Ferne Cristall.Courtesy of family
Ferne Cristall: Mentor. Mensch. Mother. Teacher. Born Aug. 10, 1954, in Brandon, Man.; died April 29, 2025, in Peterborough, Ont., from cancer; aged 70.
Family lore has it that when Gary Cristall opened his schmatta business selling workingman’s clothing in Brandon, Man., he insisted that he had a good reason for naming it the New System Store in 1912: When the revolution came marching along downtown Rosser Street, they’d know which side he was on.
Ferne Cristall would echo her grandfather’s line. Her parents, she once wrote, “started me off in ‘red diapers’ and stirred my desire for a socially just world.”
Ferne’s mother Ellie taught mathematics at Brandon University while her father Arthur ran the family store.
The Cristall household was a busy, welcoming place that didn’t hesitate to take in strangers. Once Ellie went to court to defend a couple of hitchhikers who had been arrested while passing through the small Prairie city.
“I was a Jewish kid with an agnostic mother and atheist father in a Christian town,” Ferne recalled.
She was so accustomed to her secular community that immersion in a Jewish milieu was beyond her. An often told family story was Ferne’s stay at B’Nai Brith summer camp as a young teen. Ferne confessed, quite innocently, to her fellow campers: “I’m Jewish.”
In 1971, Ferne headed to Trent University where she studied anthropology, taking time off for extensive travel before graduating in 1978. During her travel, she found herself in Guatemala when a massive earthquake killed more than 24,000 people. Ferne did not leave but stayed to help with the recovery effort. Through her passion for the common good, her everyday life showed how ideas about social change could be put into practice.
In 1978 Ferne joined the Development Education Centre (DEC), a Toronto group rooted in 1960s New Left politics dedicated to fighting global inequality. Ferne worked in DEC Films, distributing documentaries across Canada.
Meeting Robert Clarke at DEC sparked a 45-year relationship that combined Ferne’s magnetic, outgoing personality with Rob’s wry, understated persona. Robert had a daughter, Gabrielle (Gabe), from a previous marriage. Their son Jonah was born in 1983.
The family moved to Peterborough, Robert’s hometown, in 1990. Ferne commuted to the University of Toronto to get her Bachelor of Education the following year.
Her teaching career at Peterborough Collegiate and Vocational School (PCVS) focused on helping English language learners, particularly newcomers whose confidence she had an uncanny knack for bolstering.
She had a remarkable capacity for listening but a lot of trouble making decisions at the grocery store. Gabe recalls perhaps too much time needed to select just the right peach, or watermelon, or apples, or head of lettuce…
No one could drop by Ferne’s home without being greeted by a cornucopia of baked treats, fresh vegetables, fancy crackers, cheeses. Whatever she had at hand. She always welcomed friends of Jonah and Gabrielle. A friend of Gabe’s recalled that Ferne was “the only real parent in a sea of distracted boomers. … The only one who had a clue what was going on with us.”
Ferne was a fixture in the local film, music and theatre scenes. She was an indispensable volunteer at Peterborough’s ReFrame Film Festival, and specialized in programming documentaries. Given her lived experience, she had a particular interest in organizing panels and screenings on gender-based violence.
Ferne also co-authored books about women’s films and was a leader of Peterborough’s refugee sponsorship community.
Ferne unfailingly thought the best of others. She could sometimes be a soft touch for a hard luck story, unhesitatingly doling out cash to anyone in need.
Diagnosed with cancer in 2024, Ferne underwent every possible treatment and wouldn’t give up even as the end approached. She kept on screening documentaries for the 2025 ReFrame festival.
Ferne remained at home for as long as she could. Meals and generosity overflowed. Jonah had to maintain a spreadsheet to organize the volume of visiting well-wishers and their casseroles.
Through it all, Ferne kept apologizing for causing so much trouble. Coming from a woman so accustomed to giving, the beguiling paradox wasn’t lost on those who knew her well.
Jamie Swift is Ferne Cristall’s friend.
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