Margaret Dorothea Marsh, nee Heakes

Margaret Heakes married Reverend Henry Marsh in 1934. She was twenty-two and he was thirty-six. She was singing in the choir at St. Paul’s Church in Toronto when they met. Reverend and Mrs Marsh lived in the Yukon from 1962 to 1967. In 1962, she created a game, “Cars and Clergy” based on Snakes and Ladders, to help raise funds for a debt-ridden Yukon Diocese. In the Yukon she convinced a friend to make hats for the wives of Yukon clergy and they were able to choose their hat at Margaret’s Mad Hatter Tea Party.1)

In 1963, Margaret was involved with the first International Drama Festival for Yukon and Alaska. She arranged a coffee party for casts and committees, helped with the art show and arranged a display of Her Old Crow handicrafts.2) She taught at the Skookum Jim Hall in Whitehorse and spent time in the Carcross area with the children at Chooutla School. Margaret wrote articles called “Yukon Nuggets from Margaret Marsh” for local newspapers. Her collection of slides show Carcross and the Chooutla School in the years leading up to its closure.3)

Mrs. Marsh was the founder of the Women’s Church year and was president for five years of the W.A. for the Diocese of the Yukon.4)

1)
Emily-Jane Hills Oxford, Letters from Inside: The Notes and Nuggets of Margaret Marsh. Baico Publishing Consultants Inc., 2006: iii, 3, v.
2)
Emily-Jane Hills Oxford, Letters from Inside: The Notes and Nuggets of Margaret Marsh. Baico Publishing Consultants Inc., 2006: 26.
3)
Yukon Archives, March Marsh biographical sketch, Margaret Marsh fonds.
4)
“Yukon Bishop Consecrated Sunday.” Newspaper article – [1962] no reference information.