Agnes Deans Cameron

Agnes Deans Cameron was born in Victoria, Colony of Vancouver Island, the youngest child of Duncan and Jessie Cameron. Duncan Cameron was a successful Scots immigrant miner and contractor. She was an outstanding student at Victoria High School, a public school. While still a student she successfully wrote the provincial teachers' examinations. She taught in the one-room school in Comox in 1882 and then returned to Victoria in 1883 to teach at the private Angela College for girls. By 1894 she was already principal of the South Park School. She was the first woman to hold an administrative office in a co-educational school in Victoria. ==The New North: First white woman in Arctic==

In 1908 after 25 years of teaching, Cameron accepted a contract with Western Canada Immigration Association based in Chicago. Accompanied by her niece Jessie Brown, and taking her ever-present typewriter and Kodak camera, entitled "The New North". Cameron traveled extensively as lecturer, showing magic lantern slides of her photographic images from this journey. She promoted immigration to western Canada at Oxford, Cambridge, St. Andrew's University and the Royal Geographical Society. Her photographs were reproduced in 2011–2012 in an exhibit at the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Ottawa, Canada. Athabasca She was particularly enthusiastic about the Athabasca region and the Athabasca oil sands which included photos of Count Alfred Von Hammerstein's oil drill works along the Athabasca River. "While the Count was unsuccessful drilling for "elephant pools of oil," Cameron's book and its images became a best seller and made her a media celebrity." ==Gallery of lantern slides==

File:Tea on board the scow Mee-wah-sin on the Peace River, Alberta (S2004-847 LS).jpg|Tea on board the scow Mee-wah-sin on the Peace River, Alberta File:Inside_a_Settler%27s_Shack_of_the_West_of_Canada_(S2004-844_LS).jpg|Inside a Settler's Shack of the West of Canada File:Winter_Camp_Scene_(S2004-837_LS).jpg|Winter Camp Scene File:Port_Simpson,_British_Columbia_(S2004-838_LS).jpg|Port Simpson, British Columbia File:Emigrants_Camping_Near_Winnipeg(_S2004-850_LS).jpg|Emigrants Camping Near Winnipeg File:Two_men_with_a_sled_on_a_winter_trail_(S2004-854_LS).jpg|Two men with a sled on a winter trail File:Typical_Settler%27s_House_of_the_West_of_Canada_(S2004-852_LS).jpg|Typical Settler's House of the West of Canada File:Clerk_of_the_Hudson_Bay_Company_on_hunting_trip_(S2004-855_LS).jpg|Clerk of the Hudson Bay Company on hunting trip File:City_of_Stewart,_British_Columbia_(S2004-859_LS).jpg|City of Stewart, British Columbia ==References==