Leslie Fryers attributes her success in the male-dominated field of law to her educational foundation in liberal arts at Loyola College.
“I loved every minute of it,” says Fryers of Loyola, one of Concordia’s founding institutions. “It was a tremendous base for taking law.”
She recalls the classroom’s silence when professor Henry Habib spoke. Habib founded the Department of Political Science at Loyola in 1961, seven years before Fryers arrived on campus. Habib was named a Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Political Science, in 1999 and still teaches at Concordia.
As a student in honours political science in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, Fryers remembers Habib’s strong presence in the classroom. “He was a fabulous speaker,” she recounts. “So knowledgeable. You could hear a pin drop.”
Fryers was born in Winnipeg. When her father died young, her mother, with three girls at home, went from being a housewife to a working single mom. Her mother remarried and that eventually brought the small family to Quebec City.
Barely 12 at the time, Fryers didn’t speak French and therefore attended Marymount College in English in Quebec City.
When it came time to further her education, her sister Jill was already attending Loyola and many of her classmates were enrolling there as well, so she did the same. Interested in everything from economics to political history, she signed up for a diverse range of classes.
“It was very much a liberal arts education and I think that was the joy in my years at Loyola,” Fryers says. “It was an absolutely wonderful opportunity to learn as much as you can about as much as you can, and I believe that liberal arts education was really foundational for me.”
All in
At Loyola, she learned about “giving your all” and being passionate about what she is doing in life. That mindset is something she carried with her “through thick and thin” as she moved on in her education and career.
“I think you can’t be your best unless you are passionate about what it is you’re doing,” Fryers says. “You need that passion, and I think I saw it there with my professors. They were committed to what they were doing. I really enjoyed my classes.”
She went on to study common law at McGill University and graduated in 1975. By 1977, she and her new husband were headed to the then-booming Calgary to take on roles in the field of oil and gas. It was a big change for Fryers to move west, yet she’s been there ever since. She practiced law largely in the area of mergers and acquisitions until her retirement two years ago.
Fryers got her start with what is now called Dentons Canada LLP, an international law firm. At the time, the firm was local and known as Fenerty Robertson. With nearly 30 lawyers, it was considered a large law office at the time.
“I came in as the only woman in the firm and I was told by one of the partners that, as a woman, I would have to work twice as hard as the men,” she says. “I planned to do that anyway, so it didn’t matter.”
She enjoyed the firm, although it was more into litigation while she was interested in commercial law. In 1978, she joined Ballem McDill & MacInnes and stayed there for nearly three decades, establishing herself as a partner in 1981.
The firm merged with Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP in 2001 and, in 2005, she moved over to the Walton Group of Companies to serve as executive vice president of Law.
Fryers retired in 2015, although she has not stopped volunteering. For the fifth year running, she is a member of UNICEF’s Patrons’ Council in Calgary, hosting an annual Water For Life Gala to raising funds to bring clean water to the world’s children who lack a safe, potable source.
“I do think it is critical to give back,” says Fryers. “We have a duty to do so. It is not a question of will I or won’t I. I think it is really important to do what you can, however large or small.”
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Related links
- Department of Political Science
- Great Concordian: Henry Habib
- UNICEF Canada