SFU Archives poster Vancouver debutantes grace SFU's newly acquired jade boulder Rosalind Sinclair, sister of the future Margaret Trudeau, won the first Miss SFU title in 1966 In 1965 there was just one woman Letty Wilson in administration at SFU Women students wore long elegant gowns to the President's Ball and the Arts Formal In the rebellious summer of 1968, women students, staff and faculty organized the Women’s Caucus. The Women’s Caucus is the ancestor of today’s Women's Centre Collective,which continues to work for women’s rights and freedoms on campus, in Canada, and around the world Janiel Jolley of the Women’s Caucus enrolled as a candidate in the 1970 Miss Canadian University contest. Never Done, the first history of women in Canada, was published in 1974 by Andrea Lebowitz and other Women’s Caucus members. Andrea Lebowitz was a veteran of the US civil rights campaigns when she joined SFU’s English Department in 1965. Senators were worried that such a department would become a women's academic ghetto, without disciplinary standards. Today Women’s Studies is a full-fledged department offering undergraduate majors and M.A. and Ph.D. programs. SFU was revolutionary in admitting mature students, and Chancellor Gordon Shrum went on record in the Vancouver Sun that there would be babysitting services. How did women's rights evolve at SFU? The answer is in the Archives Your University. Your Archives

How did women's rights evolve at SFU?
Finding the answers in the Archives

As a researcher, you come to the Archives to solve historical puzzles. Here's an example: how did women's rights evolve at Simon Fraser University? As part of SFU's 40th anniversary celebration, we asked that question in order to prepare the commemorative display poster on the left side of this page.

Want to do your own archival research? We've turned our display into an interactive guide. Hold your cursor over a photo or paragraph; a pop-up window will display the photo caption or paragraph text along with a question. Click to find the answer and learn our tips to study historical questions of your own.

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Produced with the financial support of the Government of Canada through the National Archival Development Program, a program delivered by the Canadian Council of Archives in partnership with Library and Archives Canada.