News

Mercy Mission

Constance Beatty 1949 at Fairway Island
Constance Beattie in the summer of 1949, at Fairway Island (known today as Pitsiulartok) in Hudson Bay. [Photo: courtesy of Beattie's nephew Chuck Beattie]

“When polio struck an Inuit community in the late 1940s, it led to a tragedy that shocked the country. A physiotherapist was urgently needed to help treat Inuit polio victims in the Arctic settlement of Chesterfield Inlet on the west coast of Hudson Bay. Constance “Connie” Beattie was the only real choice to answer a distress call issued by the Department of Indian Affairs in late March 1949.”

Club member Christopher Rutty has an article, “Mercy Mission,” originally published in the Feb-March 2018 issue of Canada’s History Magazine about the fascinating story of Constance Beattie’s medical mission to the Arctic.