Diana Kingsmill Wright
| Diana Kingsmill Wright | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Diana Kingsmill 1908 Ottawa, Ontario |
| Died | 1982 |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Occupation | athlete, journalist, environmentalist |
| Spouse(s) |
Victor Gordon-Lennox (1932 - bef. 1940) J. F. C. Wright (1944-1970) |
Diana Kingsmill Wright (1908–1982) was a Canadian athlete, journalist and activist.[1] The daughter of Naval Service of Canada admiral Charles Kingsmill,[1] she was born in Ottawa, Ontario and raised and educated in Canada and England.
In her youth, she was a competitive figure skater, who was a winner of the Devonshire Cup.[2] She was later a member of the Canadian alpine skiing team at the 1936 Winter Olympics,[3] and competed despite having suffered a broken hand.[4]
She married Victor Gordon-Lennox, the son of British politician Walter Gordon-Lennox, in 1932.[5] In this era she was a friend of actor David Niven,[1] who wrote about her in his autobiography The Moon Is a Balloon.[6]
She returned to Ottawa in 1940 after separating from Gordon-Lennox.[7] She remarried to historian J. F. C. Wright in 1944, in the Parliament Hill office of J. S. Woodsworth,[8] and moved with Wright to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.[1] Active in the Saskatchewan chapter of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation, the Wrights became co-editors of Union Farmer, the newspaper of the Saskatchewan Farmers' Union, in 1950.[1]
In the 1960s, she was active in Voice of Women, and leased the Kingsmill family summer home on Grindstone Island to the Society of Friends to serve as a Quaker retreat centre and an institution for peace studies.[9]
She later served as editor of Environment Probe,[1] and served on an advisory committee to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on its coverage of agriculture and farming issues.[1]
References
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Diana Kingsmill Wright". Saskatchewan Eco Network.
- ↑ "Canada in Switzerland". Winnipeg Tribune, February 6, 1925.
- ↑ "Ottawa Ski Star Chosen on Team". Ottawa Journal, September 16, 1935.
- ↑ "Applaud Efforts Diana Lennox". Ottawa Journal, February 8, 1936.
- ↑ "Diana Kingsmill Is Bride of Capt. Gordon-Lennox". Winnipeg Tribune, December 28, 1932.
- ↑ Niven, David (1971). The Moon's a Balloon. London: Hamish Hamilton. ISBN 0-340-15817-4.
- ↑ "Ottawa Women Enter Inter-City Ski Meet". Ottawa Journal, January 27, 1940.
- ↑ "Biography - Wright, James Frederick Church". Saskatoon Public Library Local History Collections.
- ↑ "Rebels run retreat". Ottawa Citizen, August 27, 1980.