"Anne Francis" by Florence Bird, a trip into the past.

 In connection with my work-in-progress, I am reading the 19973 autobiography of Florence Bayard Rhein Bird, better known as Anne Frances, the name she used in her broadcasting and writing career.   Florence Bird headed the Canadian Royal Commission on the Status of Women, created in 1967, when I was just a mere girl, and given the mandate to inquire into and report on the status of women in Canada and to  recommend what steps might be taken by the federal government to ensure equal opportunities for women in all aspects of Canadian Society.

Researching for my 2023 novel, A Striking Woman,  I found that when the commission reported,  one of its recommendations was that an advisory council to the federal government be established.  My central character says in that novel, "What we need is  not a council responsible to the federal government, but a federal government responsible to Canadian women,"  and as a result of the more radical women who attended an initial conference, the National Action Committee on the Status of Women was formed, which lasted and did good work  until it was done away with by the regime of Prime Minister Mulroney.

In reading up on the formation of the NAC, it seemed to me that Mrs. Bird was aligned with convention and preferred a top down approach rather than a grassroots up approach when it came to women's issues. 

The Florence I discovered in "Anne Francis" was young, unconventional and very much part of the action and passion of her times , who took a long time to find a successful career. She and  her husband, a journalist,  lived in Montreal in during the 1930s until he got a good job offer in Winnipeg that he couldn't refuse. While in Montreal the Birds were part of a circle of young intellectuals and creative  people who were appalled by the suffering going on in the Great Depression and  tried to give material help to the needy while discussing ways and means to make society more fair and egalitarian.  This autobiography has been useful to me in getting a sense of her life and times for my current, budding novel.