The committee to find a female face for the Canadian five dollar bill has reported. It names Viola Desmond, who fought racial discrimination in Nova Scotia, Pauline Johnson, a poet who was the daughter of a Mohawk chief and an English woman, and Elsie MacGill, the first woman in Canada to receive a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering. Also on the list is track and field athlete Bobbie Rosenfeld, who won a silver and gold medal at the 1928 Olympics and went on to become a sports columnist, and Idola Saint-Jean, a feminist and pioneer in the fight for suffrage in Quebec. All fine women no doubt but there are some who have impacted life more, like Lucy Maude Montgomery, whose literary work has entertained millions and incidentally made Canada a real place in distant lands. Or Agnes Macphail. Canadian Press
