Regina Locals
In honour of Regina’s citizens and their achievements, REM is featuring five notable figures from our city’s history who have made a significant impact on the communities of Regina and the greater Saskatchewan area. Read more to learn about Regina Locals who have influenced politics, art, forensic sciences and African ancestry on the prairies!
Lewis and Lillie LaFayette (Far Left) and their 10 children, 1920s
Lewis LaFayette (1872-1945)
Lewis LaFayette was born in Iowa, U.S.A. in 1872 and is believed to be a descendant of the famous slave spy James Armistead, who chose the last name LaFayette from General Marquis de LaFayette when he was granted his freedom. James was a double spy for the Continental Army during the American Revolution. He acted as a double agent who fed false information to the British while accurately reporting events to the Americans including the activities of Benedict Arnold when he defected to the British side and Lord Charles Cornwallis during his planning for the siege of Yorktown. Lewis LaFayette married his wife Lillie in Iowa on February 25, 1903 and moved with her to Regina, Saskatchewan in 1906 along with his brother Golden and his first born Ernest. Lewis began homesteading near Fiske, Saskatchewan and later moved his family out to his farming operation there in 1911. It was a tough job as the land was being turned for the first time, and they had to deal with racism from locals. They prevailed and formed a twenty-two man harvesting crew along with Lewis’s brothers Golden and Jesse. The men were able to travel throughout Saskatchewan and help others in the district with getting their crops in the bins by sharing their equipment - a 1913 Waterloo steam engine, a 1927 gas engine and a 1929 International combine. Later on Lewis LaFayette also served the Saskatchewan community as a member of the Telephone Board at Fiske, the Saskatchewan Co-op Elevators group and the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool. Lewis and Lillie would have thirteen children but unfortunately only ten would survive past infancy; their names were Ernest, Karl, Homer, Anne, Glen, Edith, Earl, Lillian, Muriel and Daniel. Their descendants have lived in every Canadian province and territory, as well as twelve U.S. states and four countries. One of those descendants is Regina's Carol LaFayette-Boyd who is the Executive Director of the Saskatchewan African Canadian Heritage Museum.
Frances Gertrude McGill, 1955.
Frances Gertrude McGill (1882-1959)
Referred to as “the Sherlock Holmes of Saskatchewan” and a member of the Canadian Science and Engineering Hall of Fame is Frances Gertrude McGill. Born in Minnedosa, Manitoba, McGill was pronounced the provincial bacteriologist for the Saskatchewan Department of Health in 1918. She moved to Regina for the position where her lab and office was housed in the Saskatchewan Legislative building. Her initial work consisted of handling the local outbreak of the 1918 flu epidemic by producing flu vaccinations for over 60,000 Saskatchewan citizens while also treating WWI veterans for venereal diseases. She was appointed the provincial pathologist for Saskatchewan in 1920 and became the director of the provincial laboratory in 1922. As provincial pathologist she conducted over 64,000 laboratory examinations. In addition to this, she helped the RCMP solve suspicious cold cases where she solved numerous murders and crimes, even once travelling to the Arctic Circle to do so. She was instrumental in establishing the first official laboratory of forensic detections for the RCMP which opened in 1937. She ended up directing the laboratory where she also trained RCMP recruits in forensic detection methods. Alongside these amazing contributions to Canadian forensic pathology, she also opened a private allergy clinic out of her apartment and developed a polio serum. She became a leading specialist in bacteriology, criminology, forensic pathology and allergy research. McGill retired as the director of the RCMP forensic laboratory in 1946 and that year she was named Honorary Surgeon to the RCMP - she was the first woman to receive this title and the first female doctor to be officially acknowledged as a member of the RCMP. After her death a lake in northern Saskatchewan was named in her honour, McGill Lake.
Robert Ing, 1990s.
Roger Ing (1933-2008)
Born in a village outside Guangzhou, China in 1933, Roger Ing immigrated to Regina, Canada at 12, where his father opened a restaurant. Eventually, Ing opened his own cafe with his wife Mei called the New Utopia Cafe where he would end up creating the majority of his artwork. As he was growing up Ing learned the art of traditional bamboo brush painting and utilized those skills to influence his own artistic style that he referred to as “Rogerism”. His cafe and makeshift studio became a popular hub for artists and locals in Regina’s North Central neighborhood for 23 years. Throughout the 1980s/90s Ing’s Cafe was a Regina hangout spot for Saskatchewan artists such as Joe Fafard, Edward Pitras, Ernest Klinger, Sally Hui, Daniel E. Sali, Jack Severson, Lynda Walker, and Regina Five artist Arthur Mckay. Ing’s work was featured in many exhibitions including the Saskatchewan Arts Board show at the Mackenzie Art Gallery, The Bridge Gallery, and the Saskatchewan Cultural Exchange Society Club Gallery. In 1998 he had his first solo exhibition at the Mackenzie Art Gallery where they screened a documentary titled Roger Ing’s Utopia about himself and his artwork. The Mackenzie Art Gallery has two of Ing’s works in its permanent collection. During his lifetime he was influential in the Regina artistic community and was fondly remembered for his diverse art and unique fashion sense.
Simon De Jong, 2010.
Simon De Jong (1942-2011)
Simon De Jong was born in 1942 at Surabaya, Indonesia and spent the first three years of his life with his mother Dirkje and older brother Hielke in a Japanese concentration camp at Sidoarjo, Indonesia during the Japanese occupation of Java. At this time, the Japanese had incarcerated 3,000 women and children and only a third would survive through the war. His father was also a prisoner of war who hailed from the Netherlands. Miraculously, they were all reunited after the war and moved to his father’s homeland before they all immigrated to Regina, Canada in 1951. Despite originally not speaking English and having a stutter, De Jong trained himself in public speaking and became proficient at it. In 1964, he wrote a constitution for student empowerment as the head of the student union at the University of Regina which ignited campus unrest. After experiencing a series of sessions with LSD researcher Dr. Duncan Blewett, De Jong was inspired to cause positive societal change and moved to Vancouver to work for The Greater Vancouver Youth Communications Centre Society (otherwise known as Cool Aid) where he helped organize alternative health, work, housing and cultural programs for the city of Vancouver. De Jong returned to Regina in 1975 and eventually ran for NDP candidate in 1979. He won and would go on to serve for five terms, retiring undefeated in 1997. During his service he was the first member of parliament to raise public concerns about global warming and exposed the spraying of the toxic defoliant called Agent Orange in the province of New Brunswick by the U.S. military. Outside of politics, De Jong was a talented artist who worked with oils, watercolour, drawing and print. His artworks were featured in exhibitions including the Saskatchewan Arts Board, the Dunlop Art Gallery, the Mackenzie Art Gallery, and at private collections in North America and Europe.
Tatiana Maslany with her Primetime Emmy Award, 2016.
Tatiana Maslany (1985-Present)
Born in Regina in 1985, Tatiana Maslany has cemented herself as an accomplished Saskatchewan woman in the North American film industry. Starting with television roles in 1997 and having a debut film role in 2004, Maslany continued to be involved as an actress in cinematic productions since she was in high school. From 2003-2007 she was casted in productions at The Globe Theatre in Regina. She gained public recognition by starring in the science fiction thriller television series Orphan Black (2013-2017) which won her two Critics Choice Awards, five Canadian Screen Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award in 2016. She is the first Canadian to have won an Emmy in a major dramatic category for acting in a Canadian series. Maslany also starred in an NYC Broadway production of Network in 2019. But perhaps she is now most famous for her leading role as She-Hulk/Jennifer Walters in the Disney+ TV series She-Hulk: Attorney at Law that is set within the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Maslany also appeared in television series such as Heartland (2008–2010), The Nativity (2010), Being Erica (2009–2011),and Perry Mason (2020). Her other notable films include Diary of the Dead (2007), Eastern Promises (2007), The Vow (2012), Picture Day (2012), Cas and Dylan (2013), Woman in Gold (2015), Stronger (2017), and Destroyer (2018) as well as briefly featuring in two episodes of Parks and Recreation. She won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Actress due to her role in the romantic drama The Other Half (2016). Throughout her acting career Tatiana Maslany has won 23 awards and received 19 nominations.