Browse "Women"

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Princess Louise Margaret, Duchess of Connaught

Princess Louise Margaret Alexandra Victoria Agnes of Prussia, Duchess of Connaught and Strathearn, vice-regal consort of Canada (1911–16) and philanthropist (born 25 July 1860 in Potsdam, Prussia (now Germany); died 14 March 1917 in London, United Kingdom). The Duchess of Connaught sponsored Red Cross hospitals for the Canadian Expeditionary Force during the First World War.

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Roberta Jamieson

Roberta Louise Jamieson, OC, Kanyen'kehà:ka (Mohawk) lawyer, ombudsman, Six Nations chief, policy advisor, senior mediator, businesswoman (born in 1953 at Six Nations of the Grand River Territory near Brantford, ON). Jamieson was the first Indigenous woman in Canada to earn a law degree (1976); first non-Parliamentarian appointed to a House of Commons committee (1982); first woman appointed ombudsman in Ontario (1989); and first woman elected as Six Nations chief (2001).

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Rosalie Silberman Abella

Rosalie Silberman Abella, FRSC, justice of the Supreme Court of Canada 2004–21, justice of the Ontario Family Court 1976–92, justice of the Ontario Court of Appeal 1992–2004, lawyer (born 1 July 1946 in Stuttgart, Germany). Rosalie Silberman Abella is the first Jewish woman and the first former refugee to be appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada. She was also both the youngest person and the first pregnant person to become a judge in Canada. Abella served as a justice on the Supreme Court from 2004 until 2021. She is best known for her advocacy for employment equity, for determining the legal context that bars employment discrimination, and for extending survivor benefits to same-sex couples. She has received 40 honorary degrees and has been inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame.

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Sheilah L. Martin

Sheilah Louise Martin, justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, lawyer, professor (born 31 May 1956 in Montreal, Quebec). Sheilah L. Martin is currently a justice on the Supreme Court of Canada . She was appointed to the court on 18 December 2017. She has earned a reputation for her expertise in judicial ethics and for her efforts to eliminate stereotypes and myths around rape from Canada’s courts. She also played key roles in developing the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement and securing compensation for David Milgaard and Thomas Sophonow , two of Canada’s most infamous wrongful convictions.

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Thelma Chalifoux

Thelma Julia Chalifoux, senator, entrepreneur, activist (born 8 February 1929 in Calgary, AB; died 22 September 2017 in St. Albert, AB). Chalifoux was the first Métis woman appointed to the Senate of Canada. As a senator, she was concerned with a range of issues, including Métis housing, drug company relations with the federal government, and environmental legislation. An ardent advocate for women’s and Indigenous rights, Chalifoux was involved in organizations such as the Aboriginal Women’s Business Development Corporation and the Métis Women’s Council. She was also known for her work in the protection of Métis culture, having served in the Alberta Métis Senate and Michif Cultural and Métis Resource Institute (now Michif Cultural Connections).

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Tilly Rolston

Tilly Jean Rolston, Canadian politician (born 23 February 1887 in Vancouver, BC; died 12 October 1953 in Vancouver, BC). Rolston was best known for her service as education minister for the province of British Columbia in the Social Credit government of W.A.C. Bennett in the early 1950s. She has the distinction of being the second woman cabinet minister elected in that province, but the first with a portfolio in all of Canada. Rolston was instrumental in developing a new financing formula for the funding of BC’s public schools, and also instituted the province’s first sex education curriculum. She is noted for being the first woman in British Columbia to receive a state funeral upon her death.

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Viola Desmond

Viola Irene Desmond (née Davis), businesswoman, civil rights activist (born 6 July 1914 in Halifax, NS; died 7 February 1965 in New York, NY). Viola Desmond built a career and business as a beautician and was a mentor to young Black women in Nova Scotia through her Desmond School of Beauty Culture. In 1946, Viola Desmond challenged racial discrimination when she refused to leave the segregated Whites-only section of the Roseland Theatre in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia. Viola Desmond was arrested, jailed overnight and convicted without legal representation for an obscure tax offence as a result. Despite the efforts of the Nova Scotian Black community to assist her appeal, Viola Desmond was unable to remove the charges against her and went unpardoned in her lifetime. Desmond’s courageous refusal to accept an act of racial discrimination provided inspiration to later generations of Black persons in Nova Scotia and in the rest of Canada. In 2010, Lieutenant-Governor Mayann Francis issued Desmond a free pardon. In December 2016, the Bank of Canada announced that Viola Desmond would be the first Canadian woman to be featured by herself on the face of a banknote — the $10 note released on 19 November 2018. Viola Desmond was named a National Historic Person by the Canadian government in 2018.

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Viola Léger

Viola P. Léger, OC, ONB, senator, actor, director, teacher (born 29 June 1930 in Fitchburg, Massachusetts; died 28 January 2023 in Dieppe, NB). Viola Léger served in the Senate from 2001 to 2005. She is perhaps best known for her career as an actor and for her performance as La Sagouine in Antonine Maillet’s play of the same name. Léger performed the role 3,000 times between 1971 and 2016. Widely considered the greatest Acadian actress of all time, she was also a prominent advocate and global ambassador for Acadian people and Acadian culture. She was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la France and a Member of the Ordre des Francophones d’Amérique. She also received the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement in theatre.

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Heritage Minutes: Jackie Shane

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Heritage Minutes: Elsie MacGill

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Heritage Minutes: Chloe Cooley