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Page 6 WEST VANCOUVER HISTORICAL SOCIETY September 1997 By: Anne Vernon FEATURE PRESENTATION REPORT Your Character Is Exposed on the Page! RENATA GRIFFITHS came to B.C. via England and Alberta. A trained nurse, she took further degrees in psychiatric nursing and worked in this field for many years. During her career she became fascinated by what the handwriting ofpatients could tell her. Today this West Vancouver resident runs her own handwriting analysis company and is in constant demand for her expertise in different fields - assisting in character analysis to ensure the choice of the right candidate for the job being one important section. As well as dealing with this demanding schedule, Renata frequently appears in court as an expert legal witness and appears on many radio and TV programmes. For recreation she plays tennis and power walks around West Vancouver! Exploring Character Through Handwriting was the title of Renata Griffiths’ talk to us and what a fascinating talk it was. Handwriting can tell much about the person involved and it seems it does not change much throughout our lives. What does the expert graphologist look for when judging character? Firstly handwriting is a record of brainwaves, telling a great deal about physical and emotional wellbeing - or otherwise - of the person under scrutiny. ’ Writing has three zones - upper, middle and lower. Sounds obvious, but most of us have never thought of our writing in this way surely. Zone 1, or the upper section, belongs to the intellectual and spiritual side of life; Zone 2, or the middle section, to the ego as well as to everyday physical activities of living; and Zone 3, or the lower section, deals with the unconscious, the instincts and with our materialistic side. Left sloping writing is linked with our feminine needs and right sloping with masculine needs. One further point - illness, alcohol, memories, age and drugs can all influence how we write - hence the use of graphology in the head hunting and health aspects of the discipline. With the use of overhead slides, Renata showed us some pages of writing from the past and was able to explain the characteristics of the authors which we, perhaps, had been unaware of until then. Francis W. Caulfeild came across as being honest, determined, intelligent - all of which we could probably have guessed, but he also suffered from depression. B O O K R E VIE W By: Waring Pentland Oral Histories That Will Not Be Forgotten Union Steamships Remembered 1920 - 1958 By Arthur M. Twigg Publisher, A.M.Twigg For all Oral History buffs this book takes personal interviews to the ultimate. Art has relentlessly pursued his early interest in the Union Steamships, through years of research and personal interviews, to publish this delightfril book of West Coast maritime history. Beginning with the ships, he pieces together company records, news paper accounts, and the memories of officers and crew to develop a history of each company ship from 1920-1958. He follows with portraits of officers and crew that are humourous, sympathetic, never cruel, even when e?qx)sing human frailties. The tales ring true; there is a feeling of sitting in on a coffee break or a between-watch get together in the officers mess. John Lawson wrote a beautiful Spencerian hand. He was a friendly, organised, determined and self-confident person who was also conservative though venturesome. Several of the Royal ladies were also covered - from Queen Victoria to Princess Diana - as were Margaret Thatcher and other politicians. Not too many surprises there, but such different writing styles. Even the audience could see what our e?q)ert meant as she took us through the letters step by step. We ended up with some interesting facts about notorious men - the Oklahoma Bomber (Timothy McVeigh) who apparently had been badly deprived of maternal affection during his early childhood: Clifford Olsen’s writing showed him to be a man who was extremely aggressive: and, finally, Robert Krebbs who wrote an unsolicited letter from a California prison asking Mrs Griffiths to send him details of her operation and fee schedule. It was interesting to note that she summed him up immediately as a total psychopath - someone whose personality was most disturbing and with whom she would never, under any circumstances, even correspond. They all had very distinct hmidwriting - not at all spontaneous. Want to learn more? The library has many well written books on the subject which will widen your knowledge and prove a fascinating study. It was perhaps unfortunate that Renata did not give an analysis of handwriting from a member of the audience whom we all knew personally! That would have been very interesting, but who among us had the courage to have our strengths and weaknesses publicly analyzed -certainly not your editorial staff who were present! The New Spirit: Modem Architecture in Vancouver See Vancouver as a centre of modem architectural activity from 1938 to 1963. Organized with the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal. November 8 - January 18, Vancouver Art Galley Friday November 7,1997 Salute to Founders AIBC Panel Discussion Judge White Theatre Robson Square - 5:30pm Opening Reception Vancouver Art Gallery 7:00pm I foimd it a good read that was hard to put down, but if interrupted, could be picked up again at any point. A vivid history of a company that literally was the lifeline of the West (2oast before the airplane appeared. Don't miss our next meeting. Sept. 24, when Art will be our guest speaker for the evening. Find out how he kept the project going and how he brought so many stories into print.