Margueritte Marshall was born April 20, 1926 in Hamilton, Ontario, the oldest of thirteen children. The family moved to Niagara Falls, where her father ran a farm and worked at the Carborundum Plant. Margueritte remembers wanting to be a teacher, but with a family that size and the reality of the Great Depression, she quit school at 16 and went to work for a trucking company. It was during that time that the war broke out, and after a time she decided to enlist, just as the boys were doing. She chose the RCAF Women’s Division (WD), and after initial training Margueritte served at a number of bases, mostly in Ontario. She was a clerk for the most part, but she recalls that she and the other women had their fair share of adventures too. At one point, they bought a horse and carriage for winter travel to and from the base, and she met her husband at VE Day celebrations in Hamilton. When the war concluded, she and he married and settled down in Hamilton, where Margueritte opened her own cake/dessert shop, and together they raised a family, adding their own cadence to the rhythm of postwar life in Canada.
This interview, facilitated by the Memory Project, was conducted in June 2019, when Scott Masters visited Margueritte at her home in Hamilton.
Videos
Click next video below to keep watching
