Fifth generation of the Cattanach family graduates from Queen’s

When Dylan Cattanach, Artsci’16, walked across the Grant Hall stage on Tuesday to receive his degree, he was following in the footsteps of his father, his grandfather, his great grandfather, and his great-great uncle.

Dylan, an economics grad, is the fifth generation of the Cattanach family to earn a degree from the Queen’s Faculty of Arts and Science. (Although technically those first three generations received their degrees from the Faculty of Arts before the merger with science in the 1970s.)

 “There is something about Queen’s that builds a real loyalty; it’s a tradition,” says Dylan’s father Rory Cattanach, Artsci’80. “When I was in Grade 2, I just assumed I was coming to Queen’s. My grandfather was a very big Queen’s guy. My older sister came to Queen’s. I came to Queen’s. My younger sister came to Queen’s. It’s just a great university.”

Dylan’s older brothers went to Western and McGill so the pressure was on him to continue the tricolour legacy.

“I kind felt obligated to come to Queen’s and continue the tradition and it was an awesome decision. It was a great four years,” Dylan said.

The tradition started in 1889 when James Cattanach graduated from Theology. His nephew John Cattanach was a 1919 Arts grad. Dylan’s grandfather Lachlan graduated in 1949 and was on hand yesterday to see Dylan walk across the Grant Hall stage. Over the years, there has been numerous other Cattanach family members who spent their universities years in the Limestone City.

Lachlan met his wife at Queen’s and is still friends with classmates he met 60 years ago. He has fond memories of his time at Queen’s – even though one of those memories involve getting in a lot of trouble for painting a campus building.

“There is an old saying from (former Queen’s Vice-Principal) William Everett McNeill that goes ‘Though I am not a Queen’s man born, nor a Queen’s man bred. Yet when I die, there’s a Queen’s man dead.’ Once a Queen’s man, always a Queen’s man,” Lachlan says.