Parcourez la nécrologie de Anne Gwendolyn Burnett Purdy Wednesday February 28th 2024 résidant dans la province Ontario pour le détail des funérailles
Anne Gwendolyn Burnett (née Purdy) was born in Edmonton, Alberta on June 9th 1933, the only child of Horace Purdy and Grace Armstrong Purdy. For the first two years of her life, the family lived in a log house on the grounds of Jasper Park Lodge where her father worked as landscape architect and groundskeeper (a role he then assumed at the Toronto Golf Club). Her university-educated mother was a homemaker.
Anne received her education in Toronto, culminating in a Bachelor of Arts and Education degrees from Victoria College, University of Toronto while concurrently studying piano at the Royal Conservatory of Music.
Anne’s talent and passion for music led her to join the Victoria College Theatre group where she would meet her future husband, Jack Burnett, ‘a glorious…tenor soloist’ and law student. At Victoria College, she also joined the University Women’s Association (now the University Women’s Club), which launched her life-long enthusiasm for politics and women’s rights advocacy.
Anne became a primary school teacher, supporting Jack through his law degree. They married in 1957 and three children came along in quick succession between 1959 and 1962 whilst living in Niagara Falls. In 1968, the family moved to Montreal and, while Anne stayed home with the children, she was an active volunteer with severely autistic children, women’s organisations and a women’s shelter. Anne and Jack were divorced in 1984.
In 1974, Anne launched a new professional career, working first as a documentalist and then as Special Projects Officer for Federal Commerce & Navigation Ltd. (now ‘FedNav’, Canada’s largest international shipping company). Her success with FedNav made her a rare female executive in a male dominated sector, culminating as FedNav’s Public and Government Relations Liaison in Ottawa from 1996 to 1998, when she retired. While at FedNav, Anne met Michael Bell, and they remained loving partners for over 30 years, until Michael’s death in 2020.
Anne saw retirement not as an end, but a new beginning. At 65, she enthusiastically poured her accumulated business experience and pragmatism into NGOs focused on reproductive health and women’s rights, including Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada (PPFC), Planned Parenthood Ottawa and CARAL (Canadian Abortion Rights Action League). In addition to investing her own money and expertise into these organisations, she sought support from her network of business and professional women and government representatives. She tirelessly lobbied for access to RU486 (mifepristone) and made a critical contribution to its legalisation in Canada in 2015. In 1996, Anne joined the Famous Five Foundation in 1996, dedicated to ensuring women’s equality and to building a monument to “Women are Persons” on Parliament Hill. She supported the Persons Day Awards and Speakers series honouring women as nation-builders until 2022.
Throughout this time, Anne was an active supporter of the Liberal Party of Canada and the Ontario Liberal Party, especially during the campaigns in Ottawa Centre. She also supported Farm Radio International which provides educational broadcasting to rural areas in Africa, aimed at enhancing food security and programmes to help women. She was a major benefactor for the National Arts Centre including their mentorship programmes for young artists. Her love of travel took her to over 50 countries. She bestowed her three children with the same adventurism, as they now live in France, Australia and Italy.
Anne will be deeply missed by her three children: Stephen (Catherine), Marcia (Broderick) and Jill (Mario), to whom she was profoundly dedicated; by her six grandchildren: Eric, Victoria, Ryan, Amelia and William, and Pia, for whom she was loving Granny Annie; and by her baby great-grandson, Lennon whom she had the enormous joy of meeting when he travelled to Ottawa from Australia a few months before her death. She was immensely grateful to her close circle of dedicated friends in Ottawa, who, in the latter years of her life, had become part of her family.
A celebration of her life will be held later in the year. Donations in Anne’s name to Action Canada for ual Health & Rights (formerly Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada) would be greatly appreciated. www.actioncanadashr.org
Wednesday February 28th 2024
Décès pour la Ville:Ottawa, Province: Ontario
avis deces Anne Gwendolyn Burnett Purdy Wednesday February 28th 2024
nécrologie Anne Gwendolyn Burnett Purdy Wednesday February 28th 2024
Nous offrons nos plus sincères condoléances à la famille et aux amis de Anne Gwendolyn Burnett Purdy Wednesday February 28th 2024 et espérons que leur mémoire pourra être une source de réconfort pendant cette période difficile. Vos pensées et vos mots aimables sont grandement appréciés.