Joanna Picken

Joanna Belfrage Picken (8 May 179825 March 1859) was a Scottish-Canadian poet and satirist.

Life Joanna Belfrage Picken was born in Edinburgh on 8 May 1798 to Ebenezer Picken, a poet from Paisley, Renfrewshire, and Robina Belfrage, a sister to Reverend Henry Belfrage. She was one of nine children, with her siblings including Catherine Picken, Henry Belfrage Picken, and Andrew Belfrage Picken. She and Catherine, the only daughters of Ebenezer and Robina who survived to adulthood, were well educated.

Picken's first poems were contributions to the Glasgow Courier and Free Press in 1828. She and her sister Catherine established a boarding school in Musselburgh, Lothian, but their attempt was a failure, possibly due to uncomplimentary poems that Picken published about local figures.

She emigrated to Montreal, Quebec in 1842 with other family members. She worked as a music teacher while writing poetry under the name "Alpha". She contributed to the Literary Garland and the Montreal Transcript. She died of apoplexy in Montreal on 25 March 1859 and is buried in the Mount Royal Cemetery.