Shirley: being an activist in a divided Montreal

Listen to Shirley talk about growing up in the 1930s Westmount Jewish community, experiencing and defying anti-Semitism in Montreal and how her work in volunteering led her to change two laws. After being unable to train as a teacher because of McGill University's quota on Jewish students, Shirley went on to learn secretary work and co-run her husband's business. Shirley became a prolific activist, volunteering in education projects, advocating for penal reform and campaigning for Jewish rights. In her position as Vice-President of the National Council of Jewish Women, Shirley overcame the divisions between Montreal's Francophone, Anglophone and Jewish communities to campaign successfully for young offenders to be offered rehabilitation rather than imprisonment. Find out why working as a coalition of women was so significant to Shirley in spite of the segregation and hostility that shaped much of her life as a Jewish woman in Montreal.