Robert Dunham (1939-1990) was a professor of English at Simon Fraser University. His specialty was the literature of the Romantic Period. A graduate of Stanford University, Dunham joined SFU in 1966. He was a gifted teacher who won the University's excellence in teaching award in 1986 as well as the 3M Fellowship in 1988, a national award which recognized excellence in teaching and educational leadership.

Margo Dunn, actor, writer, feminist and owner of Ariel Books, has been an active force in the Vancouver women's movement since 1966. She participated in the Abortion Caravan to Ottawa in 1970, acted in guerrilla theatre, and taught Women's Studies at Vancouver City College Langara.

Born in Montreal, on March 17, 1944, Ms. Dunn completed a BA in English from Marianopolis College (de l'Universite de Montreal) in 1964. In 1966, she moved to Vancouver and attended Simon Fraser University from 1968 to 1970 working towards an MA in English. Ms. Dunn returned to SFU in 1974 and 1975 to finish work on her MA thesis, "The Development of Narrative in the Writing of Isabella Valency Crawford." From 1977 to 1979 she worked as an editor and taught drama at the University of New Brunswick. She also ran in the 1978 New Brunswick provincial election as a candidate for the NDP. Ms. Dunn has also taught women's studies at VCC-Langara in Vancouver from 1980 to 1990. Ms. Dunn is also a writer and editor; she edited the publication Makara in the 1970s and Room of Ones Own, in the early 1980s. In addition to her professional activities, Margo Dunn is an unofficial record-keeper of the Vancouver women's movement. She collected and stored material that she felt was important to record women's activities in the struggle for freedom and equality. In this role, she was sought out by representatives of various women's organizations and individuals to store and preserve their records.

More recently, Ms. Dunn has been a columnist for X'tra West and Angles. She also contributes opinion and editorial pieces for the gay and lesbian television programs, Prism and, later, Outlook. She also writes and performs her own work and has resumed her early profession as an actor.

Duthie Books Ltd. was founded in 1957 by Bill Duthie (1920-1984), who worked as a publisher's representative in Western Canada prior to becoming a bookseller. In 1982, Bill and Mary Frances Macneill's daughter Celia Duthie took over as president and CEO, with siblings David Duthie and Cathy Legate serving as members of the board of directors.

The first Duthie Books location was on Robson Street in Vancouver, British Columbia. The company supplied books in different languages to the general trade market and through Macneill Library Service, its wholesale library division, which distributed to school and university and public libraries. Duthie Books published a quarterly book review journal entitled "The Reader," from 1981-1995; this was relaunched as "The New Reader" in 1996 and ceased publication in 1999.

In 1997, Duthie Books acquired Bollum's Books out of receivership. Duthie Books won "Chain Bookstore of the Year" from the Canadian Booksellers Association in 1998. In 1999, Duthie Books Ltd. underwent a strategic planning and restructuring process, and went from a peak of ten locations across Vancouver, to a single store in Kitsilano. This last Duthie Books location closed its doors in 2010.

Duthie Books Ltd. was a supporter of BC and Canadian authors and publishers; the company fostered a knowledgeable reading public and a vibrant book culture in the city of Vancouver for fifty-three years. Over those years Duthie Books worked with fine printers and artists like Takao Tanabe and Bob Reid to produce beautifully designed and printed bookmarks; these are gathered into a book entitled Duthie's Bookmarks, published in 2007 by the Alcuin Society.

The East Enders Society was a private social service group which worked to aid women in Vancouver's East Side neighbourhoods from 1965 to 1993.

The group was initiated by Mrs. May Gutteridge, a social worker at St. James Anglican Church in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver. In 1964, at the request of Anglican Bishop Godfrey Gower, she extended her work to include assisting native women in the courts. Through this work she saw a need for a women's hostel in Vancouver's East End. The East Enders Society was then established to provide this hostel and other services. The Society was incorporated March 24, 1965, with early members including Mrs. M. Gutteridge, Mrs. M. White, Mrs. S. Ainsworth, Miss P. Dale, Mrs. K. Arens, Mrs. M. Beckett, Miss D. Oikawa. To raise funds for the Society, a "Dollar Club" was formed, in which members contributed one dollar each month towards the Society. The East Enders were also assisted by Mary Southin (a lawyer who provided free legal advice), the United Church Women, the Anglican Church Women's Auxiliary, the Soroptomists, the Fresco Club, and various Lions Clubs. A donation of $10,000 was also received from two anonymous women from the United Church, which went toward the purchase of a rooming house at 883 East Hastings. The rooming house was refurbished and opened as a hostel in May 1965, with Mrs. Margaret White hired as matron to live at the hostel full-time. The hostel provided temporary shelter for a number of women in the Downtown Eastside. Often, women charged with drunkenness and vagrancy would be given suspended sentences, on the condition that they go to the East Enders hostel. The Society also received a monthly grant from the provincial government to hire a social worker to assist women arriving at the hostel. This hostel (sometimes referred to as the Lodge) operated for five years, then moved to 1656 East 4th Avenue, when the Hastings Street building was demolished as part of an urban renewal program. This second lodge was later sold in the mid-1970s to the Mental Patients Association, who operated it as a halfway house.

To meet the social needs of women in the area, a Women's Centre was opened at 342 East Hastings Street in 1967. The Centre provided typewriters, sewing machines, steam irons, hair washing and drying facilities, a television, a radio, a turntable, and children's toys and games. Volunteers at the Centre served tea daily, held monthly birthday parties and sponsored demonstrations and talks. This Centre later moved to 217 Dunlevy Avenue, and eventually closed in the mid-1970s.

By 1970, several other hostels were operating in the Downtown Eastside area, and social services agencies from the City of Vancouver began to request that the hostel accept long-term guests. As a result, in 1971, the hostel began taking in women who had been discharged from hospitals, but were not yet ready to live on their own.

By 1971, the Society saw a need for low-income housing for women, and began to press for the provision of such housing. In 1972, it worked to have women included in Oppenheimer Lodge (a senior citizens' housing project built by the City of Vancouver). It also assisted in the planning of other housing projects for low income women (Bauer Villa and Adanac Place). In 1974, members of the East Enders Society joined with members of the Amherst Lions Society to form the “East-Enders Amherst Lions Housing Society” to work toward providing affordable housing for senior citizens. This Society then obtained property on 3433 Renfrew St. (between 18th and 19th Avenues), where they constructed Renfrew Park Manor, a 41-unit senior citizens housing development. In the late 1970s, the Society became involved in the Franklin House Society to purchase and refurbish a vacant apartment building on 1721 Franklin Street. Two members of the East Enders Society (Margaret Davies and Mary Kelly) were executive members of the Franklin House Society, and the East Enders provided many furnishings and appliances for the building.

During the 1970s, income generated by term deposits allowed the Society to support various agencies providing housing and other services to low income women. By 1978, the Society was donating money to agencies such as Powell Place, the Y.W.C.A., Charlsford House, the Makwalla Native Women's Association, T.R.A.C.Y. (Taking Responsible Action for Children and Youth), and others.

In the 1990s, the Society began to discuss its own dissolution, and plan for distributing its assets. After accepting proposals and discussing various distribution plans, the Society was presented with a request by the Owl House Society (later renamed the Vi Fineday House Society) for financial assistance to install a $22,000 sprinkler system in the house they had just purchased for use as a shelter. The East Enders Society eventually covered the entire cost of this system, which totaled $26,827.05. Early in 1993, the Society received a proposal from the Kettle Society for a service centre for women with mental health disabilities, and it was decided that the majority of the remaining assets would go to this group. Smaller donations from the group's assets were made to Charlsford House, Children's Foundation, First United Church, St. James Anglican Church, and the Sisters of the Atonement. On October 7, 1993, the Society applied for dissolution under the Societies Act, and was formally dissolved on March 4, 1994.