Marshall Saunders

Margaret Marshall Saunders was a prolific Canadian writer of children's stories and romance novels, a lecturer, and an animal rights advocate. She was an active member of the Local Council of Women of Halifax.

Saunders was born April 13, 1861 in the village of Milton, Nova Scotia, one of four children born to Reverend Edmund M. and Maria (nee Freeman) Saunders. She spent most of her childhood in Berwick, Nova Scotia where her father was a Baptist minister. She studied in Edinburgh, Scotland and Orleans, France at the age of 15, before returning to Halifax, where she took courses at Dalhousie for a year prior to launching her career a freelance writer. It was in response to the male dominated nature of the publishing industry and she shortened her name to Marshall Saunders.

Saunders died in 1947 in Toronto, Ontario where she had lived for a number of years. She is buried in Mount Pleasant Cemetery in Toronto. In 1953 a plaque was installed by the Nova Scotia Site and Monuments Board near the site where she was born in Milton, Nova Scotia, which was later moved to Tupper Park.

In 1994, the Beautiful Joe Heritage Society was formed to celebrate the life and story of Beautiful Joe and Saunders' achievements. A park dedicated to Beautiful Joe has been established in Meaford, Ontario, Canada