Mary Majka and Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson: On the other shores of the Atlantic she left the land of her birth shattered by a World War; friends and relatives killed in fighting and in death camps; her mother, brother and grandmother; her native language and culture; and every material possession not packed into those two suitcases. Her steps across that gangway marked a dramatic end and an uncertain beginning. A medical doctor and graduate of the University of Innsbruck in Austria, she found work as a domestic servant. However, one thing that she never parted with in any of the migrations that she was propelled along by the dramatic gusts of history she lived through was her love of nature, according to Rabble. If truth be told, after settling in Albert County, New Brunswick where her passion for nature really took root and blossomed, Mary was more often than not referred to, not as a naturalist, but as a "shit disturber" -- and she took a great deal of pride in the description. And that because what that meant for her was not accepting the status quo . Inspired by early activists such as Rachel Carson, who drew attention to how the use of pesticides such as DDT was affecting bird populations , she realized that safeguarding that natural environment -- that 'home' she had come to love and cherish from her earliest days in Poland, then during her long stay in Austria, and finally in her new "native land" -- was not something you could take for granted and On August 22, 1951 Mary Majka walked off the gangway of the USS General Blatchford tied up at the quay at Pier 21 in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She was 28 years old and had a suitcase in each hand and $20 in her pocket. A Polish refugee, she had arrived with her husband, Mieczyslaw , as DP -- displaced persons -- to seek a new life in Canada. After two days of waiting in the arrival halls, when the train pulled away from the station, it plunged through fields and forests, over rivers and along oceans, revealing a natural landscape that instantly captured her heart and imagination. When Mary Majka arrived in Canada in 1951, the word "environmentalist" hadn't yet been invented. Rachel Carson seminal book, Silent Spring , which arguably began the movement that we now call environmentalism, was only published in 1962. So, at least initially, she didn't consider herself an environmentalist, but rather a naturalist, a term that she soon learned she had to carefully distinguish from naturist , which is what nudists referred to themselves as. Indeed, some people did not realize the distinction, which lead to a few awkward moments when Mary and Mike introduced themselves as enthusiastic 'naturalist to new acquaintances. "Would you like to get involved," they would ask to averted eyes? (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.