Margaret (Peggy) Eleanor Smith-McCallum of Thunder Bay, Ontario passed away at 92 years at the Hospice at St. Joseph’s Hospital, where she was born.
Daughter of Mary Harriet Dufault and John (Jack) Reed, Peggy spent most of her life in the Thunder Bay area, telling many stories of the people and goings on in Oliver Township, Schreiber, Kakabeka, O’Connor, Nolalu, Port Arthur and Fort William.
Our mother and Gran was a true matriarch who, despite fierce challenges, always put her family and her faith as a devout Catholic first. Over the years she worked at various jobs outside of the home as an office clerk and bank teller, especially enjoying her time at the Kakabeka Credit Union until retiring in her 70’s.
Mom took great pride and pleasure in her home and gardens, cooking and baking, needlework, games and family gatherings. She savoured Saturday’s Chronicle-Journal, going first to the Passages page (to make sure she wasn’t in it) and then on to the crosswords and cryptograms. In recent years she added milkweed to her gardens to nurture monarch caterpillars. In 2022, she raised and released over 160 butterflies!
Peggy is survived by her five children—Margaret (Peggy) Anne Smith, Mary Alice Smith-Morrison, Edward Dewey Smith, Virginia Antoniak (Michael), and Marcel Smith (Holly)—and her late husband Cecil’s children Matthew, Mitchell and Mandy; grandchildren Willow and Jesse Fiddler (Angie), Danielle Morrison-Angeconeb (Blake), Madison Wheeler-Shepstone (Gerald), Marielle, Sebastien and Amelie Latour-Smith, Jessie Park (Frankie) and John Antoniak (Erinn), Robin Smith and Dylan (Meghan) Smith, as well as children of the late Joseph Morrison; great-grandchildren Elena, Anika and Jonas, Miles and Lee, Felix, Cash and Grace, Avery Isabel, Shawn, Mya and Keenan, Evie, Joseph and Animkii, and Amelia, and great-great grandchildren Jacob and Jesse. She is also survived by her sisters Catherine (Kate) Manelick and Mary (Mickey) Malcolm, her sister-in-law Gail Koivu and brother-in-law Roy Smith. She was a cherished aunt to many nieces and nephews.
She was predeceased by her parents, her husband Cecil McCallum, the father of her children Eddie Smith, her brother John William (Bill) Reed, her sisters Hazel Anne (Butch) Reed and Ellen Eickmeier, her grandson Lee Antoniak and her son-in-law Joseph Morrison.
There will be a celebratory Mass at St. Margaret’s Church on Clayte Street at 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, September 12, 2024.
Memorials or donations may be made to the St. Joseph’s Care Group. The family deeply appreciates the professionalism and kindness shown to Peggy by the Hospice staff in her final days.
Online condolences may be expressed at www.sargentandson.com.
