Dorothy Hague
Dorothy Hague (ca. 1897 – July 26, 1973) was reeve of the village of Swansea. Hague and Marie Curtis were the first women to serve as reeves or mayors of communities in the Toronto area.
She was educated at the University of Toronto and was employed as a Latin teacher. Hague served on the Swansea public school board from 1933 to 1949, serving three years as board chairman. In 1949, she was elected to the Swansea municipal council. She served as deputy reeve in 1951 and 1952 and then was village reeve from 1953 to 1963. Hague served on the first council for Metro Toronto, also serving on its executive council.[1][2] She was chair of the parks and planning committee and a member of the hospital committee for Metro Toronto.[3] Hague also served as a member of the executive council for the Metro Toronto and Region Conservation Authority and as a member of the Metropolitan Planning Board.[4]
Swansea, once scenic, with rolling hills and seven spring-filled ponds, had become the site of some of Toronto's early garbage dumps.[1] In addition to the public health dangers from smells, and runoff, Swansea had been the site of multiple serious dump fires.
Although initially opposed to Swansea becoming part of Metro Toronto,[5], Hague later expressed satisfaction with the "metropolitan form of government" in a letter to then-premier Leslie Frost.[6]
She married Henry Hague, an inspector for a railway supply company.[2]
She died at the age of 76.[1]
The Dorothy Hague room in the Swansea Town Hall was named in her honour.[7]
References
- ↑ Benjamin A. Lawson (Fall 2015). "Garbage mountains: the use, redevelopment, and artistic representation of New York City's Fresh Kills, Greater Toronto's Keele Valley, and Tel Aviv's Hiriya landfills". University of Iowa. https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6321&context=etd. Retrieved 2019-03-22. "Standardization of engineering technique did not mean widespread implementation, however, and many problems remained at sanitary landfills. For example, in the summer of 1954, several dump fires occurred (there were 4 in 6 weeks) in the Toronto metropolitan area (Swansea village), which angered local residents. They complained that the Toronto Parks Department had “promised to fill in the marsh” next to the Humber River with “trade waste only” but instead were dumping “all kinds of garbage including flammable materials.” Toronto began dumping waste at this marsh site in late June of 1954, with an average of “500 loads a day.” Local citizens’ ratepayers association, and local council led by Reeve Dorothy Hague, vowed to “see what could be done to stop [the] dumping, [which was] part of a sanitary land-fill scheme.” In short, most sanitary landfills of the 1950s were not much different than open dumps. Metropolitan News, “’Fed Up’ with Parks Dept. Over Garbage Dumping,” The Toronto Star, Saturday, September 4, 1954."
