Edith Rogers

Who was Edith Rogers?

Edith Rogers was a politician in Manitoba, Canada. She served in the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba from 1920 to 1932, as a member of the Manitoba Liberal Party. She was the first woman ever elected to the legislature.

Rogers, who was born Edith MacTavish, had strong family connections to Manitoba's past. Her maternal great-grandfather, Alexander Christie, served as Governor of Assiniboia on two occasions, and supervised the construction of Fort Garry. His son, William J. Christie, worked for the Hudson's Bay Company in Manitoba from 1843 to 1873, and was named Inspecting Chief Factor in 1868. Rogers herself was born in the tiny outpost of Norway House, six hundred kilometres north of Winnipeg, the daughter of Donald MacTavish, a chief factor for the Hudson's Bay Company. At age two, she moved with her family to Rupert House, on the shore of James Bay.

She was educated in Montreal. After graduation, she moved to Winnipeg and, in 1898, married the businessman Robert Arthur Rogers. She became prominent as a philanthropist in the 1910s, and particularly after the outbreak of World War I in 1914.