” he said.

One of the scholarship winners – Emma Knodel – was on hand Tuesday to provide an update on her career in the agriculture industry. 

That scholarship program, founded in 2018, handed out its first bursary in February of 2019. Since then the club has awarded $10,000 scholarships each year to students – two in 2020 and 2021 and three in the past three years.

Knodel represents the type of person the scholarship can help establish their careers in agriculture, said Coulter.

So far, $140,000 has been awarded by the program with more money to be disbursed this year.

Many club members were brought up in agriculture or have professional connections to the industry, Coulter noted.

“We’re different because of the ag scholarship. It’s one of the top agriculture scholarships in the country. I’m not aware of any other  $10,000 scholarships that are being given out. We’re a small club,  we’re like 25 people, but we’re able to do things that most clubs  can’t because of the industry support that we have.”