Nellie McClung: Voice for the Voiceless

Patricia Morley is professor emerita of English and Canadian Studies at
Concordia University. She is the author of several books, including The
Mountain Is Moving: Japanese Women’s Lives, Kurlek and Margaret
Laurence: The Long Journey Home.

Nellie was born in 1873 on a stony farm in Grey County, Ontario, to
Letitia and John Mooney. She was their sixth and last child. The story
begins with five-year-old Nellie fuming that boys get the adventures and
girls get the work. There was no shortage of work on the family’s
farm, yet Nellie would later write that being brought up in the country
was one of her happiest experiences, since country people “have time
to tidy up their minds, classify their emotions, and generally get their
souls in shape.” Given the hard life of pioneer farmers in the late
19th century, this reflection is surprising. Nellie’s mother and
sisters made candles, churned butter and cheese, spun and dyed wool,
knitted or sewed garments, and washed the laundry, a daylong chore over
a huge fire. When pigs were slaughtered, Nellie and her sister Lizzie
would leave the house to picnic in the woods, but the piercing cries of
the animals reached their ears. When Nellie was six, the family moved to
a new homestead near Brandon, Manitoba, but life there was even harsher
than in northern Ontario. Her older sister fell ill in mid-winter and
nearly died. The arrival of a Methodist minister with medicine and the
skill to administer it restored her faith in God.

Nellie was a contemplative child, MacPherson writes, quick to analyze
and justify the pain and pleasures of life. Indeed, she rejoiced in work
as the remedy for sadness and loss. By the age of 16, Nellie had her
second-class teaching certificate and a teaching position in a one-room
school near Manitou. During recess, she would play rough games of
football and still manage to maintain discipline in the schoolroom.

In 1891, Nellie began to support the temperance movement. Her role
model was the Methodist minister’s wife Mrs. J.A. McClung, an advocate
for women’s right to vote. Nellie kept journals and dreamed of
becoming an author. She was also eager to work for social change. That
determination would make it possible for her to achieve both goals, as
well as to marry Wes, Mrs. McClung’s oldest son. The couple moved to
Winnipeg. Babies followed in quick succession, and the couple soon had
three children under four.

In Winnipeg, becoming involved with the Woman’s Christian Temperance
Union (WCTU) saved Nellie from drowning in motherhood. She was soon
speaking for the cause and feeling the “heady power” of public
speaking and applause. Her plain speaking reminded people that
femininity could be combined with politics; women needed the vote in
order to bring about new laws and social change. Her first novel, Sowing
Seeds in Danny (1908), became a best seller.

In 1932, Wes was offered a transfer to Victoria, and the change of air
and scene proved good for both. Nellie, 59, became a keen gardener while
remaining a passionate speaker and an advocate for the ordination of
women in the newly formed United Church. Mackenzie King asked her to sit
on the CBC’s Board of Governors. She died in 1951, just before her
78th birthday. One elegy aptly called her “a sort of unofficial Number
One woman of Canada.” Well researched and well written, this biography
of Nellie McClung is highly recommended.