Public health physician.
Born at Whitelake, Ontario on 26 April 1860, he received medical training at the Manitoba Medical College and Toronto Medical College then did postgraduate training at Edinburgh, Scotland. He practiced medicine at Brandon for 25 years where he was an early proponent of the Brandon, Saskatchewan and Hudson’s Bay Railway.
He moved to Winnipeg in 1915 where he was the first permanent official under the Manitoba Board of Health appointed in 1916, as its Executive Secretary and epidemiologist. He established the first full-time Provincial Health Office in the Law Courts Building and also organized the first public health nursing group in Canada, with himself as its first medical director. He remained active after the 1928 formation of the Manitoba Department of Health and Public Welfare. He retired in 1931.
He and wife Minnie Evelyn Campbell Powers (1869-1910) had three daughters: Marjorie McGillvray Fraser (1898-?), Evelyn Rubina Fraser (1900-?, wife of Eugene Hume Burton), and Isobel Arma “Jolly” Fraser (1902-1996).
He died at the Winnipeg General Hospital on 26 October 1949 and was buried in the Brandon Cemetery.
Birth registrations, Manitoba Vital Statistics.
“Dr. M. S. Fraser, pioneer health official dies,” Winnipeg Tribune, 27 October 1949, page 44.
Burial transcriptions, Brandon Municipality Cemetery.
Obituary [Isobel Arma Fraser], Winnipeg Free Press, 24 February 1996, page 45.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 6 June 2022
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