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| t:m_thomson [2024/12/15 19:56] – created sallyr | t:m_thomson [2025/12/14 20:51] (current) – sallyr |
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| Margaret L. Thomson (d. 1983) | Margaret Louise Thomson (d. 1983) |
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| Margaret Thomson was in the medical corps of the Royal Canadian Air Force. She was posted to the Whitehorse base in the early 1950s.((Photograph posted by CBC Yukon on Facebook, 8 November 2019.)) She and her husband, Alex, moved to Victoria, British Columbia before Margaret returned to the Yukon and Ross River in 1967. She worked to improve medical services, educational facilities, and recognition of the rights of Indigenous women.((“In Memoriam.” //Northern Lights,// No. 99, Advent, 1983: 20.)) | Margaret Thomson was born in the late 1920s in Fort McMurray, Alberta. She received medical assistant training from RCAF medical corps in Aylmer, Quebec in the 1950s. She was posted to Whitehorse and met her husband to be, Alex Thomson, who was a Hudson's Bay Company trader from Glasgow, Scotland. The family settled in Ross River in 1967 to run the trading post and general store. For years, Margaret worked many jobs in Ross River, including sports coach, outreach worker and post-mistress while providing the only emergency medical service in the community. She created and operated a local radio station, CHRV, and trained youth to run the station. She was a founder of the Yukon Native Hockey Tournament in 1977 and was the manager of the Ross River Renegades hockey team, sharing coaching duties with Pete Risby.((YANSI Elders Circle, //It’s our Time to Tell Our Story.// Whitehorse Aboriginal Women’s Circle, 2025: 224-25.)) |
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| In the 1960s, many prominent First Nation women including Angela Sidney, Ellen Bruce, Virginia Smarch, Pearl Keenan, and Margaret Thomson worked for improvements within their communities and protested inequality on the federal level.((Kenneth Coates, //Best Left as Indians: Native-white Relations in the Yukon Territory, 1840 -1973.// McGill-Queen’s Press, 1993: 229.)) Margaret served as the president of the Native Women’s Association of Canada. She received the Queen’s Jubilee Medal in 1977, and in 1982 was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of laws by the University of Victoria. She would have been one of twenty-four Canadians to receive the Citation of Citizenship on Canada Day 1983.((“In Memoriam.” //Northern Lights,// No. 99, Advent, 1983: 20.)) | In the 1960s, many prominent First Nation women including Angela Sidney, Ellen Bruce, Virginia Smarch, Pearl Keenan, and Margaret Thomson worked for improvements within their communities and protested inequality on the federal level.((Kenneth Coates, //Best Left as Indians: Native-white Relations in the Yukon Territory, 1840 -1973.// McGill-Queen’s Press, 1993: 229.)) Margaret served as the president of the Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC).((“In Memoriam.” //Northern Lights,// No. 99, Advent, 1983: 20.)) |
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| | Margaret was president of the Ross River YANSI Local (1974-1976), was vice-president of YIWA in 1974, and president of NWAC from 1975 to 1977. She attended the first International Women's Year conference in East Berlin in 1975. She was the chair of the NDP's National Task Force on Older Women in 1981 and was appointed a justice of the peace in that year.((YANSI Elders Circle, //It’s our Time to Tell Our Story.// Whitehorse Aboriginal Women’s Circle, 2025: 224-25.)) |
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| | Margaret Thomson received the Queen’s Jubilee Medal in 1977, and in 1982 was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of laws by the University of Victoria. She would have been one of twenty-four Canadians to receive the Citation of Citizenship on Canada Day 1983.((“In Memoriam.” //Northern Lights,// No. 99, Advent, 1983: 20.)) |
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| The Whitehorse Thomson Centre for extended care patients is named for Margaret Thomson of Ross River, Yukon. Margaret’s daughter Nancy became an announcer for CBC North.((Photograph posted by CBC Yukon on Facebook, 8 November 2019.)) | Ross River's health and social services building in Ross River and the Whitehorse Thomson Centre for extended care patients are named for Margaret Thomson. Margaret’s daughter Nancy became an announcer for CBC North.((Photograph posted by CBC Yukon on Facebook, 8 November 2019.)) |
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