This is a tale of two Prime Ministers Trudeau, divided by about 30 kilometres and just over 32 years.

The most recent of these prime ministers, Justin Trudeau, visited Kitchener on Thursday to open the city’s new Google office. Standing in the clutch of reporters in the packed lobby, I was reminded of a chilly night in November 1983 when I travelled to Guelph to report on Pierre Elliott Trudeau. I wondered how many journalists have reported on both men, even fleetingly as I have now done. Not many, I bet. So in a real departure for Entrevestor, I want to record my impressions of covering our father-and-son Prime Ministerial tandem.

In late 1983, I got to cover Prime Minister Trudeau revealing the details of his peace initiative at the University of Guelph. In the dying days of his tenure, Pierre Trudeau wanted to add to his legacy (and divert attention from the dire economy) by championing a disarmament program he would propose to the Soviets and Americans.

I was 23 at the time and delighted to report on the august PM before he left office. I recall it was a snowy evening, though that memory may be a distortion from the fog of three decades. The hall was full of students. A few peaceniks were outside protesting the fact that Trudeau had given the U.S. permission to test cruise missiles in Canadian territory.

PM Opens Google's Kitchener Office

Even though he’d been PM for most of the past 15 years, I couldn’t help but be struck by Pierre Trudeau’s brilliance. He opened the speech with an offhand remark about the oriigins of the word “Guelph” in Italian history. Then he mentioned the mythical symbolism of the Gryphon (the university’s nickname). You knew damn well that no speech writer put that in – it was all Trudeau, drawn from his astonishing memory.

Then he went into the details of his peace initiative, which as I recall was a twin-track policy that relied on disarmament on one hand and a mix of diplomacy and conventional arms on the other. I do remember that I was on deadline and madly flipping through pages of the speech, trying to keep up mentally with the brainiest of Canadian prime ministers. I can’t say I succeeded.

Watching his son work the crowd at the Google office on Thursday, I was unable to detect any genetic link between the two of them, except possibly the high cheek bones. They’re completely different species.

Is Justin Trudeau super-smart as well? I have no idea. He never manifests the professorial learning that his father did. But likeable – Holy Lord, is this guy likeable? He’s at ease with people regardless of their age, whereas Pierre Trudeau gave the impression he would rather be off reading by himself.

The Prime Minister appeared at Google with no jacket, the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up and the top button undone. His father was known to be thrifty in buying clothes, but he was nonetheless a dandy.

Justin Trudeau’s first event at the Google office was meeting with a group of school kids who were learning technology through Codemakers, a program that Google is providing with Actua with the goal of teaching tech to 100,000 Canadian children. The Prime Minister, a former school teacher, seemed to thrive on the chance to be with kids, viewing their work and taking them on a virtual reality tour of the Parliament buildings.

Then he was in front of about 1,000 people at the opening and the boyish charm only continued. He noted he had once visited the Google office in Montreal, where he’d played on the climbing wall and rode a unicycle. He apologized that with the “stature” of his new position he wasn’t going to ride a unicycle at the Kitchener office.

“There are limits to how much people will put up with from a geeky prime minister,” he said to roars of laughter. “And I know I’m pushing the limits.”

Note the word “geeky.” Here’s one final difference between the two men – Justin Trudeau is embracing geekdom the way Pierre embraced erudition. The Prime Minister emphasized that when he studied engineering he became a pretty good coder in C++. The backdrop for the photo op yesterday was several rows of Google engineers. He taught the school children what an algorithm is.

Just playing to the crowd in tech-city? Probably not. Justin Trudeau now has to manage a miserable economic situation, and tech offers a rare bright spot in the gloom environment. I think we’ll be hearing more talk of innovation from our new leader.