By HUGH MCBRIDE


Wednesday, November 6, 2002 – Print Edition, Page A24

Father, brother, community leader, educator. Born April 22, 1944, in Detroit. Died Sept. 7 in Toronto, of a thoracic aneurysm, aged 58.

Jamie Bell brought creativity, intelligence, a commitment to public service and a talent for enlarging the ideas and roles of the people around him to benefit his community and the world at large.

Born the second of four brothers in a middle-class Detroit family, Jamie's lifelong passion for education and community work may have been inspired by his mother, a teacher, and his father, a community activist. He attended Detroit's vast Cass Technical High School, and in the graduating class of 1962 was voted most likely to succeed. The not-yet-Supreme Diana Ross was named best-dressed.

After earning an undergraduate degree in chemistry and a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship for graduate study, Jamie was by the late 1960s doing doctoral research in genetics under David Suzuki at the University of British Columbia. The experience changed his life. In a brief autobiography penned in 1996, Jamie wrote, "I'd been infected by David Suzuki's enthusiasm to communicate science and influenced by his opinion that the growth of the power of science and technology was dangerously outpacing the social and educational processes by which that power must be controlled." The die was cast for a career in science education.

There followed three "incredible" years working on the pilot project that led to the founding of the Detroit Science Center. Then there were 15 years at the Ontario Science Centre in Toronto where Jamie rose to lead the temporary exhibitions program and later, the communications department. But titles are misleading in Jamie's case, for he was never one to have his activities circumscribed by job titles and departmental divisions. He reached ardently and frequently and with conviction beyond his own area -- sometimes to the consternation of his colleagues. He was creative and enthusiastic, and instilled these qualities in those with whom he worked. More than this, he listened to and encouraged other people's ideas and helped multiply them. He empowered people before empowering became a corporate cliché.

Jamie served as a key team member in the development of all major exhibitions. He founded Science Circus, which brought Science Centre exhibitions to communities small and large all over Ontario. Finding themselves snow-bound in Fort Francis, it was Jamie who suggested they join the local Santa Claus Parade. They raised their Science Circus banners and hoisted the most portable of their exhibits. All of them sported fake noses and glasses, all except Jamie who had real glasses and a moustache. The town went wild. A television commentator said later that the big guy -- Jamie was 6 feet, 5 inches -- had the best fake nose and glasses of all.

In 1993, Jamie was named executive director of Swansea Town Hall, a community centre in Toronto's west end. He held this job until the day he died.

Jamie served for many years on the boards of the Mariposa Folk Festival and Mariposa in the Schools. Since 1990, he served on the board of the Ontario March of Dimes. He mobilized thousands of volunteers in 1998 and 1999 to build The High Park Adventure Playground -- one of the largest community-built playgrounds in Canada -- in Toronto's west end.

Jamie approached parenthood as he did everything else, with love, creativity and a sense of adventure. He was a devoted father to Kristen, Adam and Aaron. He was among the first fathers to take paternity leave.

Jamie spent his last day -- a Saturday -- with his two boys. He died in the evening, quickly and without apparent suffering, with a smile on his face.

Hugh knew and admired Jamie Bell.