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Olive MacKay Petersen

Olive MacKay was born in 1907, in Pictou, Nova Scotia (one year before her sister Eileen) to parents Roderick Geddie MacKay (a lawyer) and Florence Burnett MacKeil. Photos of Olive in her early twenties suggest she was not afraid of the outdoors which foretell of her future life's adventure.

Another early testimony to Olive's future endeavours was her writing for the "Athenaeum", the student's magazine of Acadia University, Nova Scotia. In the yearbook of 1929, Olive is affectionately known as Tacitus, "...for she understands even the wisdom of the ancients", and she is said to have, "a sense of humor that no one can surpass". For all her success in University, Olive came to consider herself, in her own words, "unsuitable to any career", having tried nursing and newspaper reporting. "It's no use; I'm just not good at earning a living", she wrote.

In the meantime, the Great Depression had urged a close cousin to seek work and raise a family in Northern Quebec - where the Gold Mines were hiring. Olive took the leap and headed up to Rouyn-Noranda by train in 1938, beginning her great adventure.

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Olive came to Swastika in May 1951 after twelve years of sharing a Prospector's life with her husband, "Pete" Reinhold Petersen. They lived in everything from tents and coreshacks to abandoned cookhouses as they started from Rouyn-Noranda and ended up some miles beyond the settlement of Batchawana. There they lived an "idyllic" life for two years, out of a group of three tents, all the while raising their two sons, Rennie and Roddie.

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Olive MacKay Petersen and Family
Circa 1960's



Credits:
Image loaned from MNH Auxiliary (Women of Kirkland Lake 2012 Exhibit)
Image loaned from the MacKay Peterson Family

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Once settled in Swastika, Olive did begin to write, publishing over a hundred articles for various newspapers and magazines in Canada, the U.S. and England. From 1963 to 1967, she edited, "The Northland", a quarterly publication of the Anglican Diocese of Moosonee, and in 1974 she published, "The Land of Moosoneek" (This book is still available through rare book dealers). Her book, "The Vanishing Prospector", published in 1981, is a charming autobiographical account of her life from her arrival in Rouyn-Noranda in 1938, to hers and Pete's days in Swastika up to the late seventies. It is also well worth the read for an indication of the tough life of a bona fide prospector, but is a much more difficult find.

Her son Rod declares his Mom was not known for her cooking prowess, Dianne Merrell remembers receiving a pie from Olive with the initials "TB" cut into the top crust. When asked what the initials stood for, Olive declared, "'Tis Blueberry or 'Taint Blueberry". Those who were fortunate enough to have known Olive, remember her with tremendous fondness. She is described as being elegant and gracious, a great storyteller with a wonderful sense of humour and many words of wisdom. She passed away in 1987.