Irene Baird
novelist
Irene Baird (April 4, 1901, Carlisle – April 19, 1981, Coquitlam) was an English-Canadian novelist, journalist and civil servant. She is best known for her 1939 novel Waste Heritage, a depiction of labour strife. She wrote four novels and also contributed journalism, stories, and poetry. In the early 1940s she began work for National Film Board and then the government of Canada, eventually becoming the first woman to head a federal information division.
Early life and first novel
Baird was born Irene Violet Elise Todd, on April 9, 1901, in Carlisle, England. She was the only daughter of Robert and Eva Todd, owners of a woollen mill. Her education was through a governess and ensuing boarding schools. After her father took a fly fishing trip to British Columbia, in 1919 the family relocated to Qualicum Beach, on Vancouver Island. In 1923, she married Robert Baird, an engineer, and they settled in Vancouver. They had two children, Robert (b.
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This entry incorporates text from “Irene Baird” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.