ON THIS DAY

October 1, 1951 - Charlotte Whitton became Canada’s first female mayor of a major city. During her time as Ottawa’s mayor, she championed women’s equality in the workplace while paradoxically opposing more liberal divorce laws and criticizing married women who worked. She also spent twenty years as founding director of the Canadian Council on Child Welfare (known today as the Canadian Council on Social Development). However, her legacy is marred by some accusations of racism - which led to her name being kept from mention on the Archives Building in Ottawa opened in 2011.