Flying Officer Robert Donald Keith Hanbidge

Flying Officer Robert Donald Keith Hanbidge

Royal Canadian Air Force

Kerrobert, Saskatchewan

Died: January 8, 1945

Commemorated on the Runnymede

Memorial near London, England.

Keith Hanbidge (b.1921) of Kerrobert was KIA on January 8, 1945. Hanbidge’s Lancaster failed to return from a night raid on Munich. Keith was a student when he enlisted at Saskatoon in 1941.

He was the only son of Robert Leith and Jane (Mitchell) Hanbidge. R.L. (Dinnie) Hanbidge QC (1891-1974) was lieutenant governor of Saskatchewan 1963-70. He was born in Bruce Co., Ontario, to parents who hailed from Wicklow, Ireland. He came west in 1909, articled with F.W.G. Haultain and settled at Kerrobert in 1914. Hanbidge was a Conservative MLA 1929-34 and a federal candidate in 1945. Dinnie acquired his unusual nickname while playing with the Regina Rugby Club, forerunner to the Roughriders.