| Main entry | Merrill, Helen |
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| Birth place | Napanee, Ontario |
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| Birth date | 12 November 1866 |
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| Death place | Toronto, Ontario |
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| Death date | 8 June 1951 |
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| Identifier | 0315 |
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| Birth name | Helen Mary Merrill |
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| Married name | Egerton |
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| Marital status | married |
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| Religious affiliation | Anglican |
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| Paid work | journalist; staff, Ontario Bureau of Archives (Toronto) |
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| Biography | Educated in Picton, Ontario and then at the Ottawa Ladies' College, Helen Mary Merrill (1866-1951), like her sister Anne Merrill*, took a particular interest in natural history. She pursued this specialty professionally as a staff member of the Ontario Bureau of Archives, publishing several articles on Northern Ontario topography and folklore as well as her first book, PICTURESQUE PRINCE EDWARD COUNTY (1892). The Oneida Band of the Six Nations honoured her contribution to cultural preservation by giving her the name, "Ka-ya-tonhas" (keeper of records). After her 1917 marriage to Frank Egerton (c1864-c1949), her literary activity dwindled but she remained an active member of historical and literary associations including the Canadian Society of Authors, the Ontario Historical Society, the Women's Historical Society, and the Canadian Women's Press Club. Helen also enjoyed singing and spent a great deal of time researching genealogies of United Empire Loyalists. |
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| Residences | Picton, Ontario; Toronto (1905-1951) |
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| Geographic regions | Ontario |
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| Primary genres | poetry; fiction; non-fiction; journalism |
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| Books | PICTURESQUE PRINCE EDWARD COUNTY (1892); SANDPIPERS, AND OTHER POEMS (1915) |
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| Periodicals | DOMINION ILLUSTRATED; SATURDAY NIGHT; THE WEEK |
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| Other publications | Anthologized in: Campbell, OXFORD BOOK OF CANADIAN VERSE (1913); Carman and Pierce, OUR CANADIAN LITERATURE (1934); Caswell, CANADIAN SINGERS AND THEIR SONGS (1919, 1925); Garvin, CANADIAN POETS (1916- 1926); Garvin, CANADIAN VERSE FOR BOYS AND GIRLS (1930); Rand, TREASURY OF CANADIAN VERSE (1900); Toronto Women's Press Club, VERSE AND REVERSE (1921, 1922) |
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| Organizations | Canadian Authors Association, Canadian Women's Press Club, Ontario Historical Society, Women's Historical Society, Women's Art Association, Canadian Folk-Lore Society |
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| Father's name | Judge Samuel Edwards Merrill |
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| Life dates of father | c1842, Picton, Ontario - 13 June 1905, Picton, Ontario; m. 1866 |
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| Father's note | lawyer; judge, County Court of Prince Edward; a colleague of John A. MacDonald |
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| Mother's name | Caroline Wright |
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| Life dates of mother | c1847, Ontario - ; m. 1866 |
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| Mother's note | of French Huguenot extraction |
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| Spouse 1 | Frank Egerton |
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| Life dates of spouse 1 | c1864, Maidstone, England - c1949 |
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| Spouse 1 note | mining investor |
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| Marriage 1 date | 11 May 1917 |
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| Marriage 1 place | Toronto, Ontario |
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| Biographical references | Morgan, Henry, CANADIAN MEN AND WOMEN OF THE TIME (1912); WOMAN'S WHO'S WHO OF AMERICA (1914-15); Garvin, CANADIAN POETS (1916), pp. 259-64; 1871 Census of Canada; 1891 Census of Canada; 1901 Census of Canada; Ontario, Canada Marriages, 1801-1928 |
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| Bibliographic references | Watters, CHECKLIST OF CANADIAN LITERATURE...1620-1960 (1970), pp. 140, 227 |
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| Research references | complete |
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| Archival references | scattered letters to John Willison, Henry Morgan, and others in the National Archives of Canada |
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| Image credits | Image from John. W. Garvin, ed., CANADIAN POETS (2nd ed., Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1926). |
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| Copyright | This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/. Please cite Canada's Early Women Writers. SFU Library Digital Collections. Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC, Canada. 1980-2014. |
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