Consumer advocate.
Born at Winnipeg on 25 April 1927, daughter of Ida Bernice Whipple (1892-1984) and Thomas Alexander Pincock, the family moved to Brandon where her father was Superintendent of the Brandon Mental Hospital. They returned to Winnipeg in the early 1940s and she completed high school at Gordon Bell High School. During the last year of the Second World War, she joined the Canadian Womens Army Corps and served in western Canada.
In August 1947, she married Alfred “Al” Friesen (1923-2007) and they had four daughters and two sons, living in the St. James area of Winnipeg since 1952. She spent over 30 years with the Consumers Association of Canada, serving as President, Treasurer, and Chair of Committees on Food, Health, Safety, Toys, Consumer Problems, Publicity, and Education. Her views were regularly sought by reporters for newspapers, television, and radio, and by local and national politicians. She worked closedly with pharmacists associations to formulae a drug caution code. She was a member of the arbitration program for the Better Business Bureau. In recognition of her service, she received a 125th Anniversary of Canadian Confederation Medal (1992).
She died at the Grace General Hospital on 4 May 1998.
Obituary, Winnipeg Free Press, 5 May 1998, page 36.
Obituary [Alfred Friesen], Winnipeg Free Press, 10 July 2007.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 2 January 2026
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