Johnson (aka Johnstone) (nee Archibald), Margaret Etta (1871-1929)

Margaret Johnstone was active in the Canadian National Association of Trained Nurses, serving on numerous committees and championing the elevation of standards for nurses and hospitals.  She was a founding member of the BC Hospital Association in 1918, and active in the early days of the Canadian Hospital Association.  She helped lay the foundations for the Survey of Nursing Education in Canada.

Born in Nova Scotian, she graduated from Boston City Hospital School of Nursing in 1899.  After a decade working in private nursing in the US, she came to Vancouver, where she owned and operated a highly successful 22-bed private Butte Street hospital from 1912 to 1928. From 1925-1927, she was President of the Graduate Nurses Association of BC.

Contents of Biographical File

  1. Summary Biographical Information
  2. Longer version for the RNABC Awards Committee
  3. Background information
  4. Curriculum Vitae
  5. Glennis Zilm. “The Search for Margaret Etta’s Photograph-or-The Importance of Primary Sources in Historical Research” (1999).
  6. Correspondence concerning photograph, 1996-1999.
  7. Photograph
  8. “New Notes” [Obituary], The Canadian Nurse, 25 (12), December 1929, 736.
  9. Photograph of Butte Street Hospital along with information on Johnson in a letter from Helen Shore to Glennis Zilm.