Introduction 
     
    
   
   
    
     A farmer by the name of Erland Lee from Stoney Creek, Ontario, happened to hear 
     
     activist Adelaide Hoodless speak one night on domestic science and he was 
     
     inspired. This woman would be just the person to speak to rural women on the 
     
     importance of agriculture. Lee was also a teacher and a government employee, and 
     
     it was he and his wife, Janet, who are said to be the co-founders, with Adelaide 
     
     Hoodless, of the Women’s Institute of Canada. Mrs. Lee drafted the constitution, 
     
     and the Women’s Institution was founded in Canada in 1897. Adelaide’s quest was 
     
     personal. Her 14-month-old son, John died, from unpasteurized milk; she blamed 
     
     herself for not knowing what ailed him. She was determined to make sure no other 
     
     woman would make the same mistake. 
     
    
   
   
    
     The Agricultural Instruction Act was why the Women’s Institute was funded in 
     
     Canada. Government wanted the country to further promote this area of the 
     
     economy and to be educated in ways to further increase its production. The 
     
     Institute proved to be a vital way to reach out to women, especially those in rural 
     
     areas. The first Women’s Institute in Prince Edward Island was formed in 1911, 
     
     but it wouldn’t be until 1928 that the Knutsford Women’s Institute would be 
     
     formed. On November 28, 1928, 13 women of the farming community of 
     
     Knutsford, Prince Edward Island, stood together in the local one-room 
     
     schoolhouse. They waited for Representative, Miss Mona Saunders, of the 
     
     Department of Agriculture to arrive from Charlottetown to officially welcome 
     
     them as a branch of the Women’s Institute. In her speech, Saunders told women 
     
     how important it was to have a Women’s Institute in the rural communities. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Present at the first meeting were Miss Mona Saunders, organizer district/teacher, 
     
     Miss Gladys Wright, Mrs. William Dyment, Miss Pearle Shaw, Mrs. James 
     
     Smallman (Sr.), Mrs. Harry Harris, Mrs. Harvey Adams, Mrs. Thomas R. Harris, 
     
     Mrs. Robert Woodside, Mrs. Beecher Smallman, Mrs. John Yeo, Mrs. Raeburn 
     
     MacNeill, and Mrs. Addison Raynor. These were the founding members. When the 
     
     meeting concluded, the Knutsford Women’s Institute was formed.