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Start giftingThe Abortion Caravan
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Spring 2020 marks the 50th anniversary of a group of remarkable women who helped bring about abortion reform. The caravan left Vancouver with 17 activists and arrived in Ottawa on May 8th 1970, where over 500 women rallied and shut down parliament.
In the spring of 1970, seventeen women set out from Vancouver in a big yellow convertible, a Volkswagen bus, and a pickup truck. They called it the Abortion Caravan. Three thousand miles later, they “occupied” the prime minister’s front lawn in Ottawa, led a rally of 500 women on Parliament Hill, chained themselves to their chairs in the visitors’ galleries, and shut down the House of Commons, the first and only time this had ever happened. The seventeen were a motley crew. They argued, they were loud, and they wouldn’t take no for an answer. They pulled off a national campaign in an era when there was no social media, and with a budget that didn’t stretch to long-distance phone calls. It changed their lives. And at a time when thousands of women in Canada were dying from back street abortions, it pulled women together across the country.
Reviews
“Wells’s powerful book affirms that such ongoing obstacles to women’s autonomy and reproductive rights are why the Abortion Caravan matters more than ever.” — Kerry Clare, Quill & Quire
“Wells’s descriptions of political action in the days before social media and #MeToo are at times witty and always fascinating.” — Charlotte Gray, The Walrus, Canadian Authors Pick Their Favourite Books of 2020
“Karin Wells uses deep, original research and energetic writing to expose the ideological and practical ups and downs of the early struggle for reproductive rights in this country. Her book is a poignant revelation of the many small conflicts and victories that led to a pushing of the barriers.” — 2021 Shaughnessy Cohen Prize Jury
“Karin Wells makes excellent use of both oral histories and archival documents to create a gripping and nuanced narrative of the Abortion Caravan that made its way across Canada in the early 1970s. Her exploration of this important historical event is valuable in its own right and should provoke renewed interest today … The book is an engaging read about a compelling story in our history.” —The OHS Honours & Awards Committee
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