Frances Wasserlein (b. July 31, 1946 San Francisco – August 23, 2015 Halfmoon Bay) was an Canadian-American arts community manager and a

LBTQ ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is a ...

rights activist residing in Canada. She was executive producer of

Vancouver Folk Music Festival The Vancouver Folk Music Festival (VFMF), founded in 1978, is an outdoor multistage music festival, located at Jericho Beach Park on the west side of Vancouver, British Columbia. It takes place annually, on the third weekend of July. The fe ...

and box office manager of other festivals and centers in the Vancouver area. She was a board member of a

British Columbia Arts Council The British Columbia Arts Council (or BC Arts Council) is a statutory independent agency supporting arts in British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Can ...

predecessor from 1996 to 2002.

Life

Wasserlein was born in San Francisco but brought up in Vancouver in Canada. She received a BA in history from

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public university, public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks a ...

in 1980, after which she received a Master of Arts in history at

Simon Fraser University Simon Fraser University (SFU) is a public research university in British Columbia, Canada, with three campuses, all in Greater Vancouver: Burnaby (main campus), Surrey, and Vancouver. The main Burnaby campus on Burnaby Mountain, located ...

. In 1970 she led the

Abortion Caravan The Abortion Caravan was a feminist protest movement formed by The Vancouver Women's Caucus in 1970 which travelled across Canada from Vancouver to Ottawa to advocate for increased access to legal abortion. A 1969 amendment to the Canadian Crimina ...

from Vancouver to Ottawa, and in 1982 she co-founded Women Against Violence Against Women (WAVAW/Rape Relief). She moved to

Halfmoon Bay, British Columbia Halfmoon Bay (xwilkway in ''she shashishalhem'', the Sechelt language) is a small community of about 2,800 people, many of whom are only summer residents. It is a large scalloped bay protected from the open sea by South Thormanby Island and Vancou ...

after marrying Marguerite Kotwitz in 2003. There, she was executive director of

Sunshine Coast Sunshine Coast may refer to: * Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia **Sunshine Coast Region, a local government area of Queensland named after the region **Sunshine Coast Stadium * Sunshine Coast (British Columbia), geographic subregion of the Br ...

Community Arts Council from 2008 to 2013 and taught cultural event management at

Capilano College Capilano University (CapU) is a teaching-focused public university based in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, located on the slopes of the North Shore Mountains, with programming that also serves the Sea-to-Sky Corridor and the Sunshin ...

. She died at home in

on August 23, 2015.

Life

References

Further reading