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authority records
Bell, Vera
Person · 1933-2020

Vera Bell (neé Lyon) was born December 2, 1933 in Clinton, Ontario.  She took her nursing training at Victoria Hospital in London Ontario, graduating as an RN in the class of 1955. She arrived in Hazelton, B.C. in early 1956, serving for five years at Wrinch Memorial Hospital.  In 1961, she moved to Queen Charlotte City, where she served as matron of the hospital for two years. She received midwifery training in Edmonton in 1963.  She attended Covenant College (Toronto) in 1963-1964 before being posted to Portugal and Kenya.  In 1971, she completed her Bachelor of Nursing at McGill University in Montreal, before marrying Alfred Bell, former auditor for United Church of Canada Hospitals.  She was a She was a vital member of First United Church (Prince Rupert, B.C.) and Brechin United Church (Nanaimo, B.C.) Vera died November 14, 2020 in Nanaimo, B.C. 

Gibson, Barbara
University of British Columbia Archives · Person · [fl. 1966-1976]

Barbara Gibson was a faculty member of the University of British Columbia's School of Librarianship (later the School of Library, Archival and Information Studies, now the iSchool). She was also a UBC graduate of the Class of '35 and left in 1936 to pursue a nursing career.

In 1966 and 1967, Woodward Library acquired the Sister Mary Gonzaga letters, which came together with Florence Nightingale letters from Goodspeed Dealers in Boston. These letters were later transferred to Rare Books and Special Collections in 2013. At the time of the acquisition, Gibson became interested in Sister Mary Gonzaga's life, a Canadian nurse born in 1825 who spent most of her life in Britain. During the following years, Gibson compiled research materials from various other sources, mostly from the United Kingdom, to write a Sister Mary Gonzaga biography.

Herald Family Fonds
MS 140 · Family · 1882-1949

Dr. Dundas Herald, son of Rev. James Herald, was born at Dundas, Ontario in 1870 and was awarded his medical degree at Queen’s University in 1891. Dundas and his brother Wilson registered with the BC College of Physicians within the year. Both brothers practiced in Vancouver before Wilson moved to Ashcroft, BC and Dundas moved to Quesnelle Forks in the Cariboo. After 1901 the brothers established a cattle ranch at Medicine Hat, Alberta.

In 1905 Dundas married Edith Phyllis Grant and their children Jessie Edith (1905 ) and James Barclay [Buster] (1907) were born in Medicine Hat. A third child, Arthur Dundas, was born in Salmon Arm in 1909.

Edith Phyllis Grant was born October 18, 1875 to Joseph and Anne Grant (nee Schroder) at Corona, Ontario. Her family moved to Walsh, Alberta in 1900 to ranch.

In 1906 the Heralds purchased “Bonny Bray” a 160-acre farm and home from John Reinecker near Sunnybrae and moved to the Shuswap. Dundas Herald never practiced medicine in the Shuswap.

The Heralds lived in isolation. Children Buster, Arthur, and Jessie were educated by their father at home and without the guidance of a school curriculum.

The family raised Jersey cows and took their milk across the lake every two or three days. They also made butter for sale – 70 to 80 pounds a week. Power for churning the cream into butter was provided by a water wheel. The Herald family picked and shipped cherries and raspberries for a few years, but gave that up and concentrated their efforts growing hay.

Dundas Herald died in 1951 and was survived by his wife and children. Their Sunnybrae property was sold to the provincial government and became a park in 1975.

Herald, Dr. Dundas
MS 140 · Person · 1870-1951

Dr. Dundas Herald, son of Rev. James Herald, was born at Dundas, Ontario in 1870 and was awarded his medical degree at Queen’s University in 1891. Dundas and his brother Wilson registered with the BC College of Physicians within the year. Both brothers practiced in Vancouver before Wilson moved to Ashcroft, BC and Dundas moved to Quesnelle Forks in the Cariboo. After 1901 the brothers established a cattle ranch at Medicine Hat, Alberta.

In 1905 Dundas married Edith Phyllis Grant and their children Jessie Edith (1905 ) and James Barclay [Buster] (1907) were born in Medicine Hat. A third child, Arthur Dundas, was born in Salmon Arm in 1909.

Edith Phyllis Grant was born October 18, 1875 to Joseph and Anne Grant (nee Schroder) at Corona, Ontario. Her family moved to Walsh, Alberta in 1900 to ranch.

In 1906 the Heralds purchased “Bonny Bray” a 160-acre farm and home from John Reinecker near Sunnybrae and moved to the Shuswap. Dundas Herald never practiced medicine in the Shuswap.

The Heralds lived in isolation. Children Buster, Arthur, and Jessie were educated by their father at home and without the guidance of a school curriculum.

The family raised Jersey cows and took their milk across the lake every two or three days. They also made butter for sale – 70 to 80 pounds a week. Power for churning the cream into butter was provided by a water wheel. The Herald family picked and shipped cherries and raspberries for a few years, but gave that up and concentrated their efforts growing hay.

Dundas Herald died in 1951 and was survived by his wife and children. Their Sunnybrae property was sold to the provincial government and became a park in 1975.

Kahn, Sharon E.
Person · 1946-

Sharon Elaine Kahn was born in Kansas City, Missouri, USA in 1946. She received postsecondary degrees from Washington University, St. Louis (BA English Literature 1968), Boston University (Med Counselling and Guidance 1969), and Arizona State University (PhD Counselling Psychology 1975). In 1975, Kahn accepted a faculty position in the Department of Counselling Psychology at the University of British Columbia, where she earned tenure and was promoted to full professor. Kahn concentrated her research on counselling theory, gender-fair practices, and women’s career issues. Her scholarly activities included two edited books, seven book chapters, more than twenty-five refereed articles, as well as numerous conference presentations and research reports.
In 1989, Kahn became UBC’s first Director of Employment Equity, and in 1994, she was appointed UBC’s first Associate Vice President, Equity, responsible for administering the University’s employment and educational equity programs and for its handling complaints of discrimination and harassment. Under her direction, UBC received two Certificates of Merit from the federal government for special achievement in implementing an employment equity work plan and maintaining a representative workforce. In 1997, Human Resources Development Canada awarded the University its Vision Award for the excellence of its employment equity program. In 2006, Kahn became UBC’s first Academic Leadership Coach, a position that supports the University’s senior leadership. Kahn retired from UBC in 2013.
In 1986, Kahn married Thomas Edgar Blom, a professor of English literature at the University of British Columbia. Professor Blom died in 2003. In 2015, Kahn married Barrie James MacFadden, a retired Vancouver elementary school teacher.

Mater Misercordiae Hospital
Corporate body · 1896-[ca. 2000]

The Mater Misericordiae Hospital was founded in 1896 by the Order of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Newark and is one of the oldest hospitals in the B.C. Interior. The Hospital Auxiliary was organized in 1938. In 1939, the present structure was added and the old wing subsequently removed. On 2 July 1969, the Hospital changed ownership from the Sisters to the Rossland Hospital Society. The Hospital has been an accredited facility since 1972. Founded on a tradition of caring and sharing, efforts are directed towards maintaining that tradition.

McEwen, Margaret
MS 137 · Person · 1922-1981

Margaret Ivy McEwen was born July 11, 1922 to George and Daisy McEwen and raised on a small farm in Grindrod, B.C. Her parents had two more children, Donald and Duncan. When Margaret was six years old, her mother, Daisy, was pregnant with a fourth child and suddenly died. Margaret’s bother Donald McEwen wrote about the tragedy.

“Dad had a job rafting cedar poles from Enderby to Mara for the piling for the bridge. He wasn’t able to get home until late. Mom went to get the cows pasturing...... She had difficulty with them, and tripped in a gopher hole and fell. She was expecting another child, had complications and passed away.” (Oct. 21, 1928)

“In May of 1929 our Aunt Ivy came from [Hampstead, London] England to look after the family. They were married within six months.”

George and Ivy married on August 19, 1929 in Vernon, B.C. and by all accounts Ivy was a loving mother to the three children. Ivy passed away in 1948 and George passed away in 1972.

Margaret attended the school of nursing at Royal Jubilee Hospital in Victoria in 1942 and graduated in 1944. She found work at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton, but took a six month leave to nurse her stepmother who was failing. At that time Margaret met Robert (Bob) Douglas Jackson from the Mt. Ida District, Salmon Arm, and the couple were married May 18, 1948. The Jacksons had five children: Barbara, Margaret Elizabeth (Betty), Douglas Ian, and twins Garth and Gordon. All the children were born at the Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops. Gordon and Garth were premature and Gordon passed away at the age of one month.

While raising her family and working on the farm, Margaret continued to nurse, initially providing homecare to people who needed help. Soon she was asked to come in to work in the hospital when extra help was needed. This became a full time job that she enjoyed. Margaret Jackson died February 26, 2011. Robert (Bob) died December 18, 1990.

Corporate body · 1891-1925

The first branch in B.C. of the Methodist Woman's Missionary Society was organized at the old Pandora Avenue Church in Victoria in 1888. It soon became the auxiliary of Metropolitan Church, and its original purpose was to help in the setting up of a "rescue home" for Chinese women and girls who had been forced into prostitution. Other local auxiliaries soon appeared throughout the province, and in 1891 they were unified through the establishment of the B.C. Conference Branch of the W.M.S. In 1904, District branches were created for Victoria, Vancouver, Westminster and Kamloops. Besides the rescue home in Victoria, the Methodist W.M.S. in B.C. supported Residential Schools such as the Crosby Girls' Home in Port Simpson (Lax Kw'alaams), the Coqualeetza Institute in Chilliwack, the Elizabeth Long Memorial Home in Kitamaat (Haisla); the Turner Institute in Vancouver; and Methodist hospitals at Port Simpson, Bella Bella and Hazelton.

Norris, John MacKenzie
Person · 1925-2010

John MacKenzie Norris (1925-2010) was born on March 3, 1925 in Kelowna, B.C. to Jean Mary Norris (née) Denovan and Thomas Grantham Norris. At the time of his birth, his father, T.G. Norris, was practicing as a lawyer in Kelowna and subsequently served as a judge on both the British Columbia Supreme Court and the British Columbia Court of Appeal. John Norris had an older sister and a younger brother, attended elementary schools in Kelowna and Vancouver, and graduated from Lord Byng Secondary School in Vancouver. He enlisted with the Royal Navy in 1943 and, after returning, attended UBC from 1946-1949 where he obtained both a Bachelor of Arts Degree (1948) and a Master of Arts Degree (1949). At UBC he met Barbara Violet Casey whom he married in 1947. They had one son, Thomas Norris. John Norris pursued additional graduate work at Northwestern University, obtaining his Ph.D. in 1955, and post-graduate studies at the London School of Economics.
In 1953, John Norris began teaching as an instructor within the Department of History at the University of British Columbia and in 1964 became a Professor of the Department of History. He published five books and numerous articles in the areas of administrative, economic and demographic history. During the 1970s, he began to change his academic focus towards the history of medicine and over the next few decades he specialized in the study of the history of various diseases, including plague, cholera, and scurvy.
In 1980, John Norris was appointed Professor and Director of the Division of the History of Medicine and Science at UBC. He continued to serve in this role until his retirement early in 1990 when he was extended the title of Professor Emeritus in the History of Medicine. He continued to teach on a part-time basis until at least 2004.
Norris served on many boards and committees, including acting as the Chair of the Osler Medal Committee of the American Association for the History of Medicine (1978-1979); as Chair of the Programme Committee of the Canadian Society for the History of Medicine (1983); and as the Chair of the Grants Committee of the Hannah Institute for the History of Medicine (1980). At UBC, he served in such capacities as Chairman, University Curriculum Committee, UBC (1968-1974); as a Member of the University Senate (1964-1974); and as Chairman of the University Grievance Committee (1968-1969). He held an American Council of Learned Societies Graduate Fellowship, 1951-3, a Nuffield Commonwealth Fellowship, 1961-1962, a Canada Council Senior Fellowship, 1967-1968; and a Killam Senior Research Scholarship, from 1975-1976.
John Norris was an active member in politics, first in the C.C.F., and subsequently of the N.D.P. In 1963, he unsuccessfully ran to be N.D.P. representative for Vancouver Centre during the British Columbia Provincial election.
John Norris died on May 2, 2010. At the time of his death, he was working on a history of cholera.

Corporate body · 1903-1925

The Presbyterian Woman's Missionary Society, nationally organized with a few auxiliaries in B.C., was originally concerned with foreign missions. Both native Indian and Chinese work in B.C. (as they were known at the time) were included as foreign. As an outgrowth of the committee, which supported the Atlin Hospital, a new organization emerged in 1903: the Woman's Home Missionary Society. In 1914, the two societies were united nationally as the Woman's Missionary Society and a provincial synod branch was organized. In addition to its support for the Atlin Hospital and a hospital at Telegraph Creek, it took special interest in the Loggers' Mission. Support was also give to Indian Residential and Day Schools at Alberni, Ahousaht, and Ucluelet. After church union in 1925, the society was merged into the Woman's Missionary Society of the United Church of Canada.

Splane, Richard B.
Person · 1916-2015

Richard Beverly Splane was born in 1916 in Calgary, Alberta. During the Great Depression Richard worked in construction camps with Frontier College in Alberta and then taught in a one-room school for two years. Following this he went on to earn a B.A. in economics and history from McMaster University (1944) and M.A. (1945), M.S.W. (1951) and D.S.W. (1961) from the University of Toronto. He served in the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War, afterwards staying in London to complete a certificate in Social Science and Administration from the London School of Economics. He returned to Canada with his wife, Marion, to continue his education at the University of Toronto after which he worked for the federal government in various important positions in the Department of National Health and Welfare including: Economist, Research Division; Executive Assistant to the Deputy Minister of National Welfare; Director, Unemployment Assistance; Director General, Welfare Assistance and Services; Assistant Deputy Minister, Social Allowances and Services. In addition to his significant contributions to the development of the social welfare system in Canada, Splane was also very interested in international welfare issues. He served as Canada's representative on the UNICEF Board and was a member of the United Nations' Expert Group on Social Welfare Policy and Planning. In 1973 he became a professor in the School of Social Work at the University of British Columbia and served as acting director of the School 1980/81. He retired from UBC in 1982. Before and after his retirement he served on the boards of many organizations such as the International Council on Social Welfare, the International Association of Schools of Social Work, the World Federalists, and the Vancouver Branch of the the United Nations Association of Canada. He held many honours and awards – he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and was awarded honorary degrees from Wilfred Laurier University, McMaster University, the University of Toronto, and UBC. He died in November 2015.
Verna and Richard were married in 1971 following the death of Richard’s first wife Marion. After their move to Vancouver they were active members of the University Hill congregation of the United Church of Canada, and together undertook a study on Chief Nursing Officer positions around the Globe, which resulted in the 1994 publication Chief Nursing Officers in National Ministries of Health: Focal Points for Nursing Leadership. In 1996 they were awarded UBC’s first ever-joint honorary degree.

Splane, Verna Huffman
Person · 1914-2015

Verna Huffman Splane was born in 1914 in Peterborough, Ontario. She became a nurse after high school. In 1939 received a diploma in Public Health from the University of Toronto School of Nursing, and worked from the Victorian Order of Nurses until she entered Columbia University where she graduated with a Bachelor in Science in 1957 and then went on to earn a master’s degree in public health from the University of Michigan. After she graduated she worked for the World Health Organization as a nurse advisory in the health ministries of Guyana, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, and the Windward and Leeward Islands. Upon her return to Canada she joined the federal Department of National Health and Welfare as a public health nursing consultant from 1963-1966, though she returned to the WHO to work on a national health planning project in Libya in 1966. In 1967 she once again returned to Canada, becoming Canada’s first Chief Nursing Officer, a position that she held until 1972. After her marriage to Richard Splane in 1971 the couple moved to Vancouver in 1973 where Verna joined the UBC School of Nursing from 1975 to 1984, and in 1985 she joined the University of Victoria School of Nursing faculty until 1991. She was made an Officer of the Order of Canada, and was granted the Queen’s Silver and Golden Jubilee medals (1977 and 2002). She held several honorary degrees and won awards such as the Jeanne Mance Award and the Lillian Carter Centre for International Nursing Award from Emory University. She died in January 2015.
Verna and Richard were married in 1971 following the death of Richard’s first wife Marion. After their move to Vancouver they were active members of the University Hill congregation of the United Church of Canada, and together undertook a study on Chief Nursing Officer positions around the Globe, which resulted in the 1994 publication Chief Nursing Officers in National Ministries of Health: Focal Points for Nursing Leadership. In 1996 they were awarded UBC’s first ever-joint honorary degree.

Thornton, James E.
Person · 1927-

James E. Thornton (b. 1927) received his MA (1967) and PhD (1972) in Adult Education from the University of Michigan. From 1969 until his retirement in 1992, Thornton taught in the Department of Administrative, Adult and Higher Education at the University of British Columbia. His research interests concern the impact of educational, social and economic programs on the development and well-being of the older adult. Current research interests are education for the third age: second careers, retirement, leisure activity, aging in the workforce, and life-span learning and education. At UBC Thornton introduced graduate course in educational gerontology and on aging themes. From 1980 to 1990, he served as co-ordinator for the Faculty of Graduate Studies Committee on Gerontology. The Committee encouraged teaching and research programs in faculties, schools and departments.