Mary Rogers

Mary Rogers

Mary (born Mary Isabella) Rogers (born Angus). Arts patron, born Manchester 12 Mar 1869, died Vancouver 14 Oct 1965. Mary Isabella Angus acquired her love of music from her mother's family (Fairweather) and as a girl learned to play the violin. With her parents she moved as a child to Toronto and at about 16 to Victoria where she later taught school. She settled permanently in Vancouver after her marriage in 1892 to Benjamin Tingley Rogers, who became the founder of the BC Sugar Refinery.

Mary Rogers was deeply committed to the encouragement of musical life in Vancouver. From the 1930s to the 1950s she gave considerable financial and moral support to the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, thus ensuring its survival and development. She was an initiator of the Vancouver Woman's Musical Club and backed Lily Laverock and other impresarios in their efforts to present artists of international stature to Vancouver audiences. She adamantly shunned publicity, but was awarded the MBE (Member, Order of the British Empire) in 1946, in recognition of her dedication to music in Vancouver.

Her daughter Elspeth married Jan Cherniavsky.