Fonds F2399 - Hilda Neatby fonds

Born in Sutton, Surrey, England on 19 February 1904, and daughter of Andrew Mossforth and Ada Debora (Fisher) Neatby, Hilda Neatby was educated in Saskatchewan earning a B.A. Scholarship (1924), and M.A. (1927), from the University of Saskatchewan. In 1925 she received a Certificat d'Etudes francais from the Sorbonne in Paris, France. In 1934, she received her Doctorate in History from the University in Minnesota. From 1926 to 1931, she was an Instructor in History at the University of Saskatchewan and then a Teaching Assistant at the University of Minnesota (1931-1933). She then returned to her adopted home, north of the 49th Parallel, where she took up duties as an Assistant Professor of History at Regina College, University of Saskatchewan (1936-1944); then Associate Professor of History at the University (1945-1952); before becoming a full Professor in 1952; Head of Department in 1958; and the Morton Professor of History, in 1968. During the 1944-1945 academic year, she held the post of Visiting Lecturer at the University of Toronto. In 1970, she retired from the University of Saskatchewan and accepterd an offer from the then Principal of Queen's University, Dr. John Deutsch, to write that institution's official history.

Dr. Neatby was an accomplished author and wrote extensively on historical and educational subjects. A former editor of "Saskatchewan History", she published "The Administration of Justice Under the Quebec Act" (1937); a searing indictment on Canadian education entitled, "So Little for the Mind" (1953); "A Temperate Dispute" (1954); "Quebec: The Revolutionary Age, 1760-91"(1966); and ""to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield: Queen's University Volume I, 1841-1917"(1978), edited and published posthumously.

She garnered many accolades and awards including becoming a member of the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters, and Sciences (1949-1951); the first female President of the Canadian Historical Association (1962-1963); a Companion of the Order of Canada (1967); accepting the Medal of the Canadian Council of Jewish Women for Outstanding Service to Canada (1967); and receiving honorary degrees from the University of Toronto (1953); Brock University (1967); University of Windsor (1974); and the University of New Brunswick (1975).

Dr. Hilda Neatby died 15 May 1975, in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, at age 71.