Bernice Loft was a sincere and direct orator
Barbara A. Martindale- For What It's Worth December 9, 2013
Once upon a time there was another advocate commemorating experiences, history and tales of the Six Nations.
Bernice Loft, daughter of Chief William Loft, was said be sincere and direct, with a style less conventional than that of Pauline Johnson, the tone less sentimental. Yet, she was similar at a later time, especially the 1930s. She was known as a lecturer.
People liked her.
Les Richardson remembered when the family lived on Arygle Street South's west side while the children were going to high school.
"The Loft family were smart people and they made names for themselves. Mr. Loft was a dignified gentleman, dressed in the latest fashion with spats and gold watch chain, spoke beautiful English. The children went on to higher education. Mr. and Mrs. Loft moved back to the Reserve. Bernice was in the teaching profession and her first posting was in 1920 at No. 11 School, three miles from her family's residence.
"When Bernice got up to lecture her audiences were captured by her professionalism. Her English was beautiful and her modulation held them in a trance," said Mr. Richardson.
One such lecture was headlined ‘Compelling Address’ when she spoke to the Women's Travel Club.
The newspaper report said, "Miss Loft presented her story in a fearless and frank manner." She made friends with her listeners who gave sympathetic and warm response to her, as she brought so much interesting material to their notice.
Miss Loft's musical intonations and beautiful diction rounded out her recital in a most entrancing fashion and her visit to the club proved to be one of the most outstanding events in a long series of programs of a higher character.
She lectured throughout southern Ontario at schools, universities, service clubs, church groups and organizations, telling tales of her life on the Reserve, reciting stories and legends of the Six Nations.
She married Arthur Winslow in September 1937. When their daughter, Dawn, was born in 1938, Bernice stopped making public appearances. After the death of her 85-year-old father in 1943, the Winslows moved permanently to Whitman, Massachusetts, her husband's home.
Her husband passed away in 1962, and Bernice resumed her public speaking and story-telling from her home base of Whitman.
She was still living in the Boston area in 1994 in a nursing home at about 90 years old, where her three grandchildren and two great-grandchildren were making regular visits to see her.
