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2 women carry on Viola Desmond's legacy thanks to business bursary

Kendra Smith and Leah Matheson are the first two recipients of the Viola Desmond bursary at Saint Mary's University.

'It just gives me more motivation to ... be a businesswoman like she was'

Emma Davie · CBC News ·
Leah Matheson, left, and Kendra Smith are the first two recipients of the Viola Desmond Bursary at Saint Mary's University. (Shannon Doane/Saint Mary's University)

Two African Nova Scotian university students are getting financial help for their studies thanks to a bursary named for human rights activist Viola Desmond.

Saint Mary's University in Halifax launched the Viola Desmond bursary for African Nova Scotian students last November.

This week, the university announced it had been awarded to two women at the Sobey School of Business.

"I was really excited and I also felt honoured because of the name on the scholarship," said 19-year-old Leah Matheson of Dartmouth, N.S., who is one of the recipients.

"I'm very happy to be representing Viola Desmond's legacy as an African Nova Scotia business woman as well as carrying on her legacy of standing up for what she believes in."

Black rights activist Viola Desmond was jailed for sitting in the whites-only section of a Nova Scotia theatre. (CBC)

Kendra Smith, 22, from North Preston said the bursary will help her as she finishes her final year of the business program.

"It takes that burden off of thinking of ways to get more money to get through school and get transportation and everything," Smith said. "It gives you that piece of mind that you can just focus on your studies."

Each woman was given $1,946 — an amount chosen for the year Desmond refused to leave the whites-only section of a theatre in New Glasgow.

The 32-year-old beautician and businesswoman wanted to see a movie at the Roseland Theatre, but instead was dragged out and arrested, spending the night in jail.

Friday marked 73 years since Desmond's stand against racism and oppression in Nova Scotia.

A older Black woman holds a plaque that reads "Celebrating Viola Desmond Bursary"
Viola Desmond's sister, Wanda Robson, is shown at the announcement for The Viola Desmond Bursary at Saint Mary's University in November 2018. (Saint Mary's University)

Desmond is the first Canadian woman to be featured on the country's $10 bill.

The bursary is intended for students with financial need studying business, but may also be awarded to those in entrepreneurship programs.

"It just gives me more motivation to complete my studies and be able to be a businesswoman like she was, and not take no for an answer like she did in that theatre," Smith said.

The bursary was endowed by lawyer and retired senator Wilfred P. Moore and Jane Adams Ritcey, president of fishing company Adams & Knickle. The two are married.

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