Mary Mackay

ID # 4193, (1864-1933)
BirthMary Mackay was born on 29 June 1864 at Stellarton, Nova Scotia. 
MarriageShe married John Buchanan, son of William Buchanan and Catharine Harvie, on 25 January 1889 at Indore, India.
The date for the marriage of John Buchanan and Mary MacKay is taken from the family bible of William Buchanan and Elizabeth Sowden. The place of marriage is taken from Ruth Buchanan's book, 'My Mother', see page 2. 'They were...married...in Indore by the Rev. Dr. J. Fraser Campbell.'
 
DeathShe died on 15 May 1933 at Amkhut, India, at age 68. 
BurialShe was buried at Amkhut. 
NoteShe The date of Mary's birth is taken from her daughter Ruth's book, 'My Mother', 1938. Her name, MacKay, was pronounced Mu-Ky. This is apparently the Gaelic pronunciation.

Mary MacKay's story is remarkable, for she became a medical doctor in the 1880s, studying medicine at University of Toronto. This would have been a difficult undertaking for a woman in this era. Her daughter Edith said that with whatever problems she had, she faced them with a sense of humour. An example the family loved to tell was occasioned by the fact that it was considered improper for a woman to take rooms on campus at this time. She was obliged to take rooms off campus and would travel to and from school by the trolley. This did not exempt her from the rigours of study and she had such things as dissection for anatomy to deal with. She would carry human specimens back to her room for study, such as a hand, particularly mentioned, or some other part of the human anatomy, and she would transport them in a hat box. She would chuckle when telling the story and said that she often wondered what would happen if she dropped the hat box on the trolley!

When daughter Edith was expected, John and Mary returned to Canada and, it seems, stayed with Dan Buchanan in Galt where Edith was born in 1905. They remained long enough that, so the family story goes, Edith was baptised at Central Church in Galt in September of the year. Her cousin Eleanor was said to have been baptised at the same service.

One glitch in this story is that the Presbyterian Church archives have been visited and microfilm of Central Church's records examined without finding the baptisms. 

Children of Mary Mackay and John Buchanan

Last Edited14 Sep 2023