PICKFORD, Linda (nee Markle)

Let us be blunt: Linda Markle Pickford was a force.

Persistent is one way of describing Linda's passion forsocial justice issues, particularly affordable housing. Some (fondly) called her overbearing. Others, such as the municipal leader who Linda clearly had onspeed dial, were aware of the aforementioned traits but added prescient to that adjective list.

Linda was a wonderfully bossy lifelong friend to a gang of women who grew up in Windsor. "We're all very independent and no one took offence," one friend said of Linda's ability to stir up trouble – the good kind.

In the 1950s, when women were pressured to pursue husbands, Linda convinced one of those girlfriends to quit her job so they could travel the world together, which is exactly what they did.

Perhaps the woman Linda became was the result of time and place, including her birth order as Dolly and Victor Markle's third daughter, born in Windsor's Metropolitan Hospital on July 29 (a Leo!) in 1939, shortly before the start of World War Two. Dolly was a homemaker and Victor was a tool and die worker for Ford. They already had two much older daughters, the studious Beverly and Patricia, the fashionista.

Linda grew up on Turner Rd., staying outside until all hours with other kids whose fathers worked at the nearby auto plant. Like Linda's dad, these workers quietly played their part in the war effort that produced the Commonwealth's land-based military vehicles.  

It was a street of typical Windsor homes, with heavy brick facades, front porches and an alley in the back. The Markle house had a peach tree producing such an abundance that Linda-the-child strolled the streets with a wagon full of fruit, selling to neighbours.

Like her older sisters, Linda attended Hugh Beaton School but instead of following their path to Walkerville Collegiate, she chose W.D. Lowe Vocational School. Upon graduation, she got a job offer from Hiram Walker and Sons Ltd. and started in the mail room before joining the accounting department.

Loyal to her father's employer, Linda's first car was a turquoise and white 1955 Ford, a four-door, with lots of room for her girlfriends who she drove around Ontario and Michigan, mostly to the lakes for swimming.   

If the war loomed large in the memory of her older sisters, the names of beach battles in Europe did not resonate with the much younger Linda who, after five years of work, left for Europe with her girlfriend. Travelling by ship to England, they visited Germany, Italy, France, Spain and Morocco, ending up in Greece, a country that Linda loved. For decades, she wrote letters to a male Greek "friend," a mystery that her nieces later enjoyed.

A frequent bridesmaid, Linda was also an active aunt to Patricia's children, Cheryl, Susan, Mark and Rachel and Beverly's daughters, Megan and Moira. She once took Cheryl and Susan across the river to Detroit for a Sonny and Cher concert. "They never forgot it!" she liked to say.

But in 1969, Linda donned a white dress and married Patrick Pickford, an engineer working at Chrysler in Windsor. They settled in a little cottage with a dog named Tippy but her travels began anew when Patrick got a job offer in Saudi Arabia, where they would live for two years.  After returning, she continued her role as "Auntie Linda," not just to her sisters' children but she was also deeply involved in the lives of Patrick's niece, Kelly, and nephews Scott, Jay and Darren.

It was in the mid-1980s that Linda and Patrick moved to the Sarnia area where her work on social justice issues began, first with the Lambton chapter of the Multiple Sclerosis organization and later, with Habitat for Humanity.

Linda served as Habitat's chair for a decade, retiring in 2010 but recognizing the need for a "new" approach to government-supported homes, she carried on the fight by supporting non-profit and co-operative housing groups. After her next employer, an agency serving the rental market in Sarnia – Lambton lost its funding, Linda started a housing service charging a fee to rental property owners looking for clients.

She helped numerous new immigrants settle in Sarnia, including Syrian refugees, many of whom she befriended and watched as their children started school, joining hockey and soccer teams.

Over the years, Linda contacted Sarnia Mayor Mike Bradley –often – to share her views on the issues she supported. These conversations continued, even after she moved to a retirement community in Petrolia.

"Linda," Bradley wrote after learning of her passing, "was truly committed to social justice and housing and knew that the key on many issues, from addictions to mental health, was housing, housing and housing.

"Her passion she wore proudly and could be persistent and aggressive on issues," he said. "In the end Linda did get results."

In 2003, Bradley recognized Linda and her advocacy, placing her name on the Mayor's Honour List.

Her work, he said, is more important than ever, given the "desperate" shortage of affordable housing.

"Linda was ahead of her time."

In early September, at the age of 87, Linda fell in her home, breaking her hip and dislocating her shoulder. She died in Sarnia's Bluewater Hospital on September 30 with her eldest niece, Cheryl Rogers, at her side.  

A celebration of life for Linda Pickford will be held in Petrolia on October 17, 2026, from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. at Victoria Hall, 411 Greenfield St. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to Habitat for Humanity.  

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