Laura Elizabeth McCully

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Laura Elizabeth McCully

Laura Elizabeth McCully (17 March 1886 – 7 July 1924) was a first-wave Canadian feminist and a poet, living in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Early life

McCully was one of Dr. Samuel Edward McCully and Helen Fitzgibbon's three surviving children, and a great-niece of

Father of Confederation.[1]

As a child, she was a regular poetry and correspondence contributor to the

Toronto Daily Mail and Empire section "Children's corner", and in 1899, she was profiled in Harper's Bazaar.[1] She published two volumes of poetry later in life, Mary Magdalene, and other poems (Toronto, 1914)[2] and Bird of dawn, and other lyrics (1919).[1][3]

Education

An early female university student, McCully received a BA in 1907 from the

World noted was "rarely accorded a woman". She returned home in 1910, without completing the studies.[1] Upon return, she worked for The Sunday World.[5]

Suffrage

McCully's commitment to women's suffrage and feminism developed as an undergraduate. An active member of the Canadian Women's Suffrage Association, her writings included an article in Maclean's in 1912, stating "no human being is complete without the legal status of a citizen."[1][6]

During the

First World War, while many advocated for women to have a role in the war, she looked further, wanting to give women the right to bear arms or at least serve in an auxiliary force. As such, she joined the widely derided Women's Home Guard in 1915, defending the movement in Maclean's the next year.[1][7] On their first day at Toronto City Hall, McCully said that the club had around 700 recruits.[8] That, despite resigning as the organization's treasurer a year prior, suggesting "Kaiserlike methods" of Miss McNab, the group's president, and in turn being accused of herself wanting "to be like the Kaiser." McNab claimed herself the organization's chief funder to that point, and given the group's infancy, didn't want to "submit to the dictates of the Treasurer."[9] She was employed in munitions work.[5]

Illness

Her public life took a hit in 1916 with a

Pauline Johnson."[5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Sperdakos, Sophia. "McCully, Laura Elizabeth". Dictionary of Canadian Biography. Toronto ON/Laval QC: University of Toronto/Université Laval. Retrieved 1 August 2017.
  2. ^ "Books of the Day: A fine book of verse". The Globe. Toronto ON. 21 April 1914. p. 6.
  3. ^ ""Bird of Dawn" (advertisement)". The Globe. 20 December 1919. p. 15.
  4. ^ "At Osgoode Hall: Mrs. Helen E. McCully sues husband for alimony". The Globe. 28 July 1909. p. 7.
  5. ^ a b c d e f "Gifted young poet is called by death". The Globe. 10 July 1924. p. 12.
  6. ^ McCully, Laura Elizabeth (January 1912). "What women want". Maclean's.
  7. ^ McCully, Laura Elizabeth (April 1916). "The woman soldier: a by-product of the war". Maclean's.
  8. ^ "Recruiting Women for the Home Guard". The Globe. Toronto ON. 28 August 1915. p. 10.
  9. ^ "Women's Home Guard has healthy schism". The Globe. 31 August 1915. p. 7.
  10. ^ "News of the Day". The Globe. 23 June 1917. p. 1. Miss Laura McCully of Kenilworth avenue, a patient at the Reception Hospital, tried to end her life by cutting her throat with a piece of broken bottle.
  11. ^ "A Bystander at the Office Window". The Globe. 10 July 1924. p. 4.

Further reading

  • "'For the joy of the working': Laura Elizabeth McCully, first-wave feminist," Ontario History, 84 (1992): 283–314.
  • Archives of Ontario, Fonds 719, Laura Elizabeth McCully family fonds
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