In Memoriam: Sally M Weaver 1940-1993

The anthropology community in Canada lost one of its leading figures with the de ath of Sally M. Weaver, Professor at the University of Waterloo, at her home in Cambridge, On tario, on May 5, 1993. She died while in the prime of her career, at age 52, from cancer. In this brief obituary I hope to indicate something of the contribution of Sally Weaver to ant hropology at Waterloo, in Canada and internationally. Along the way I will provide an anecdo te or two on Sally the person who meant so much to all of us.Weaver was born on August 24, 1940, in Fort Erie, Ontario. Her university education, both undergraduate and graduate, was in anthropology at the University of Toronto. S he earned an Honours B.A. in 1963, an M.A. in 1964 and she completed her Ph.D. in 1967. She was the first female to earn a Ph.D. in anthropology from Toronto and, to my knowledge, was the first Canadian woman with an anthropology Ph.D.I first met Sal in 1965 while we were both Ph.D. students at the University of Toronto. We shared an office in the Borden Building, where Spadina Avenue circles the Connau ght Laboratories. We occupied a "cat walk" which had connected the two halves of th e building. It was an ideal set - up for two doctoral students -- we kept our desks at each end and the electric kettle and instant coffee in the middle. As we relaxed over coffee we could discuss the theoretical issues in anthropology, our common interest in the Iroquois people, their culture and history and gossip about anthropologists in and out of the department.At the time the Anthropology Department at the University of Toronto was go ing through one of its cyclical traumas of internal conflict, so Sal and I hid in our office in the Borden Building, removing ourselves from the blood being spilled in Sydney Smith Hall w hich housed the bulk of the department. Our major problem was keeping pigeons out of the of fice when we opened windows on warm days. Sal was looking for a job, and made contact with t he University of Waterloo. Most of us at Toronto thought of Kitchener - Waterloo o nly as a town one had to pass through on the way to theatre at Stratford. Sal took the train (they ran more frequently then) for her job interview, informing her contacts at this end that they could easily spot her. They should look for red hair and ared fox collar on her coat.She joined the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Waterloo as its second anthropologist in September 1966. That academic year she completed and defended her thesis on Health Care on the Six Nations Reserve.At Waterloo Weaver was energetic in developing the anthropology program. W e expanded (I was hired as the third anthropologist in September 1967, and two more anthrop ologists were hired in 1968), instituted a general, then an honours degree and had our own bud get by 1970. Weaver became Associate Chair for Anthropology within the combined department in 1975 - 76 and moved anthropology to fully independent departmental status. Weaver served the department as its first chair from 1976 - 79.Weaver also quickly made contributions to the growth of anthropology, and c ommunication among anthropologists, within Canada. She served a term on the Executive of the Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Association from 1970 - 73. That organization, howev er, neither had a large anthropology membership nor did it attract many anthropologists to i ts meetings. Weaver, along with others, saw a need for a separate association for social and cultural anthropology within Canada. She was instrumental in the founding of the Canadia n Ethnology Society (now the Canadian Anthropology Society) in 1974. Sal served as Presiden t of the organization in 1975 - 76. As past - President she organized a plenary session on applied anthropology in Canada at the fourth annual Congress of the Canadian Ethnology S ociety. On May 8, at the 1993 meetings of the Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA as the C ES is now known), Dr. …