Main entry | Lefevre, Lily Alice Cooke |
Birth place | Kingston, Ontario |
Birth date | 5 April 1854 |
Death place | Vancouver, British Columbia |
Death date | 17 October 1938 |
Identifier | 0128 |
Birth name | Lily Alice Cooke |
Alternate names | Fleurange |
Married name | Lefevre |
Marital status | married |
Religious affiliation | Catholic |
Other work | doctor's wife |
Biography | Educated at the Villa Maria Convent in Montreal, Lily Alice Cooke (1854-1938) moved to Vancouver in 1886, after her marriage to Dr. John Lefevre (1853-1906) who was the Pacific district surgeon for the Canadian Pacific Railway. He later became a member of the Vancouver City Council and president of the Vancouver Board of Trade. Left a wealthy, childless widow after his death, Lily became a patron of the arts in Vancouver, helped found the Vancouver Art Gallery, and made her home, "Langaravine," a local gathering spot for writers, painters and academics. Her circle included members of the Vancouver Poetry Society, Robert Cromie (the editor of the VANCOUVER SUN), William and Annie Charlotte Dalton*, E.J. Pratt, and Pelham Edgar. A contributor of verse to the Montreal and Vancouver press, she won $100 from the MONTREAL WITNESS for the best poem with reference to the first Montreal Winter Carnival. Her other accomplishments include writing lyrics which may have been set to music, publishing three volumes of verse, and some proficiency with watercolours and charcoal. She also organized the Imperial Order of Daughters of the Empire in Vancouver on Edward VII's coronation. |
Travel | England, 1923, 1926, 1929 |
Other notes | Graham House, now a meeting facility at UBC, was originally designed for Lily in 1915. |
Honours and awards | Award, Best poem with reference to the first Montreal Winter Carnival ($100) (MONTREAL WITNESS, n.d.) |
Residences | Kingston, Ontario (1854-); Elizabethtown, Brockville, Ontario (1871, 1883); Vancouver (1886-1938) |
Geographic regions | British Columbia |
Primary genres | poetry |
Books | THE LIONS' GATE AND OTHER VERSES (1895); THE LIONS' GATE AND THE BEAVER AND THE EMPRESS (1903); A GARDEN BY THE SEA, AND OTHER POEMS (1921) |
Periodicals | CANADIAN BOOKMAN |
Other publications | Anthologized in: Garvin, CANADIAN VERSE FOR BOYS AND GIRLS (1930); Lighthall, CANADIAN POEMS AND LAYS (c1892); Lighthall, SONGS OF THE GREAT DOMINION (1889); Rand, TREASURY OF CANADIAN VERSE (1900) |
Organizations | Canadian Authors Association, Vancouver Poetry Society |
Other arts | lyrics (may have been set to music); painting (watercolours, landscapes); drawing (charcoal) |
Father's name | Richard Plunkett Cooke |
Life dates of father | 12 October 1824, Birr, King's Co., Ireland - 27 January 1892, Vancouver, British Columbia |
Father's note | engineer, Grand Trunk Railway; Brockville and Ontario Railway; engraver; contractor; buried in Brockville; petitioned to connect Mission and Chilliwack by rail |
Mother's name | Anna Maria Plunkett |
Life dates of mother | 17 March 1827, County Mayo, Ireland - 17 September 1893, Vancouver, British Columbia |
Mother's note | Possibly cousin to husband Richard |
Spouse 1 | Dr. John Matthew Lefevre |
Life dates of spouse 1 | 12 October 1853, Bellevile, Ontario - 15 September 1906, Vancouver, British Columbia |
Spouse 1 note | medical doctor; Canadian Pacific Railway's district surgeon (Pacific Division); Vancouver City Council member; president, Vancouver Board of Trade; involved in real estate and in the early development of BC Tel |
Marriage 1 date | 28 June 1883 |
Marriage 1 place | Brockville, Ontario |
Biographical references | WOMAN'S WHO'S WHO OF AMERICA (1914-15); 1871 Census of Canada; 1891 Census of Canada; 1901 Census of Canada; British Columbia Death Index: 1872 to 1979; Canada, Ocean Arrivals (Form 30A), 1919-1924; Canadian Passenger Lists, 1865-1935; Ontario, Canada Marriages, 1801-1928; UK Incoming Passenger Lists, 1878-1960 |
Bibliographic references | Watters, CHECKLIST OF CANADIAN LITERATURE...1620-1960 (1970), p. 112 |
Research references | complete |
Archival references | correspondence, Canadian Authors Association papers, National Archives of Canada; correspondence, Queen's University Archives; letter to W.D. Lighthall, McGill University Library. |
Image credits | Line drawing by Una Vernelli (Vancouver, British Columbia). |
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. |