From Lakefield, Ontario
Susanna Moodie, née Strickland, sister of Catharine Parr Traill, was an author who wrote about her experiences as a settler in Canada, which was a British colony at the time.
Born in 1803 in Bungay, River Waveney, Suffolk, England
Died in 1885 in Toronto, Ontario
Susanna was the youngest in a literary family of whom Catharine Parr Traill and Samuel Strickland are best known in Canada.
In 1832, with her husband and daughter, Moodie immigrated to Upper Canada. The family settled on a farm in Douro Township, near Lakefield, north of Peterborough, where her brother Samuel worked as a surveyor
Her increasingly highly regarded book, Roughing It in the Bush (1852), detailing her experiences on the farm in the 1830s, has made her a legendary figure in Canada.
Moodie’s books and poetry inspired Margaret Atwood’s collection of poetry (People of Small Towns), The Journals of Susanna Moodie, published in 1970.
A Part of Our Heritage. The View of Two Sisters Catherine Parr Traill and Susanna Moodie
In 2003, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the National Library of Canada, Canada Post released a special commemorative series, “The Writers of Canada.” Moodie and her sister Catherine Parr Traill were featured on one of the English-Canadian stamps.
Lakefield, Ontario, was merged to form the Township of Selwyn.
