Journalist, art educator, broadcaster.
Born at Canora, Saskatchewan on 10 July 1914, the youngest of the six children of Cecilia Mildred Diner (1888-1951) and Samuel Cohen (1878-1952), her childhood was spent there as her parents operated the Canora Hotel, established in 1910. Her family were active in the Jewish community and the Shaarey Zedek congregation. In 1926, the Cohen family moved to Winnipeg, where her father built the Brooklands Hotel on Keewatin Street, which became a hub for extended family gatherings during the Great Depression.
In 1932, she graduated from Daniel McIntyre Collegiate where she edited and wrote for the yearbook and was President of her class. After attending the University of Manitoba, she moved to Toronto, Ontario during the Second World War to work as a journalist. She was promoted to Department Editor on Industrial Canada magazine, a breakthrough for a woman in that era.
Returning to Winnipeg in 1946, she married Milton Rabinovitch (1909-2001) that year and then moved with him to his hometown of Morden where he operated a clothing store. During their 13 years there, she was involved in the Morden Little Theatre and the Order of the Eastern Star, besides raising a son and twin daughters. Relocating to Winnipeg with her family in 1959, she joined the Women's Committee of the Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG) and became active as an art educator in the schools. In 1968, she hosted artists and critics from across North America as chair of the Eleventh Winnipeg Show, a major regional event held at the WAG in November of that year that featured modern and experimental sculpture. She eventually became known as an art consultant, advocating for Canadian artists and promoting their work. She was also for many years a popular art teacher for the Winnipeg School Division.
In the early 1970s she began a new career as a writer-broadcaster for CBC Radio, interviewing prominent figures, including Virginia Satir, Susan Sontag, Judy Chicago, and Hans Selye. She wrote and produced documentaries on historic Winnipeg personalities such as Ralph Connor, judge Lewis Stubbs, and John MacAulay. Her wide-ranging documentary subjects include a history of Manitoba small-town newspapers, playing bridge as an obsession, women and aging, and the ethnic recording industry in Canada. Among other honours, she was awarded first prize by the Media Club of Canada for her documentary Cora Hind: Woman of the West, and was nominated for an award for her documentary on Ralph Connor by ACTRA (Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television, and Radio Artists). Her extensive body of work was donated to the University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections.
She died at Winnipeg on 2 December 2012 and was buried in the Shaarey Zedek Cemetery.
“Sculptors in the Prairie Provinces,” Vie des Arts, Spring 1969.
Obituary [Milton Rabinovitch], Winnipeg Free Press, 21 August 2001.
Obituary, Winnipeg Free Press, 4 October 2012.
“Sheila (Stella) Rabinovitch.,” Shragge Family Website, MyHeritage.
This page was prepared by Lois Braun.
Page revised: 15 August 2026
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