Dictionary of Canadian Biography/Dictionnaire biographique du Canada

Bio of the Day: Allan Gilmour was among the considerable number of businessmen in Glasgow, Scotland who had commenced their careers in Canada. He was regarded as one who had been particularly successful and was certainly in the first rank of the great timber magnates of the 19th century. His good fortune in this most lucrative of fields for the British entrepreneur may be attributed not only to his astuteness as a businessman but also to the fact that the various Pollok, Gilmour concerns in British North America had been well established and were served by competent personnel from the very beginning of the timber trade era. He died on this date in 1884. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca//bio/gilmour_allan_1805_84_11E.html

NEW BIO! In her reminiscences Jean Drever Pinkham (1849-1940) would call herself a prairie "old timer"; born in Lower Fort Garry, she spent almost 91 years in western Canada. The death in infancy of her first child focused her attention on health care. A passion for community hospitals guided her work as a founding vice-president and later president of the Women’s Hospital Aid Society, organized in 1883 to help support the Winnipeg General Hospital. The family moved to Calgar...y in 1889, and there she became a valuable community leader and popular hostess. In 1890 she not only headed a women’s group that collected money to establish the Calgary General Hospital but also organized the Women’s Hospital Aid Society, of which she would be president until 1901. As time went by, her associational commitments grew to include national organizations, including activities related to the National Council of Women of Canada, the Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada, the Imperial Order Daughters of the Empire, and the Calgary Women’s Canadian Club. During World War I she helped create the Alberta branch of the Canadian Red Cross Society in 1914. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/drever_jean_anne_16E.html

NEW BIO! Today we are pleased to announce a completely new entry for Louis Hébert (1575-1627), apothecary, colonist, and king’s attorney. Recent advances in historical and genealogical knowledge have revealed little-known areas of his life, including his work as an apothecary, which he raised to a very high standard. By sending previously unknown plants to France, he facilitated the role of New France in the emergence of botany in Europe. Our original biography of Louis Hébert was published in 1966 and revised in 1979; you can read the 1979 version along with this new biography - see the Publication History at the bottom of the biography. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/hebert_louis_1E.html

Bio of the Day: Marie-Geneviève Noël was only 16 when she married Joseph Drapeau, a man 14 years her senior. At his death in November 1810 he left a sizeable estate to his 44-year-old wife, which included a considerable fortune in land. Unlike the status of a married woman, who at the time had only restricted rights since she was subject to her husband’s authority, status as a widow conferred numerous possibilities. Indeed, the Coutume de Paris, which was in force in the colony, gave a widow the same rights as a male who was of age. Henceforth Marie-Geneviève Drapeau could manage her properties without any man being able to exercise authority over her. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/noel_marie_genevieve_6E.html

From 2003 to 2017, Grandmother Water Walker Josephine Mandamin walked around the Great Lakes to raise awareness about the need to fight water pollution and co...ntaminated water on Indigenous reserves in Canada. Discover her story in our NEW video, part of a series on the history of Canada’s environment and climate for #HistoryWeek2020.

It's #LouisRielDay! Louis Riel, Métis spokesman, regarded as the founder of Manitoba, teacher, and leader of the North-West rebellion, is of the most controversial figures in Canadian history, and is the subject of our most popular biography. Read it here: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/riel_louis_1844_85_11E.html For more context, see our themed gallery "From the Red River Settlement to Manitoba (181270)": http://www.biographi.ca/en/theme_riviere_rouge.html

#HistoryWeek2020 Canada History Week provides Canadians throughout the country with opportunities to learn more about the people and events that have shaped the that we know. Learn something new today! http://ow.ly/rWOz50CtofV

It's Canada History Week 2020! This year's theme is environmental history. Today we highlight the artist Emily Carr (1871-1945). Through her paintings and her short stories, Emily Carr created an awareness of First Nations culture among an initially unsympathetic, non-native audience. Above all, she provided a unique vision of the coastal landscape that made Canadians look at the forest in a new way. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/carr_emily_17E.html To learn more about Canadian History Week 2020: https://www.canada.ca//canadia/campaigns/history-week.html

Bio of the Day: John Baptist Rousseaux St John was a fur trader, interpreter, businessman, militia officer, and office holder. He was a visible bridge between two régimes, the one French and geared to the ancient fur trade, the other British and responsive to the needs of more varied commercial enterprises and, above all, to the demands of a colony of settlement. He died on this date in 1812 in Niagara (Niagara-on-the-Lake), Upper Canada. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca//rousseaux_st_john_john_baptist_5E

It's Canada History Week 2020! This year's theme is environmental history. Today we highlight Archibald Stansfeld Belany, known as Grey Owl (1888-1938). The story of this pioneer environmentalist's rise to international fame is remarkable. As Grey Owl, he became the prophet of a vitally important message. He saw one truth clearly, the need to work for the conservation of the environment to preserve Canada’s forests and wildlife. He was decades ahead of his time. Read more:... http://www.biographi.ca//belaney_archibald_stansfeld_16E.h Library and Archives Canada To learn more about Canadian History Week 2020: https://www.canada.ca//canadia/campaigns/history-week.html

Bio of the Day: Sophia Thomas was born on this date in 1822 at Red River, a daughter of Sarah, a Cree woman, and Dr Thomas Thomas, HBC chief factor and governor of the Northern Department. She received a sound education at the Red River Academy and was offered the position of governess in the ladies’ section of the academy but she declined in order to marry a young missionary, the Reverend William Mason. The couple were part of a group that worked to translate the Christian b...ible into Cree. Unfortunately, when the two sections of the Bible were published, the title pages bore only the name of William Mason as translator. William Mason’s own statements would suggest that the final translation was his wife’s. He wrote that "her perfect command and knowledge of the Indian language was invaluable," and that "she laboured night and day to finish the final revision of the Old Testament, having completed the New in 1859." Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/thomas_sophia_9E.html Read more about Red River here: http://www.biographi.ca/en/theme_riviere_rouge.html

Bio of the Day: A descendant of the kings of Navarre, Robert Navarre was educated in Paris. When he came to Canada is not known. He signed notarial acts at Detroit as early as 24 Nov. 1729, and in 1734, when he reached the age of majority, he received his commission as a royal notary. During his years at Detroit he acquired a familiarity with the local Indigenous languages and occasionally acted as an interpreter. After British rule was established at Detroit in 1760, Navarre continued as a notary. He may have been the author of an account of Pontiac’s uprising of 1763 which served as the historical basis for Francis Parkman’s The conspiracy of Pontiac. He died on this date 1791 at Detroit. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/navarre_robert_4E.html

Joséphine Marchand Dandurand (1861-1925) was a journalist, writer, lecturer, and feminist activist. In 1893 she founded Le Coin du feu in Montreal. With the inauguration of this monthly magazine she established a secure place for herself in the field of journalism. Le Coin du feu was the first French-language periodical in Canada edited by a woman and intended specifically for women. Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/marchand_josephine_15E.html #WomensHistoryMonth #BecauseOfYou - Women and Gender Equality Canada

Bio of the Day: With a dowry of approximately 50,000 écus, Jeanne Le Ber was rightly considered the most eligible girl in New France. Interested in a religious vocation at an early age, she was a pensive, withdrawn, and introverted young lady, who daily spent much time in prayer and in adoration of the Sacrament. The death of one of the sisters of the Congrégation de Notre-Dame in 1679 profoundly affected her; she decided to live a secluded life for a five-year period. She le...ft her seclusion only to attend daily mass. She remained undecided about entering a regular order and taking permanent vows; nevertheless, her determination to shun the attractive life her family offered became evident, and in 1685 she took a simple vow of perpetual seclusion, chastity, and poverty. When she heard that the sisters of the Congrégation planned to build a church on their property she gave them generous financial assistance on condition that they reserve for her a three-room apartment directly behind the altar, so that she could view the blessed sacrament without leaving her quarters. She lived there until her death on this date in 1714. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_ber_jeanne_2E.html

Maude Abbott (1868-1940) was "consumed by a great thirst for the school work" and won a scholarship to McGill University; she graduated in 1890 as that year’s valedictorian and took home the Lord Stanley Gold Medal for academic achievement. Her studies continued at Bishop's College where she earned an MD in 1894. (McGill did not admit women into the Faculty of Medicine at that time.) After graduating Maude Abbott practiced medicine, curated the McGill Medical Museum, and did medical research and teaching. In 1994 she was the only woman among the first ten laureates of the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame in London, Ontario. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca//abbott_maude_elizabeth_seymour_16 #WomensHistoryMonth #BecauseOfYou - Women and Gender Equality Canada - McGill University - Bishop's University Musée McCord Museum

Bio of the Day: John Wilson Bengough was a cartoonist, editor, publisher, author, entertainer, and politician. On 24 May 1873, at the age of 22, he published the first issue of 'Grip'. For the next two decades this Toronto weekly would carry puns, jokes, satire, and especially cartoons about virtually every topic of the day in late-19th-century Canada. "The Pun," 'Grip' proclaimed, "is mightier than the Sword," for Bengough’s humour was purposeful. Above all, 'Grip' featured ...his cartoons and caricatures. Some were large enough to fill an entire page and many revealed the influence of Thomas Nast, the great Republican cartoonist of Harper’s Weekly (New York). John Wilson Bengough died on this date in 1923. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/bengough_john_wilson_15E.html

Endowed with a deep sense of social justice and fairness, Marie Lacoste Gérin-Lajoie (1867-1945) devoted her talents to various causes directed at furthering women’s independence by their taking their own destinies into their hands. She not only made a forceful contribution to changing attitudes but also opened the way for the dramatic rise of Quebec’s feminist movement during the Quiet Revolution. Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/lacoste_marie_17E.html #WomensHistoryMonth #BecauseOfYou - Women and Gender Equality Canada

Mary Ann Camberton Shadd (1823-1893) gained considerable recognition by articulating what would become her perennial themes: black independence and self-respect. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca//bio/shadd_mary_ann_camberton_12E. #WomensHistoryMonth #BecauseOfYou - Women and Gender Equality Canada

Bio of the Day: Ann Jane (Annie) Powell was born on this date in 1853. Educated in Mooretown, she took first prize in reading in the township examinations. She won this distinction on the same day that the battle with the Fenians took place at Ridgeway, 2 June 1866; consequently the award was long remembered within the family. It was at this competition too that she met Henry Gray, the fellow student who would become her husband. After her marriage in 1879, she settled in Van...kleek Hill, Ont., where her husband had been made principal of the county model school. About 1893 they moved to Toronto. She was an active church member, and served with the Methodist Ladies’ Aid and the Woman’s Missionary Society. In all her commitments Gray was an unrelenting advocate of temperance. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/powell_ann_jane_15E.html

Bio of the Day: As a young man Wageezhegome witnessed the destruction of his people’s way of life. The arrival in what is now southern Ontario of thousands of white settlers after the American revolution quickly led to the surrender of much of the Mississaugas’ hunting territory and the loss of their fishing grounds. Close contact with the whites also introduced a series of epidemics, such as smallpox, against which the indigenous people had no immunity. Recognizing that the... world of his youth was gone forever, the young Mississauga Ojibwa warrior earnestly sought to adjust to the society of the white people around him. The Mississaugas respected him, selecting their westernized tribesman in August 1805 to succeed his father as one of the band’s two chiefs. It was presumably then that he received the title Ogimauhbinaessih, although even after this date his other name continued to be used. He died on this date in 1828. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/ogimauh_binaessih_6E.html

There were more than 130 residential schools in operation between the 1870s and 1996. Was there a residential school near you? Use this interactive tool to find out: https://www.cbc.ca//inte/beyond-94-residential-school-map/ #OrangeShirtDay

Today is #OrangeShirtDay, to raise awareness and remember and honour both the survivors of residential schools and those who did not return from them. Thank you to our friends at Historica Canada for the Chanie Wenjack #HeritageMinute, available in English, French, and Anishinaabemowin, and to The Canadian Encyclopedia for their biography of Chanie Wenjack. https://www.historicacanada.ca//heritage-mi/chanie-wenjack ... English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_tcCpKtoU0 French: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYCZKMpBXqM Anishinaabemowin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DI2nAHSXlpM https://thecanadianencyclopedia.ca//article/charlie-wenjack

NEW BIO! Pierre-Jean Veniot (1863-1936) was commonly known as Peter John, and usually signed P. J.; he was a journalist, typographer, newspaper owner, political organizer, politician, and civil servant from New Brunswick. A talented orator in both English and French, and with a distinguished appearance, he was a charismatic figure. As minister of public works, Veniot launched one of the most ambitious road construction programs in the country, which led to the creation or imp...rovement of more than 1,200 miles of New Brunswick’s road network. These accomplishments earned the minister the nickname "Good Roads Veniot." In 1923 Premier Walter Edward Foster announced to his caucus that he was retiring from politics and asked that it support the candidacy of Veniot as his successor. He thus rose to the highest political position in the province, the first Acadian to do so. He later left provincial politics and became the first Acadian to sit in the federal cabinet, having been elected in the riding of Gloucester in September 1926. He served as postmaster general from 1926 to 1930 in the Liberal government of William Lyon Mackenzie King and under his direction, the country issued its first bilingual postage stamps. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/veniot_pierre_jean_16E.html Archives de Montréal

Bio of the Day: Victoria McVicar’s early life was peripatetic, as her father sought permanent employment after his retirement from the Hudson’s Bay Company in 1830. Much of her childhood was spent in tiny settlements on the edge of the Huron Tract in Upper Canada. Then in 1860 the family moved northwest to Thunder Bay. In the 1860s she had served briefly as a tutor to the children of HBC employees and, as a result, has been described as Fort William’s first teacher. But it was as a shrewd bargainer with government departments and potential buyers of real estate that Victoria became famous locally. She died on this date in 1899. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/mcvicar_victoria_12E.html

Bio of the Day: Henry How was born in England and studied at the Royal College of Chemistry. In 1854, he was appointed professor of natural history and chemistry at King’s College, Windsor, Nova Scotia. Appointed vice-president of the university in 1877; he also served as librarian and curator of the university museum. How also prepared a collection of minerals for the Paris Exposition of 1867, and this collection became the basis of the Nova Scotia Museum, founded in 1868. T...hrough his pupils and his writings, he strongly influenced science in Nova Scotia in the 19th century. He died on this date in 1879. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/how_henry_10E.html University of King's College, Halifax

Bio of the Day: Minerva Margaret Greenaway was among Canada’s first generation of pioneering women doctors. Frustrations in securing positions for women doctors in Toronto hospitals would eventually lead to the founding of Women's College Hospital.The only hospital in Canada to be staffed entirely by women and administered by a predominantly female board of governors, it served an exclusively female clientele until the 1920s. Dr Greenaway’s life was tragically cut short in th...e fall of 1906 when, after nursing her father and two sisters who had contracted typhoid, she herself succumbed to the disease in her 33rd year. The Canadian Journal of Medicine and Surgery noted that her passing "removes one of the most accomplished and beloved lady doctors of the Dominion." Read more: http://biographi.ca//b/greenaway_minerva_margaret_13E.html City of Vancouver Archives

Bio of the Day: Frank Mantle was a journalist in Winnipeg and a civil servant in Saskatchewan before he joined the Canadian army in 1915. He was 34 when he left for Europe in July 1916 and was killed on the Somme front on this date in that same year, struck down by a sniper’s bullet. The report of Mantle’s death greatly distressed many of his former colleagues in the Saskatchewan government. The minister of agriculture, William Richard Motherwell, said that "Everyone is now s...aying . . . that such indispensable men as Frank Mantle in a new land like Saskatchewan should not be permitted to enlist." Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/mantle_alfred_frank_14E.html Digital Collection at the Canadian Virtual Memorial by Veterans Affairs Canada

This is wonderful - Cheryl Foggo's documentary "John Ware: Reclaimed" premiered last night at the Calgary International Film Festival - CIFF. The film re-examines the story of Ware, the Black cowboy who settled in Alberta prior to the turn of the 20th century. https://www.cbc.ca//john-ware-documentary-black-prairie-co Our bio is here: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/ware_john_13E.html

Bio of the Day: Polly Barber was born on this date in 1803. She received a sound intellectual and practical education, which she put to good use as a teacher, farmer, and businesswoman. Already sorely tried by the deaths of several of her children, in 1847 her husband died, leaving her pregnant at the age of 44, with three other children to raise and debts to pay. She was equal to the task. The "widow Scovill," as she was called, was so successful that, according to her obituary in the Montreal Daily Star, she was known as "the most prosperous farmer of Sutton." Read more: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/barber_polly_12E.html

Bio of the Day: Uloqsaq was a Copper Inuit hunter and shaman who lived in the Coppermine district, N.W.T. (today it is Kugluktuk, Nunavut). Accused of killing two Oblate priests in 1913, Uloqsaq and another hunter, Sinnisiak, surrendered in 1916, and were tried. Found not guilty of one death and guilty of the other, they were the first two Inuit to be convicted of murder by Canadian courts. Their death sentences were immediately commuted to life imprisonment and in 1922 they ...were permitted to return to their people. Uloqsaq died on this date in 1929, one of the many Inuit who succumbed to the terrible epidemic of tuberculosis then sweeping the region. Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/uloqsaq_15E.html Glenbow Museum Archives, now held by Archives and Special Collections, University of Calgary Libraries

Bio of the Day: Though Émilie Tavernier wrote to a relative in 1822 that she felt "a strong vocation . . . for the convent" and that she would "renounce for ever the young dandies and also the [vanities of this] world; I shall become a nun some time in the autumn", in June 1823 at age 23, she married Jean-Baptiste Gamelin, a respectable Montreal bachelor of 50. Despite the difference in their ages, the marriage was a happy one, but it lasted less than five years for Gamelin d...ied in 1827; two of the couple’s three sons had died shortly after birth and the third survived his father by less than a year. Hence at the age of 27 Émilie Gamelin was alone. She began to take an interest in charitable works to assuage her grief. In 1844 she took vows as part of the newly-established Daughters of Charity, Servants of the Poor, and is considered the founder and first superior of that order - the first French Canadian founder of a religious community in Lower Canada after the conquest. She died on this date in 1851. Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/tavernier_emilie_8E.html Centre Émilie-Gamelin - Les Soeurs de la Providence

NEW BIO! Robert Menzies Mitchell (1865-1932) was born to Scottish immigrant parents in Upper Canada. After some time as a physician in Dundalk, he and his family migrated west to the District of the almost uninhabited locality of Weyburn, southeast of Moose Jaw, where he opened an office and drugstore. For a time Mitchell was the only physician in the roughly 170 miles between Moose Jaw and North Portal, a village on the American border, and the only one on the section of the... "Soo" rail line that ran between Moose Jaw and Minot, N.Dak. Mitchell encouraged people to settle permanently in the region and was very active in the community, chairing local school boards and serving twice as mayor of the town of Weyburn, which would become a city in 1913. In 1907 Mitchell retired from his medical practice and devoted his full attention to politics in the newly created province of Saskatchewan. The next year he was elected as a Liberal to the Legislative Assembly for Weyburn. He would represent the riding for 11 years, resigning after being chosen as the first superintendent of Saskatchewan’s second mental hospital. Although he was beset by legal difficulties late in his life, Robert Mitchell never tired of helping his adopted western community, and he dedicated much of his life to building up Weyburn and the surrounding region. Read more: http://www.biographi.ca///mitchell_robert_menzies_16E.html

Bio of the Day: With a background in architecture and building, Charles Barber arrived in Winnipeg in May 1876; his first known commissions in Winnipeg were the designs for Central and North Ward schools (187677), two Italianate structures, the first in Manitoba. He also conceived of the unusual design for Winnipeg’s city hall (188386) - it proved to be almost beyond architectural description. It featured a boxy mass topped by a large cupola, surrounded by four smaller towe...rs at each corner of the building. With its red brick and white stone walls and its copper roof, the city hall was an extraordinary sight. Its oddity made it a readily identifiable symbol of Winnipeg. (The "Gingerbread" building, as it was known, was demolished in the 1960s.) The city hall project also marked the downfall of Barber’s architectural firm in Winnipeg. He died in New Westminster, B.C. on this date in 1915. Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/barber_charles_arnold_14E.html Portrait - City of Winnipeg Archives

Bio of the Day: Maria Louisa Angwin was born on this date in 1849 in Newfoundland. Convinced of the need of women doctors, she taught for five years to raise the money to fund her studies at Woman’s Medical College in New York - Canadian medical schools were not then admitting female students. In 1884 she became the first woman licensed to practice medicine in Nova Scotia. She initially saw patients in both Halifax and Dartmouth, but after 1886 she had a joint residence and o...ffice in the central part of Halifax. She was an early telephone subscriber, and patients ringing her doorbell were greeted by a resident parrot announcing, "Someone wants the doctor." A contemporary remembered her as "a woman of courage ready for any emergency, versatile, afraid of nothing, answering all calls to any section of the city by day or night," armed, she herself said, with a hat-pin. She was also known for her short hair and her determined stand against alcohol and cigarettes. Read more: http://biographi.ca/en/bio/angwin_maria_louisa_12E.html