A Biography of Cairine Wilson
FIRST PERSON
Canada’s First Woman Senator
Valerie Knowles
Dundurn Press
Toronto & Oxford
1988
Copyright © Valerie Knowles, 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press Limited.
Design and Production:Andy Tong
Printing and Binding:Gagne Printing Ltd., Louiseville, Quebec, Canada
The writing of this manuscript and the publication of this book were made possible by support from several sources. The publisher wishes to acknowledge the generous assistance and ongoing support of The Canada Council, The Book Publishing Industry Development Programme of the Department of Communications and The Ontario Arts Council.
Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in the text (including the illustrations). The author and publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any reference or credit in subsequent editions.
J. Kirk Howard, Publisher
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Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Knowles, Valerie
First person: a biography of Cairine Wilson,
Canada’s first woman Senator
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
ISBN 1-55002-029-3 (bound) ISBN 1-55002-030-7 (pbk.)
1. Wilson, Cairine. 2. Canada — Politics and government — 1930-1935.* 3. Canada — Politics and government — 1935-1957.* 4. Women legislators — Canada — Biography. 5. Canada. Parliament. Senate — Biography. 6. Women philanthropists — Canada — Biography. I. Title.
FC581.W54K64 1988 328.71'092'4 C88-093810-2
F1034.W54K64 1988
Senator Cairine Wilson shown at her desk in the Senate Chamber shortly after her appointment.
A Biography of Cairine Wilson
FIRST PERSON
Canada’s First Woman Senator
Valerie Knowles
CONTENTS
Chapter 6 Chatelaine of the Manor House and Clibrig
Chapter 7 Go in Peace to Love and Serve the Lord
Chapter 8 Citizen of the World
Chapter 9 Mother of the Refugees
Chapter 10 Sir Herbert Emerson’s Representative
Chapter 11 Old and New Challenges
PREFACE
In the course of the over five years that this book has been in the making many people have given me invaluable support and encouragement. Chief among these has been my husband David who patiently instructed me in the use of a word processor, without which the whole enterprise would have been doomed, and who relieved me of many of the technical chores associated with the preparation of this manuscript. Without his assistance and encouragement I may not have persevered.
To the Honourable George Mcllraith goes the credit for encouraging me to embark on this project in the first place. He also lent me important source material, gave generously of his time in interviews and kindly provided an introduction. From his home in Princeton, New Jersey, Dr William Heckscher sent a steady stream of letters replete with useful advice, insights and encouragement. In Ottawa, the late Cairine Wilson, the Senator’s daughter and namesake, answered countless queries and located letters and documents that enabled me to plug some of the gaps in my research.
Other members of the Wilson family also furnished much appreciated assistance, notably Angus Wilson, Janet Burns and Norma Davies. A niece of Senator Wilson, Anna Cundill, frequently came to the rescue with information about the Mackay family. Because of the paucity of correspondence in the Cairine Wilson papers in the National Archives, the aid that family members furnished was invaluable.
I am extremely grateful to the many people who granted me interviews and/or supplied information and recollections by letter. I only hope that I expressed the depth of my gratitude adequately by means of footnotes in the book and thanks expressed over the phone or in letters.
I am indebted to Dr Donald Page who provided me with important material for the chapter entitled “Citizen of the World” and made valuable suggestions for its redrafting; to Dr Gerald Dirks who made a number of helpful recommendations for the rewriting of the chapters relating to Cairine Wilson’s work with refugees; to the Honourable Eugene Forsey who read various chapters with an eagle eye and made many useful comments; to Mrs Isobel Dobell who contributed useful comments for the rewriting of the chapter on the Mackays; and to my father-in-law, the Reverend Dr E. Clifford Knowles, who tracked down contacts for me and who, along with my mother-in-law, Dorothy, supplied constructive suggestions for the rewriting of some early chapters.
Helping me to find my way through the labyrinth of research were staff at