Canada is home to a number of trailblazers, and Black women have never been the exception.
That’s why the country is steadfast in honouring those who have made a mark on our history and refused to take no for an answer when it came to pursuing their dreams.
Now Toronto had the opportunity to speak with the daughter of one of Canada’s greatest groundbreakers, Violet Pauline King Henry.
Henry was no stranger to being the first of many. She was the first Black woman lawyer in Canada, the first Black person to graduate law in Alberta and the first Black person to be admitted to the Alberta Bar.
Additionally, she was a trendsetter for women in general after being the first woman named to a senior management position with the YMCA of the USA.
READ MORE: Five fearless Black women who left their mark in Canadian history
“I’ve had the amazing privilege of getting to witness the legacy and hear from those who were affected by my mom’s legacy,” Jo-Anne Henry told Now Toronto.
Henry shares that she lost her mother, who died of cancer in 1982, when she was only 16 years old and admits at the time, she didn’t realize how big a deal she really was until she found clippings of newspaper articles years later.
Since then, she’s made it her life mission to keep her mother’s work alive.
Today, Henry is a social justice advocate and for two years in a row she’s been a speaker at the Black Law Students’ Association of Canada conference.
“Just to be on the podium and look out over a room of Black lawyers or lawyers to be, I know that my mom was literally a trailblazer there. That’s astounding to me,” she shared.
Oct. 18 is Violet’s birthday and to celebrate what would be her 94th birthday Google dedicated a doodle in her honour.
“She was a forward thinker, she was a visionary and I think to be the Google doodle she would be incredibly honoured,” she said.
In a Google blog post guest written by Henry, she shared that the artwork honoured her mother in many ways and that to this day she continues to learn more about who she was.
“The depth and breadth of her courage and perseverance, the truly complex contexts she was pursuing her goals in, and the many ways she inspired so many people to also pursue their dreams and advocate for justice,” she wrote.
Today, there are a number of awards in Violet’s name, including the University of Calgary’s Violet King Engaged Scholar Award to recognize the unique barriers, challenges, victories, and lived experiences of BIPOC students attending the institution.
The University of Alberta (her alma mater), supported by Miller Thomson LLP, founded the Violet King Henry Law School Award which is a $20,000-award given annually to a student in the Faculty of Law, who is of African descent and who has demonstrated leadership and commitment to the advancement of equity, diversity and inclusion.
We asked Henry if she will carry on her mother’s legacy for the rest of her life.
“She’s an example for so many ways of thinking about leadership and I will always credit her,” she said.
Just like her mom, Henry is raising a teenage daughter who she says is already a leader in her own right.
“Her name is Hawaiian for “High Chief” and from four years old on the playground she has been a leader.”
