Constance Hamilton

Constance Eaton Hamilton (1862–1945) was the first female member of Toronto City Council and the first woman in Ontario to hold elected office at either the federal, provincial, or municipal level (one year before Agnes Macphail). The elective office of public school trustee was open to Ontario widows and unmarried women who owned property from about 1884, although the first female trustees to be elected in Toronto were in 1892.

Born in Yorkshire, England in 1862 to Dr George Fowler Bodington (1829-1902) and Caroline Mary Eaton (1825-1873). She attended Conservatory of Music in Leipzig, Germany and became a pianist. Hamilton immigrated to Canada with her family in 1887 and settled in Vancouver.

Hamilton married Canadian Pacific Railway land commissioner and civil engineer Lauchlan Alexander Hamilton (1852-1941), who was also Vancouver City Alderman and designed the Coat of arms of Vancouver. In 1888 the Hamiltons' moved to Winnipeg (her husband was transferred there as senior CPR land commissioner) and then to Toronto in 1899.[1][2] During her time in Winnipeg, she was one of the six women who founded the Women's Musical Club of Winnipeg, and served as the first President when it was formally organized in 1899.[3] A supporter of women's suffrage, she became president of the Equal Franchise League of Toronto. In 1919, women obtained the right to run for elected office in Ontario. Previously married women had been barred, by law, from doing so. Hamilton ran for Toronto city council and was elected for a one-year term in 1920. She was re-elected for another one-year term in 1921.

After two terms in office she resigned so that she could continue to campaign for immigrant settlement and refugee issues, and for equal rights.

In 1979, city council established the Constance E. Hamilton Award on the Status of Women. The award is made annually chosen by the women members of city council. To qualify, a recipient must be a resident of Toronto whose actions have had a significant impact on securing equitable treatment for women in Toronto, either socially, economically or culturally.

Her husband died in 1941 and she died in 1945. They did not have any children, but Lauchlan had a daughter (Isabella) from his marriage to Isabella Hamilton (1858?-1888).[4]

References

  1. ↑ http://www.citytv.com/toronto/citynews/topic/mayoral2010/article/96692--city-hall-pioneers-a-look-back-at-two-people-who-changed-toronto-s-political-landscape
  2. ↑ http://gent-family.com/Estevan/lauchlanalexanderhamilton.html
  3. ↑ Winnipeg Free Press, 10 January 1959
  4. ↑ http://gent-family.com/Estevan/lauchlanalexanderhamilton.html
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