Ralph E. “Buzz” Hudson (1933 - 2005)

Ralph Hudson was born and raised in Victoria. He attended the University of British Columbia, where he played basketball, and graduated with a law degree in 1959.¹⁾ He moved to the Yukon in 1960 to work in Eric Nielsen’s law firm and stayed in the territory until 1974.²⁾

In 1970, Buzz was the coach of the Yukon basketball team at the first Arctic Winter Games in the NWT. A spokesperson from the Alaska team described the skills of their all-star players before Hudson got the microphone. The Yukon team was pretty disheartened until Hudson gave a comic routine about players from the banks of the Teslin River and other outlandish dialogue. People in the gym cheered and laughed and, although the team lost, they held their heads high.³⁾ In 1976, Hudson served as a Yukon territorial judge and a British Columbia provincial court judge and returned north in 1993 as the senior judge of the Yukon Supreme Court. He and wife Jan retired to Salt Spring island in 2003.⁴⁾ Throughout his legal career, Hudson was an active volunteer as the president of the Law Society of the Yukon and the director of the Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce. Hudson also organized a number of continuing legal education seminars for Yukon lawyers.⁵⁾