Alumnus, philanthropist, and longtime Queen’s champion Rob Sobey, Artsci’88, is among the five new appointments to the , the province’s highest honour.
In his announcement Dec. 23, Nova Scotia’s lieutenant-governor, Mike Savage, noted Sobey’s corporate leadership and support of the visual arts and access to higher education.
Before retiring as president and CEO of Lawtons Drugs in 2014, Sobey had worked for 30 years in his family’s business, Sobeys Inc., one of the largest supermarket chains in Canada.
He now sits on the boards of Empire Company, SeaFort Capital, the Institute of Corporate Directors, and is a director emeritus of Smith School of Business Advisory Board.
Sobey has also served on the Queen’s Board of Trustees and continues to help fund two major gifts at his alma mater.
One, established in 1998, is the Sobey Atlantic Award – now worth up to $120,000 and given to up to 10 students from Atlantic Canada entering the first year of any undergraduate program at Queen’s. To date, there have been approximately 150 Sobey Scholars.
The second Queen’s gift, set up in 2008, is the Sobey Professorship, which funds research done by Smith School of Business faculty. The current Sobey Professor is , whose research focuses on the behaviour and performance of multinational corporations.
Sobey has been the chairman of the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and is a distinguished patron of the National Gallery of Canada. He is also the current chair of the Sobey Art Foundation, which funds the – one of the world’s most generous prizes for contemporary artists.
“On behalf of The King and all Nova Scotians, I am delighted to announce the 2024 appointments to the Order of Nova Scotia,” said Lt.-Gov. Savage in a press release. “These Nova Scotians have made exemplary contributions and enhanced the social fabric and identity of Nova Scotia and Canada across diverse fields.”
The 2024 appointees will be invested at a ceremony in Halifax in the spring.
