Quote:
"I came to the [National Film] Board in June, 1942. I had been living in Millerton, New Brunswick, and Mr. Leonard O'Brien, an M.P. living in South Nelson not far away happened to see some movies I was attempting to make as an amateur. They were of a documentary nature: short 10-minute films of happenings in this Miramichi area. He thought my attempts looked promising and apparently told Mr. [John] Grierson about me, although I was not aware of this until I received an offer to go to the N.F.B. in Ottawa. [...] After a time, because I was somewhat familiar with using a camera, I was given various assignments. What really gave me my start was the fact that the N.F.B. had purchased some footage of the Island of Grand Manan. No one at the Board had been there, and I had, so they passed the footage over to me to edit. [...] And after that I was given various assignments as camerawoman: to do a film being produced by Gudrun Bjerring (now Gudrun Parker); to complete some footage necessary for a film on Prince Edward Island, etc. Then Grierson dispatched me to Halifax in 1945. I had a request to go down to the Nova Scotia Travel Bureau, and he said, 'The very thing you should do'. [...] Well, I worked there for 24 years. And the first few years, I was doing everything myself: carrying camera, shooting, scripting, editing; just everything. Sometimes I didn't know if I was going to sink or swim. The only good thing about it was that nobody else knew more than I did, and so it was just up to me. And I made out, and I enjoyed it. [...]"
-- Margaret Perry

Source:
Denisko, Olga, ed. 4 Days in May (6 to 9): Films, Workshops, Share and Exchange Ideas; A Report. Montreal: National Film Board of Canada, 1975. 'Photography - Mary Daemen, Karen Marginson, Ches Yetman. N.F.B. Archives, & 'women from the earliest years'. Drawings - Michael Didur, Blake James'. [report]