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247 This research project is based on the analysis of a large variety of documents as well as on three series of interviews. A word about each of these types of source should allow a better appreciation of the breadth, and limits, of a project like this, spread over almost ten years. Written sources Where the written sources are concerned, we should first point out that the women’s, feminist, and medical journals mentioned in the bibliography, numbering almost 15, were reviewed systematically for the entire period 1910–1970, or at least for all of their (sometimes ephemeral) existence. This was particularly the case for the journal La Santé, published by the Fédération des œuvres sociales de santé, the precursor of the FoCCF, which appeared for only two years and did so only irregularly. Similarly, the reader should probably know that in certain years the Bulletin sanitaire, the organ of the Board of Health of the province of Québec, published only a few issues, and sometimes just one. In all these journals we attempted to identify every article dealing with infant mortality in Quebec, and with the means proposed, or put into effect, to combat it. Other texts, dealing more generally with the development of health services in Canada and Quebec, with maternal and infant health, and with the division of responsibilities between the public authorities and private organizations in these areas, were also considered. To complement this, we consulted files of press cuttings previously collected by certain associations such as the Assistance maternelle, and by the City of Montreal, and searched the newspaper Le Devoir for the period 1940–1970. The annual reports of various private and public organizations involved in the campaign against infant mortality were examined systematically for the entire period, when they were available. Similarly, we also scrutinized the minutes of general meetings and meetings of their different official appendix 1 Sources 248 aPPenDix one bodies (boards, committees, bureaux, etc.), the memoranda and other documents produced by them, in addition to their correspondence when it was preserved and accessible. These different sources enabled us to establish a picture, including a statistical one, of the way in which the activities of each of these organizations evolved, and to define the nature of their participation in the campaign against infant mortality and in developing social health services for mothers and babies. Despite numerous attempts, however, it proved impossible to find the archives of the Fédération d’hygiène infantile. The existence of this organization was therefore traced with the help of a brochure published under the aegis of the École sociale populaire, in addition to the few reports on its activities that it published in L’Union médicale du Canada and various documents found in the municipal archives as well as in those of the archdiocese and of Centraide. The documents relating to the Fédération des Œuvres de charité canadiennes-françaises, preserved in the latter centre, also allowed us to complete our information on the Assistance maternelle. Finally, let us stress that all the files dealing with maternal and infant health contained in the collections of the Ministry of Health in Quebec City and the Department of Health in Ottawa were reviewed. Despite the promising titles of some files, in the end this rather tedious research turned out to be disappointing. Yet we sometimes struck gold—for instance when I asked to see the files of the Ligue d’hygiène dentaire, not expecting them to be of any interest, but found in them almost 100 letters from women asking for the book The Canadian Mother and Child to be sent to them. Oral sources In writing the final chapter of this book, three sets of interviews, combining the stories of 66 women, were used, among other sources. The first, extracts from which, identified by Roman numeral I, followed by the number of the interview in the series, contains 31 interviews carried out in 1993–1994. These dealt principally with the Gouttes de lait, attendance at which, even when short-lived, was the only criterion used in selecting informants. Other subjects, such as the use of prenatal clinics, the service of visiting nurses from the Met, and also the question of contraception (when possible), had however been raised, but not analyzed until now. This first group was made up of women who, for the most part, had had their first child between 1935 and 1949, the oldest among them...

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