THE ADVOCATE 277
VOL. 79 PART 2 MARCH 2021
Robert had a lifelong interest in sports beginning when he played for the
Kamloops High School Red Devils basketball team as a guard. He never lost
his enthusiasm for high school ball and was still attending the B.C. boys’
high school invitational tournaments whenever the Kamloops team made
the cut. His various talents began to show themselves quite early in life
when he was elected treasurer of the high school student council, wrote for
the student newspaper and engaged in many other student activities.
For a small interior town, Kamloops has produced its share of significant
legal figures. These include the former federal Justice Minister Davie Fulton,
Q.C., former treasurer of the B.C. Law Society Peter Millward, Q.C., and
several judges. In our grade 10 English class at Kamloops High School, there
were five students whose names began with “B” who were grouped together.
Four of them were boys, including Robert and me, and all four attended and
graduated from UBC law school. The fifth “B”, a girl named Aline Beach,
was a talented classical pianist. She sat between Robert and me. He was
quite fascinated by her and constantly snuck me notes, commenting on various
aspects of her pulchritude. Fortunately, none of these notes were intercepted.
Nothing happened. She moved away. Twenty years later, when
Robert was a mid-level partner at Davis and Company, he mentioned to me
over lunch one day that he had run into Aline, who was single, at some
Davis promotional function. He was just as enamoured with Aline as he had
been in grade 10. He eventually proposed and they married. Their son,
Kevin Banno, a Vancouver realtor, was his father’s pride and joy. Kevin’s
athletic endeavours outstripped those of his father when he became a varsity
football player at SFU. Robert never missed a play.
While we were at UBC, Robert’s interest in sports morphed into an interest
in journalism. The two of us joined the student newspaper, The Ubyssey,
as reporters. We had both completed grade 13 in Kamloops and moved into
second year at UBC. One of our greatest thrills was that we were now in a
city that had a major league sports team. I speak of the B.C. Lions. Robert
was so inspired that he would frequently persuade me to make the trek out
to Empire Stadium, taking two or three busses through fog or rain to watch
the Lions play. They were a good team in those years and won the Grey Cup
in 1964. Robert remained a lifelong Lions fan and also a Grizzlies fan. We
were a good support for each other through all sorts of sporting and political
events. I particularly remember spending an entire day drinking coffee at
the Village Café at UBC attempting to absorb the dreadful news of the assassination
of John F. Kennedy.
Robert graduated from law school in 1968, returned to Kamloops and
joined Peter Millward’s firm. He was quite happy with the work there, but