Ruth Haig

• Born in Mildmay, Ontario, 18 September 1928
• Registered X-ray Technologist (1954); worked in Hamilton and at DOFASCO
• Joined the CSCL and the Hamilton Leather Guild in 1962, from a night-school leather course under Irva Ford
• Associate of the CSCL, 1966; Fellow, 1985; Life Member, 1991
• Weston Trophy inter-branch winner across eleven years between 1965 and 1994
• Michigan Leather Award (1980) and Irva Ford Award (1984, best moulded-leather article)
• Twenty articles and twenty ribbons at the Canadian National Exhibition, 1977–1981
• Charter member of the TEXTURES craft co-op, Hamilton (1983); World Craft Council conferences, Vienna (1980) and Vancouver (1986)

Ruth Matilda Haig came to leatherwork by way of radiography. Born on 18 September 1928 and raised in Mildmay, Ontario, she qualified as a Registered X-ray Technologist in 1954 and spent her working life in Hamilton’s hospitals and at DOFASCO. In 1962 she enrolled in an eight-year leather course at the Hamilton night school under Irva Ford — herself a Fellow, and the namesake of the Society’s moulded-leather award — and joined the Canadian Society for Creative Leathercraft the same year. (Her own résumé and a tribute printed in the Society’s newsletter both give her birth only as “the early 1930s”; the fuller date above follows her published obituary, which is also consistent with its own statement that she died “in her 83rd year.”)

Over the next three decades she became one of the Society’s most decorated competitors. She won articles in the Weston Trophy inter-branch competition across eleven years between 1965 and 1994, took the Michigan Leather Award in 1980 and the Irva Ford Award in 1984 for a moulded-leather article, and entered twenty pieces at the Canadian National Exhibition between 1977 and 1981, winning twenty ribbons. Her work was shown in the Leather ’72 through Leather ’94 gallery exhibitions and at the Ontario Crafts Council; she conducted leather workshops in Buffalo and Rochester, New York, and attended World Craft Council conferences in Vienna and Vancouver.

She was made an Associate of the CSCL in 1966, a Fellow in 1985, and a Life Member in 1991, and volunteered on the Society’s booth committee at the Canadian National Exhibition.

The newsletters of the early 1990s show her at the centre of the Society’s working life. She had served as the Society’s President — the 1991–92 slate lists her as Past President, immediately before Don MacLeod — and signed that slate as its Nominating Committee chair. She led the Society’s workshops of the era: lasted boxes at St. Margaret’s Church, Hamilton, in September 1992, and the Society workshop of 16 November 1991 (moulded credit-card holders), at St. Margaret’s Anglican Church, Hamilton. She wrote “The Ranger Belt”, with its hand-drawn assembly sheets, for the Fall 1993 newsletter. In competition she remained formidable: Craftsman ribbons in 1993 for a card case, a Maple Leaf tray and a belt; a braided belt among Hamilton’s winning Weston Trophy entries — the judges’ critique calls it a 5-strand belt and the sketch page a belt of 8 strand braid, and both counts are kept as printed; and the Irva Ford Award of 1993 for a moulded box with black design on the lid — the award named for the teacher under whom she had first studied leather.

Ruth Matilda Haig died in her 83rd year, predeceased by her husband Alvin Haig, himself an Associate of the Society. The Society’s Fall 2011 newsletter gives 1 September 2011, at Dundas; her published obituary (Marlatt Funeral Home, Swackhamer Chapel) gives 3 September 2011, at St. Joseph’s Hospital, Hamilton. Both are kept as printed.

Compiled from Ruth Haig’s own résumé, prepared in 2005, the Society’s records, and her published obituary (September 2011).