The Stories behind the
Famous Canadian Women Match Game
Manon Rhéaume. Born February 2, 1972.
She was the first girl to play in the annual Quebec peewee hockey
tournament. She was the first female goaltender to play professionally
and the first in the National Hockey League. She played for the Tampa
Bay Lightning. She has written a book "Manon: alone in front of
the net." If the book is not at your own library, just request
an interlibrary loan from your librarian.
Jeanne-Mathilde (Benoit) Sauvé. Born at Prud'homme,
Saskatchewan April 26, 1922 studied in Ottawa and in Paris. She married
in 1948 and began a brilliant career as a free-lance journalist in
print, radio and Television. In 1972 she was elected to the House of
Commons and was a Member of Parliament for Montreal until the 1980's.
She was the first female French Canadian Member of Cabinet as Minister
of State for Science and Technology, Minister of the Environment and
Minister of Communications. She was the first woman Speaker of the House
of Commons in Parliament. In 1984 she was the first woman appointed as
Governor General. As head of state, she was a rallying point for her
compatriots, a dignified representative of Canada abroad and a symbol of
Canadian unity.
Lady Mary Pellatt. (née Dodgson) Born Toronto, Ontario 1858.
The first Commissioner of the Girl Guides of Canada lived in a Castle!
Lady Mary often invited Girl Guides to have rallies at Casa Loma in
Toronto. She was warranted as Commissioner of the Dominion of Canada
Girl Guides on July 24, 1912. When she was too ill to attend events she
enjoyed watching the girls from her bedroom window. When Lady Pellatt
died in April 1924, she was buried in her Girl Guide uniform and the
Girl Guides formed a Guard of Honour at the funeral service. Check out
the Girl Guide Fact Sheet at: http://www.girlguides.ca/media/pdfs/14-3/14.3.1.8.pdf
Roberta Lynn Bondar was the first Canadian woman to go into
space. A dedicated scientist, who enjoys flying and photography in her
spare time, has fond memories of being a member of Guiding in her youth.
When she was allowed to bring some special food into space she took with
her favorite "Girl Guide Cookies"! She is currently a research
professor and traveling lecturer working out of the University of
Western Ontario, London Ontario.
Jenny (Kidd) Trout was born at Kelso, Scotland in April 1841
but grew up near Stratford, Ontario. After she was married in 1865, to
Toronto publisher Edward Trout, she decided to become a doctor. There
were no Canadian medical schools that admitted women, so she enrolled at
the Women's Medical College at Pennsylvania and graduated in 1875. She
passed the Ontario registration exam for doctors and became the first
Canadian woman licensed to practice medicine in Canada. She promoted
women in medicine all her life and she helped endow the Women's Medical
College, Kingston Ontario in 1883. Have you seen the stamp with her
picture on it?
Margaret Marshall Saunders was the first Canadian author to
sell 1,000,000 copies of a book. Her book "Beautiful Joe"
is the story of an abused dog written for an American Humane
Society competition. It won 1st prize and became a world best
seller translated into more than 14 languages. It reached
one million sales in 1894! Margaret Saunders was a woman of charm and
humour, and her animal stories were sentimental and gracefully written
to be truly entertaining.
Agnes Campbell Macphail. Born in Ontario in 1890, Agnes was
the only woman elected to the Canadian Parliament in 1921. That was the
fist Canadian federal election that allowed women to vote. Later she
would become one of the first of two women to be elected to the Ontario
Provincial Legislature. She was also the first woman appointed to the
Canadian delegation to the League of Nations (now the United Nations)
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