Jean McBean fought for women’s rights as trailblazing lawyer

Jean McBean

EDMONTON — In the early 1980s, when law offices were the domain of men in dark suits, Jean McBean took a notion and opened Edmonton’s first all-female law firm where the children of the four lawyer moms could come after school to do their homework.
The firm’s specialty was family law in an era when the battle for women’s equality was transforming divorce, child custody and rules for sharing property after marriage breakups. McBean Becker Cochard and Gordon was on the cutting edge of this major social change.
Yes, you might find toast crusts stuffed into computers or kid-size finger smudges on the boardroom table, recalls former law partner Marie Gordon. But McBean and company were determined to show women could be excellent lawyers and moms and have a family life, too — a radical notion at the time.
That wasn’t the only radical notion McBean took up. An influential figure in Edmonton legal circles, Jean McBean was a committed reformer for social justice. She wanted a fairer system of family law and went to the Supreme Court of Canada, lobbied cabinet ministers, wrote books and lectured across the country about dramatic changes of the 1970s — from marriage contracts to maternity leave.
She took on other jobs, too — lay minister at a Unitarian church, community volunteer, a one-time New Democrat candidate for Parliament, a mother to two girls with her husband, John Worton, also an Edmonton lawyer.
Her last job, which caused her to close her law practice and move to Victoria in 2008, was as a devoted grandmother to two boys, Oliver and Finnigan, the children of her daughter Jane and husband Greg Awai.
McBean died April 7 in Victoria from cancer. She was 63.
Born in London, England, in 1948, McBean came to Edmonton as a young girl of working-class parents. Her father believed in education for girls as teachers and nurses. A friendly priest intervened and McBean ended up with a law degree in 1972 from the University of Alberta.
At the time, no-fault divorce didn’t exist, divorced women had no right to a share in the family home and the U of A law school had some strange customs (more on that later).
Then came the Murdoch case — southern Alberta rancher Irene Murdoch, who was denied a share of the ranch post-divorce despite years of running it — and it sparked a revolution across the country.
By the 1980, almost every province had revamped matrimonial property laws and, in Alberta, McBean played a key role in these changes.
Her husband of 44 years, John Worton, says McBean’s work on Alberta’s new Matrimonial Property Act, along with a handful of other young female Edmonton lawyers, was probably her biggest achievement.
Daughter Bevin agrees.
“At the end of the day, what she wanted was fairness, a better deal for families,” said Bevin, noting that McBean represented both mothers and fathers in her practice.
“Her approach was, if something was wrong, there had to be change.”
And she was fearless in tackling change, says John, recalling the story of the naked women photos at the U of A law school.
In those pre-feminist days, law students would post pictures of naked women from a certain magazine on announcements for law school social events. The Christmas Party poster, put in the library, might carry the full frontal nudity of Miss December.
McBean and a handful of women decided that should stop. When their request was turned down, they decided to fight fire with fire.
But to find pictures of naked men was impossible in pre-Playgirl days.
So Jean, a young student in her 20s, went on a mission to the less desirable parts of 97th Street. In an adult shop, she asked for photos of naked men, scandalizing the male shopkeeper who insisted she was in the wrong store.
“But the woman behind the counter quietly pulled out some photos held discreetly behind on a shelf,” recalls Worton.
Back at the law school, the women students made new posters with the male photos and tried to post them. Of course, they were accused of posting smut.
“There was fury in the law school,” Worton said. But that was the last time nude of photos of anyone were used.
The family lived in Bonnie Doon near Mill Creek, except for a couple of years in the late 1980s when Jean went to Montreal with her two daughters do a master’s degree at McGill University.
Big-hearted and practical, “she could not bear to see a child in distress,” recalls Bevin. So she opened their home to teenagers who needed support.
Driven by her strong beliefs in social justice, McBean joined the New Democrats. In fact, she met her husband at a social event for Young New Democrats in 1968.
In 1990, McBean served on Alberta’s electoral boundaries commission when the ND party was official Opposition. She became party president while Ray Martin was party leader. But times were about to change. In the 1993 election, the New Democrats were wiped out, losing all 15 of their legislature seats.
“It was devastating, but Jean was a stalwart and kept the party together while it regrouped,” said Martin.
At a memorial service, Bevin heard an amusing story about her mom, who loved opera, theatre and the symphony.
When the Worton-McBeans donated a chair to the Winspear Centre, Jean thought it was too ostentatious to have their names inscribed on their gift. Instead, she wanted the words “Till we have built Jerusalem.”
Winspear fundraisers were flummoxed. Was this lefty couple perpetrating some kind of hidden political message on their chair?
The crisis passed when a fellow lawyer explained the words came from a well-known English hymn, based on a poem by poet William Blake. It was McBean’s favourite hymn and it featured prominently in her memorial service in Victoria last week.
“She was my love and my most constant companion,” said John, 65. “We loved many of the same things and did so much together.”
A celebration of her life will take place on Friday, May 11, at the north Unitarian Church in Edmonton.