Annie Robertson Logan

1851-1933

Annie Robertson (MacFarlane) Logan was born on 9 March 1851 in Saint John, New Brunswick.  Logan attended the Provincial Normal School in Fredericton, where she housed with the Reverend Mr. Brook. Later, Logan moved to New York where she kept house for her brother, Wallace, who was appointed the US District Attorney by Theodore Roosevelt. During her stay in New York, she wrote for various periodicals, including Scribner’s Magazine, The Saturday Evening Post, and most notably for The Nation (as a literary critic). Her only novel, Children of the Earth, was published under her maiden name in 1886. Sometime later, she was sent to Montreal to write a series of sketches on French Canadians for Scribner’s Magazine. There she met John Edward Logan, a poet commonly known as “Barry Dane,” in September 1889 and permanently relocated to Montreal.  In Montreal, Logan continued to write for The Nation. In 1908, she also published her sole work of history—An Account of the Exploration and Discoveries of Samuel de Champlain, and of the Founding of Québec—in celebration of Quebec’s 300th anniversary. The chapbook was published under the name Mrs. J.E. Logan and was dedicated to Governor General Earl Grey. With the death of her husband in 1915, Mrs. Logan travelled between Ireland, Bermuda, and her Montreal home. In 1930, she donated eight thousand dollars to the University of New Brunswick in the name of her brother to establish the William Stuart MacFarlane Classics Prize. Logan died in Montreal on her 82nd birthday, 9 March 1933.

Predominant New Brunswick Residences:

Saint John