Mary Percy Jackson
Encyclopedia
Dr. Mary Percy Jackson, OC
, AOE
(27 December 1904—6 May 2000) was an English
medical practitioner
in the Canadian
province of Alberta
based in Keg River and the Peace River
Country for 45 years.
, England
. Many of her family, including her mother Amy Jane Percy (née Chilton) were school teachers. Despite the family tradition of teaching, at the age of eleven she decided she wanted to be a medical doctor. No-one, including Mary herself, knows why she made this choice; her father suggesting that she would have make an excellent lawyer because she argued so much. However, in 1915 women were not allowed to be lawyers.
in 1927 with degrees in surgery and medicine. She took the Queen's Prize for achieving the highest marks in her class. Over the next two years she served as a house physician at Birmingham General Hospital, casualty house physician in the children's hospital, and house surgeon in the maternity hospital.
She wanted to work in obstetrics in Calcutta, India
, a post that only came up every third year. As she graduated in "the wrong year", she had to find other work to fill in the time until she would be able to apply for the Calcutta job. A colleague drew her attention to a job advertisement in the British Medical Journal
. It was seeking a female doctor to serve in Alberta, Canada.
In reply to her request for further information from Dr. Emma Johnstone, the reply added that "The ability to ride a saddle horse would be a great advantage". Jackson had previously taken up horse riding at Sutton Coldfield Riding School in a desire for more exercise, although her family said she rarely, if ever, left the indoor arena. When she learned that Alberta had the Rocky Mountains
she was keen to go, not realising how far north she was to be stationed, or the distance to the Rockies. She originally intended her stay in Alberta to be a one-year adventure.
She travelled to Southampton
and boarded the S.S. Empress of Scotland for a week-long voyage to Québec City
, passing around Cape Race
on July 13, 1929. A further week-long railway journey took her westwards past Ottawa
and Lake Superior
across the expanse of Canada from dense forest to open prairie. Her companions for the sea voyage—also funded by the Fellowship of the Maple Leaf—were Dr. Helen O'Brien, who would serve in Lac La Biche, and Dr. Elizabeth Rodger, who was heading to work at Lesser Slave Lake
northwest of Edmonton
.
Arriving at the end of a three month drought in Central Alberta, on 21 July 1929 she was introduced to her job by the Minister of Health, the Honourable George Hoadley, at a meeting in Edmonton. Following this meeting she spent a week with the Travelling Clinic, reaching some 50 miles (80.5 km) north further north to Clyde
. Her journey concluded by train 300 miles (480 km) from Edmonton, north to Peace River Town
and along the Peace River
aboard D.A Thomas accompanied by Kate Brighty, the Superintendent of Public Health Nursing.
. The nearest medical aid was 120 km away in Peace River, connected to her territory by a dirt road which was impassible in bad weather. In these early days there were eight deliveries of post a year—one delivery per month for the summer months when the river was not frozen. There were no roads, no electricity, no telegraph lines and no services.
She was given a remote log shack in the middle of the 400 square miles (1,036 km²) area she was to serve. The property was dirty when she arrived, there were no shelves, and the only place for a patient to lie down was her own bed. She was from a family which had a maid, so she was not used to cooking, nor to such harsh circumstances as she found in Canada on her arrival. She had grown up during the First World War, when food was in short supply, with not enough available for girls to have cookery lessons with at school. Cooking at her new home was not easy and happened on a wood burning stove that needed almost continual stoking to prevent the flames from going out; for quite a time, she relied heavily on her Primus stove
. She bought a rifle in 1929 so she could hunt prairie chickens and even moose to supplement her diet. Despite the hardships, she wrote to her parents a few weeks after her arrival “I wouldn’t come back to England for a 1000 dollars just now! I know I’m doing the right job.”
The newly arrived doctor began her practice immediately. She traveled by horseback and occasionally by dogsled or cutter. Pneumonia was common in the area, but much of her work was from accidents including gunshot wounds, falls and axe wounds. There were also many childbirths, though the births that Mary attended were often "the kind that would turn you grey" — most of the men in the area expecting their wives to deliver their baby without the assistance of a doctor. A typical week's caseload might include several fractured limbs or a broken back; a birth; cases of dysentery, pneumonia, smallpox, scarlet fever or tuberculosis; as well as the other illnesses expected in a family practice; and perhaps some tooth extractions, as there were no dentists in the area. Many of the cases she saw really needed the attention of a specialist, but as she later said, “Some of the stuff I did I was out of my depth really, but I was the only one there.”
playing on the Gramophone
in temperatures of –40°. Frank, a widower, started to find excuses to travel and see her. They started courting and were married 10 March 1931 in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police
barracks at Battle River. She moved to her husband's homestead at Keg River, 100 km further north than her original assignment in Battle River. With her marriage and the move, she lost her wages, as the government decided that there wasn't a need for a doctor in Keg River, and in those days, husbands were supposed to provide for their wives. But even without the government salary, she continued practicing medicine.
in the small community were remarkably fit, but were being decimated by Tuberculosis
(TB). She managed to almost eradicate the spread of TB in the area with preventative techniques and education. This was before there were any drugs to treat TB, so one of the solutions involved stopping people with TB from spitting on the floor. Prior to her arrival the people had had little idea about germs
and how they could spread disease. Other prevalent diseases were rickets, which she treated very successfully with doses of cod liver oil, and goiter due to iodine deficiency.
Jackson completed her own laboratory work and X-rays, with equipment set up in various parts of the house. There was no way to get results back in time if she sent the samples out. She had several timers set up around the house, one for bread baking, one for the X-ray, and one for the laboratory tests. She eventually built a small outpost hospital.
The first time she used an antibiotic was after a colleague in Edmonton sent her a small vial containing crystals of penicillin
for a Christmas gift. She wondered if this new drug was as good as everyone said it was, and whether it was safe. She decided she would give some of it to the next person who was so sick that she was sure that person would die, having no more she could do for that person. This proved to be a little native girl with pneumonia, whom Jackson believed would not live through the night. She mixed the penicillin and gave a small amount to the girl her every three hours until she was better. The child markedly improved with every hour after beginning the injections of penicillin, and went home completely well. Jackson, many years later, expressed her view with certainty that the child would have died that night without penicillin.
Believing that disease prevention by a mentally and physically healthy community was the best medicine, she and her husband were instrumental in establishing the school, the hospital, the community centre, and a library, all while raising their family. She had two children of her own, and Frank had three from his previous marriage.
. It was during the Great Depression
and the government had created a work program to provide employment for the unemployed and helped to build new infrastructure. Conditions for the laboring men were grim, and their canned food supplies often frozen solid. She treated many cases of frostbite, more than she had seen in the previous six years.
The creation of the road altered life in the north significantly. Transporting patients to hospital was now possible and it became easier to get medical supplies. However, it wasn't until after World War II
that the road became passable in summer, after the frost had melted and the ground was no longer swampy. The road created work for Mary, particularly in the early days when the road was dirt. In summer, drivers would follow the dust cloud of the vehicle in front (which could last a couple of miles) as a way to find the road, but sometimes they would end up crashing into the vehicle in front.
Following her husband's death, she started doing more lectures and talks. She also visited her family in Britain several times, often taking some of her grandchildren with her. She told many stories, both from her own life and the extensive reading she undertook. She had a very down to earth attitude and spoke plainly. She said that she had no fear of being dead, commenting:
In 1955 she received a type-written letter dated 28 July 1955 from Clarence House
, on behalf of the British Queen Mother
:
CLARENCE HOUSE
S. W. 1.
28th. July 1955.
Dear Dr. Percy-Jackson,
I am commanded by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother to
write and say that Her Majesty commands me to send you a brief word
of appreciation for the truly great work that you are doing in and
around Keg River.
I am to explain that Queen Elizabeth reads the magazine
of the Fellowship of the Maple Leaf and Her Majestywas deeply impressed
to read of your great work, to alleviate suffering and to bring comfort
to those who live in such isolated and often almost intolerably
difficult surroundings.
Queen Elizabeth knows full well that such work cannot be
carried out without real courage and self-sacrifice, and I am to finish
this short letter by saying how much Her Majesty hopes that you may go
from strength to strength in your great undertaking,
Yours sincerely,
Katherine Seymour.
Order of Canada
The Order of Canada is a Canadian national order, admission into which is, within the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, the second highest honour for merit...
, AOE
Alberta Order of Excellence
The Alberta Order of Excellence is a civilian honour for merit in the Canadian province of Alberta. Instituted in 1979 when Lieutenant Governor Frank C...
(27 December 1904—6 May 2000) was an English
English people
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...
medical practitioner
Physician
A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...
in the Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
province of Alberta
Alberta
Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...
based in Keg River and the Peace River
Peace River (Canada)
The Peace River is a river in Canada that originates in the Rocky Mountains of northern British Columbia and flows to the northeast through northern Alberta. The Peace River flows into the Slave River, a tributary of the Mackenzie River. The Mackenzie is the 12th longest river in the world,...
Country for 45 years.
Background
Mary Percy Jackson was the eldest of four children. Her father, Thomas Arthur Percy, was a wool merchant and tailor in DudleyDudley
Dudley is a large town in the West Midlands county of England. At the 2001 census , the Dudley Urban Sub Area had a population of 194,919, making it the 26th largest settlement in England, the second largest town in the United Kingdom behind Reading, and the largest settlement in the UK without...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. Many of her family, including her mother Amy Jane Percy (née Chilton) were school teachers. Despite the family tradition of teaching, at the age of eleven she decided she wanted to be a medical doctor. No-one, including Mary herself, knows why she made this choice; her father suggesting that she would have make an excellent lawyer because she argued so much. However, in 1915 women were not allowed to be lawyers.
Education
She graduated from the University of BirminghamUniversity of Birmingham
The University of Birmingham is a British Redbrick university located in the city of Birmingham, England. It received its royal charter in 1900 as a successor to Birmingham Medical School and Mason Science College . Birmingham was the first Redbrick university to gain a charter and thus...
in 1927 with degrees in surgery and medicine. She took the Queen's Prize for achieving the highest marks in her class. Over the next two years she served as a house physician at Birmingham General Hospital, casualty house physician in the children's hospital, and house surgeon in the maternity hospital.
She wanted to work in obstetrics in Calcutta, India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, a post that only came up every third year. As she graduated in "the wrong year", she had to find other work to fill in the time until she would be able to apply for the Calcutta job. A colleague drew her attention to a job advertisement in the British Medical Journal
British Medical Journal
BMJ is a partially open-access peer-reviewed medical journal. Originally called the British Medical Journal, the title was officially shortened to BMJ in 1988. The journal is published by the BMJ Group, a wholly owned subsidiary of the British Medical Association...
. It was seeking a female doctor to serve in Alberta, Canada.
- February 23, 1929.
Strong energetic Medical Women with post-graduate experience in Midwifery, wanted for country work in Western Canada, under the Provincial Government Department of Health. Apply in first instance to Dr. E.M. Johnstone, c/o Fellowship of the Maple Leaf, 13, Victoria Street, London, SW1.
In reply to her request for further information from Dr. Emma Johnstone, the reply added that "The ability to ride a saddle horse would be a great advantage". Jackson had previously taken up horse riding at Sutton Coldfield Riding School in a desire for more exercise, although her family said she rarely, if ever, left the indoor arena. When she learned that Alberta had the Rocky Mountains
Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the southwestern United States...
she was keen to go, not realising how far north she was to be stationed, or the distance to the Rockies. She originally intended her stay in Alberta to be a one-year adventure.
Voyage from England
The Fellowship of the Maple Leaf organisation were to pay her passage. She travelled to stay with and meet the organisation's founder Canon P. J. Andrews and his wife, also meeting their friend Dr. Johnstone, with whom Mary had had her earlier correspondence. Johnstone gave her the advice "Whatever you do, go to the Dental Hospital a get yourself a week's practice pulling teeth!".She travelled to Southampton
Southampton
Southampton is the largest city in the county of Hampshire on the south coast of England, and is situated south-west of London and north-west of Portsmouth. Southampton is a major port and the closest city to the New Forest...
and boarded the S.S. Empress of Scotland for a week-long voyage to Québec City
Quebec City
Quebec , also Québec, Quebec City or Québec City is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec and is located within the Capitale-Nationale region. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal, which is about to the southwest...
, passing around Cape Race
Cape Race
Cape Race is a point of land located at the southeastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula on the island of Newfoundland, Canada. Its name is thought to come from the original Portuguese name for this cape, "Raso", or "bare"...
on July 13, 1929. A further week-long railway journey took her westwards past Ottawa
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital of Canada, the second largest city in the Province of Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the country. The city is located on the south bank of the Ottawa River in the eastern portion of Southern Ontario...
and Lake Superior
Lake Superior
Lake Superior is the largest of the five traditionally-demarcated Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded to the north by the Canadian province of Ontario and the U.S. state of Minnesota, and to the south by the U.S. states of Wisconsin and Michigan. It is the largest freshwater lake in the...
across the expanse of Canada from dense forest to open prairie. Her companions for the sea voyage—also funded by the Fellowship of the Maple Leaf—were Dr. Helen O'Brien, who would serve in Lac La Biche, and Dr. Elizabeth Rodger, who was heading to work at Lesser Slave Lake
Lesser Slave Lake
Lesser Slave Lake is a lake located in central Alberta, Canada, northwest of Edmonton. It is the second largest lake entirely within Alberta boundaries , covering and measuring over long and at its widest point. Lesser Slave Lake averages in depth and is at its deepest...
northwest of Edmonton
Edmonton
Edmonton is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta and is the province's second-largest city. Edmonton is located on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Capital Region, which is surrounded by the central region of the province.The city and its census...
.
Arriving at the end of a three month drought in Central Alberta, on 21 July 1929 she was introduced to her job by the Minister of Health, the Honourable George Hoadley, at a meeting in Edmonton. Following this meeting she spent a week with the Travelling Clinic, reaching some 50 miles (80.5 km) north further north to Clyde
Clyde, Alberta
Clyde is a village in northern Alberta, Canada. It is located north of Edmonton and east of Westlock, near the junction of Highway 18 and Highway 2.It was incorporated in 1914 and named after the River and Firth of Clyde in Scotland.- Demographics :...
. Her journey concluded by train 300 miles (480 km) from Edmonton, north to Peace River Town
Peace River, Alberta
Peace River is a town in northwestern Alberta, Canada, situated along the banks of the Peace River, at its confluence with the Smoky River, the Heart River and Pat's Creek. It is located northwest of Edmonton, and northeast of Grande Prairie, along Highway 2. The Peace River townsite is nearly ...
and along the Peace River
Peace River (Canada)
The Peace River is a river in Canada that originates in the Rocky Mountains of northern British Columbia and flows to the northeast through northern Alberta. The Peace River flows into the Slave River, a tributary of the Mackenzie River. The Mackenzie is the 12th longest river in the world,...
aboard D.A Thomas accompanied by Kate Brighty, the Superintendent of Public Health Nursing.
Canada
Jackson was based in Battle River PrairieBattle River-Wainwright
Battle River-Wainwright is a provincial electoral district for the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, Canada.-Boundary history:- Members of the Legislative Assembly :-2004 general election:-2004 Senate nominee election district results:...
. The nearest medical aid was 120 km away in Peace River, connected to her territory by a dirt road which was impassible in bad weather. In these early days there were eight deliveries of post a year—one delivery per month for the summer months when the river was not frozen. There were no roads, no electricity, no telegraph lines and no services.
She was given a remote log shack in the middle of the 400 square miles (1,036 km²) area she was to serve. The property was dirty when she arrived, there were no shelves, and the only place for a patient to lie down was her own bed. She was from a family which had a maid, so she was not used to cooking, nor to such harsh circumstances as she found in Canada on her arrival. She had grown up during the First World War, when food was in short supply, with not enough available for girls to have cookery lessons with at school. Cooking at her new home was not easy and happened on a wood burning stove that needed almost continual stoking to prevent the flames from going out; for quite a time, she relied heavily on her Primus stove
Primus stove
The Primus stove, the first pressurized-burner kerosene stove, was developed in 1892 by Frans Wilhelm Lindqvist, a factory mechanic in Stockholm, Sweden. The stove was based on the design of the hand-held blowtorch; Lindqvist’s patent covered the burner, which was turned upward on the stove...
. She bought a rifle in 1929 so she could hunt prairie chickens and even moose to supplement her diet. Despite the hardships, she wrote to her parents a few weeks after her arrival “I wouldn’t come back to England for a 1000 dollars just now! I know I’m doing the right job.”
The newly arrived doctor began her practice immediately. She traveled by horseback and occasionally by dogsled or cutter. Pneumonia was common in the area, but much of her work was from accidents including gunshot wounds, falls and axe wounds. There were also many childbirths, though the births that Mary attended were often "the kind that would turn you grey" — most of the men in the area expecting their wives to deliver their baby without the assistance of a doctor. A typical week's caseload might include several fractured limbs or a broken back; a birth; cases of dysentery, pneumonia, smallpox, scarlet fever or tuberculosis; as well as the other illnesses expected in a family practice; and perhaps some tooth extractions, as there were no dentists in the area. Many of the cases she saw really needed the attention of a specialist, but as she later said, “Some of the stuff I did I was out of my depth really, but I was the only one there.”
Marriage
One of her early patients was Frank Jackson, a trapper who had contracted blood poisoning in his hand. He had treated himself for a time but sought out the new doctor when the infection started to spread. She opened up the infection, bandaged the wound and left him to sleep. They soon found they had much in common, including finding that they shared love of classical music as they listened to PucciniGiacomo Puccini
Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian composer whose operas, including La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, and Turandot, are among the most frequently performed in the standard repertoire...
playing on the Gramophone
Phonograph
The phonograph record player, or gramophone is a device introduced in 1877 that has had continued common use for reproducing sound recordings, although when first developed, the phonograph was used to both record and reproduce sounds...
in temperatures of –40°. Frank, a widower, started to find excuses to travel and see her. They started courting and were married 10 March 1931 in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Royal Canadian Mounted Police
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police , literally ‘Royal Gendarmerie of Canada’; colloquially known as The Mounties, and internally as ‘The Force’) is the national police force of Canada, and one of the most recognized of its kind in the world. It is unique in the world as a national, federal,...
barracks at Battle River. She moved to her husband's homestead at Keg River, 100 km further north than her original assignment in Battle River. With her marriage and the move, she lost her wages, as the government decided that there wasn't a need for a doctor in Keg River, and in those days, husbands were supposed to provide for their wives. But even without the government salary, she continued practicing medicine.
Practice in Keg River
The Indians and MétisMétis people (Canada)
The Métis are one of the Aboriginal peoples in Canada who trace their descent to mixed First Nations parentage. The term was historically a catch-all describing the offspring of any such union, but within generations the culture syncretised into what is today a distinct aboriginal group, with...
in the small community were remarkably fit, but were being decimated by Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
(TB). She managed to almost eradicate the spread of TB in the area with preventative techniques and education. This was before there were any drugs to treat TB, so one of the solutions involved stopping people with TB from spitting on the floor. Prior to her arrival the people had had little idea about germs
Germ theory of disease
The germ theory of disease, also called the pathogenic theory of medicine, is a theory that proposes that microorganisms are the cause of many diseases...
and how they could spread disease. Other prevalent diseases were rickets, which she treated very successfully with doses of cod liver oil, and goiter due to iodine deficiency.
Jackson completed her own laboratory work and X-rays, with equipment set up in various parts of the house. There was no way to get results back in time if she sent the samples out. She had several timers set up around the house, one for bread baking, one for the X-ray, and one for the laboratory tests. She eventually built a small outpost hospital.
The first time she used an antibiotic was after a colleague in Edmonton sent her a small vial containing crystals of penicillin
Penicillin
Penicillin is a group of antibiotics derived from Penicillium fungi. They include penicillin G, procaine penicillin, benzathine penicillin, and penicillin V....
for a Christmas gift. She wondered if this new drug was as good as everyone said it was, and whether it was safe. She decided she would give some of it to the next person who was so sick that she was sure that person would die, having no more she could do for that person. This proved to be a little native girl with pneumonia, whom Jackson believed would not live through the night. She mixed the penicillin and gave a small amount to the girl her every three hours until she was better. The child markedly improved with every hour after beginning the injections of penicillin, and went home completely well. Jackson, many years later, expressed her view with certainty that the child would have died that night without penicillin.
Believing that disease prevention by a mentally and physically healthy community was the best medicine, she and her husband were instrumental in establishing the school, the hospital, the community centre, and a library, all while raising their family. She had two children of her own, and Frank had three from his previous marriage.
Arrival of the road
In 1935 work started to create the road that is now the Mackenzie HighwayMackenzie Highway
The Mackenzie Highway is a Canadian highway in northern Alberta and the Northwest Territories. It begins as Alberta Highway 2 at Mile Zero in Grimshaw, Alberta...
. It was during the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
and the government had created a work program to provide employment for the unemployed and helped to build new infrastructure. Conditions for the laboring men were grim, and their canned food supplies often frozen solid. She treated many cases of frostbite, more than she had seen in the previous six years.
The creation of the road altered life in the north significantly. Transporting patients to hospital was now possible and it became easier to get medical supplies. However, it wasn't until after World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
that the road became passable in summer, after the frost had melted and the ground was no longer swampy. The road created work for Mary, particularly in the early days when the road was dirt. In summer, drivers would follow the dust cloud of the vehicle in front (which could last a couple of miles) as a way to find the road, but sometimes they would end up crashing into the vehicle in front.
Later life
She retired from active practice in 1975. She and Frank then enjoyed various holidays, away from the harsh North of Canada. Frank Jackson died on September 1, 1979.Following her husband's death, she started doing more lectures and talks. She also visited her family in Britain several times, often taking some of her grandchildren with her. She told many stories, both from her own life and the extensive reading she undertook. She had a very down to earth attitude and spoke plainly. She said that she had no fear of being dead, commenting:
- "It's not being dead that one is afraid of, but a process of dying after a stroke or a heard attack. When you've almost got one foot in heaven, it's a bit annoying to be brought back so you can do the whole thing again slowly. Doctors say they don't want to play God, but if a person has died suddenly and then is brought back to life, that is playing God."
Recognition
- 1953, Master Farm Family of Alberta award for proficiency (awarded to only five farming families in total).
- 1963, Dr Mary Jackson School named after her and serving grades K-12 in Keg River, Alberta.
- 1967, Centennial Medal of CanadaCanadian Centennial MedalThe Canadian Centennial Medal is a commemorative medal struck by the Royal Canadian Mint in 1967 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Canadian Confederation and was awarded to Canadians who were recommended by governments and professional, educational and cultural associations, as well as...
"in recognition of valuable service to the nation". - 1975, Alberta Achievement Award, together with her husband, Frank Jackson "in recognition of outstanding service in the community".
- 1975, Woman of the Year by the Voice of Native Women.
- 1976, HonoraryHonorary degreeAn honorary degree or a degree honoris causa is an academic degree for which a university has waived the usual requirements, such as matriculation, residence, study, and the passing of examinations...
Doctor of Laws degree from the University of AlbertaUniversity of AlbertaThe University of Alberta is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford, the first premier of Alberta and Henry Marshall Tory, its first president, it is widely recognized as one of the best universities in Canada...
. - 1983, Alberta Order of ExcellenceAlberta Order of ExcellenceThe Alberta Order of Excellence is a civilian honour for merit in the Canadian province of Alberta. Instituted in 1979 when Lieutenant Governor Frank C...
. - 1989, Officer in the Order of CanadaOrder of CanadaThe Order of Canada is a Canadian national order, admission into which is, within the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, the second highest honour for merit...
.
In 1955 she received a type-written letter dated 28 July 1955 from Clarence House
Clarence House
Clarence House is a royal home in London, situated on The Mall, in the City of Westminster. It is attached to St. James's Palace and shares the palace's garden. For nearly 50 years, from 1953 to 2002, it was home to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, but is since then the official residence of The...
, on behalf of the British Queen Mother
Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon
Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon was the queen consort of King George VI from 1936 until her husband's death in 1952, after which she was known as Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, to avoid confusion with her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II...
:
CLARENCE HOUSE
S. W. 1.
28th. July 1955.
Dear Dr. Percy-Jackson,
I am commanded by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother to
write and say that Her Majesty commands me to send you a brief word
of appreciation for the truly great work that you are doing in and
around Keg River.
I am to explain that Queen Elizabeth reads the magazine
of the Fellowship of the Maple Leaf and Her Majestywas deeply impressed
to read of your great work, to alleviate suffering and to bring comfort
to those who live in such isolated and often almost intolerably
difficult surroundings.
Queen Elizabeth knows full well that such work cannot be
carried out without real courage and self-sacrifice, and I am to finish
this short letter by saying how much Her Majesty hopes that you may go
from strength to strength in your great undertaking,
Yours sincerely,
Katherine Seymour.
External links
- Official Web Site of Dr. Mary Percy Jackson, including history of Frank Jackson.