Born: September 18, 1923
Died: April 28, 2007 Place of Birth: Kirkcaldy, Scotland
Major Notes:
Bertha Wilson was the first woman to be appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada.
Wilson came from an above average Scottish family; her father being a commercial traveller in stationary.
The headmaster at her public school felt Wilson would not qualify for university and would not permit her to write the necessary three entrance exams to go on.
Wilson's mother instead had her write five entrance exams provided by the university itself and she passed all five.
She attended and received her Master of Arts degree from the University of Aberdeen in 1944.
After university she completed work for a Teacher's Diploma and then married Reverend John Wilson, a young minister who became very well liked in his chosen field.
In 1949, the couple decided to emigrate to Ottawa, Canada, where a church was very much in need of a new minister.
During the time of the Korean War, her husband became a chaplain for the Canadian Navy, and later became stationed in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Bertha Wilson moved to Halifax and received entrance to Dalhousie University where, in 1957, she qualified for a Law degree.
After practising law in Nova Scotia, in 1959 Wilson moved to Toronto and worked for the law firm Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt, where she enhanced her research skills.
Wilson was appointed as the first woman judge for the Ontario Court of Appeal in 1975.
Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, in 1982, decided to appoint Wilson as the first woman judge to the Supreme Court of Canada.
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms was shortly enacted after her appointment and Wilson was prominent in several major legal decisions.
She supported a woman's constitutional right to have an abortion in the case of Dr. Henry Morgentaler.
Following her retirement from the court in 1991, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney appointed Wilson to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples.
Bertha Wilson was a women's rights advocate and in 1992 was honoured by being made a Companion of the Order of Canada.
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