Frances Shelley Wees

Frances Shelley Wees (April 29, 1902 – November 27, 1982) was an American-Canadian educator and writer.

Life Wees was born in Gresham, Oregon and later moved to Saskatoon where she attended normal school. She began teaching when she was seventeen. Wees received a BA from the University of Alberta; during this time, she wrote her first novel which remained unpublished.

Having always been a writer, one of Wees' early manuscripts was found by her husband who later typed it and sent it to a New York publisher. This novel ended up selling 50,316 copies.

She also published readers for primary school and contributed serial fiction, poems and articles to various publications. One of the recurring characters in her novels was psychologist Dr. Jonathan Merrill. Merrill would aid the police in solving the crime. The character was based on her friend and public relations pioneer, James Alexander Cowan.

Family In 1924, she married Wilfred Rusk Wees; the couple had two children, Margarita and Timothy. In 1933, the couple moved to Toronto where Dr. Wees began studying psychology at the University of Toronto; he later accepted a teaching position at the university. The family owned two homes whilst living in Toronto, one in the city and one 35 miles out. During the war, Dr. Wees became head of the personnel selection for the Canadian Army overseas and later became director of training for Veteran's Affairs.

She spent 30 years in Stouffville, Ontario before moving to Denman Island in British Columbia in 1981. Wees died there at the age of 80.