Character Inspiration: Legal Secretary

Lorraine Eger was a legal secretary for nine years in three cities across Canada.

WBS: How did you get into work as a legal secretary?

Lorraine: I was a legal secretary for 9 years, 3 in Montreal, 5 in Saint John and 1 in Calgary.  I started out planning to be a high school music teacher.  I took two years of post-secondary in music education at Vanier College (CEGEP) and 1 year at McGill.  By that time, I was 19 and realized I was far too shy and young looking to be able to stand in front of a group of high school students and get them to listen to me.  Therefore, I switched to the administrative route (called secretarial in the 70s) and took a one-year intensive secretarial course at Notre Dame Secretarial School in Montreal (run by nuns and very strict!).  I took the courses to be a medical secretary but ended up getting a job for a small law firm in Montreal.

WBS: Can you walk us through what a day in the life would look like at this time? What were your duties and responsibilities?

Lorraine: I would take the train downtown (I lived in the suburbs) and worked 9 to 5.  My responsibilities changed over the years.  The years in Montreal I took dictation (shorthand), typed up documents, kept track of my boss’s time sheets (lawyers charge by the hour) and correspondence and spoke on the phone to clients. While in Saint John, I ended up with much more responsibility, more of what would be paralegal work today, opening files, creating all the documents and doing pretty much everything except going to court. 

WBS: What was the work environment like? Were you in an office? What sort of people were you working with?

Lorraine: In Montreal, I was in a small office with just a few lawyers and secretaries.  In Saint John, there were 16 lawyers, many secretaries, a receptionist, an accountant and an office manager. In Calgary, I worked at one of the largest law firms, with several floors and many lawyers and support staff.  It was mostly (besides a few bad experiences) a great atmosphere to work in.

WBS: When you look back on your time as a legal secretary, what are some of the first memories or experiences that pop to mind?

Lorraine: Lots of friendships and laughs despite working very hard.  I saw the beginnings of technology in the office.  In Saint John, I had a mag card machine – you could record documents that were very similar and leave blanks to fill in the information for each case.  You had to type perfectly.  If you made a mistake, you would have to start over from the beginning.  A few years later, we got a word processor which was a very basic (but high tech at the time) machine to be used for common documents.  It seems funny now with all the technology we have but was “state of the art” in the late 70s and early 80s. 

WBS: Highlights of the job? Lowlights?

Lorraine: I enjoyed the challenge of being very busy and being given lots of responsibilities.  I enjoyed the camaraderie among the “girls” in the offices.  Lowlights – when I look back, I realize it was a very sexist environment in which sexual harassment was common.  Most of the lawyers were men and all of the secretaries were women (from 18 to 65).  In Calgary, I had a very mean and demanding boss who was not kind at all.  I stuck it out for just over a year because I was pregnant and knew I wouldn’t be planning to come back but it wasn’t an enjoyable work environment.

WBS: You did this job in a second language! Were you already fluent in French when you began? Was the language ever a challenge for you?

Lorraine: I did some of the job in a second language, not all.  All court documents had to be in French whether or not the parties were French which was challenging but made my written French very good.  I wouldn’t say I was fluent in French but having lived in Montreal for many years, I could certainly get by.  In Saint John, I got hired by a French lawyer who wanted a bilingual secretary but I didn’t really use it that much.  I had a lawyer in Montreal tell me that he would never hire an English person who spoke French because he believed a French person who spoke English was far better.  I’m not sure I agreed with that but it was interesting to hear.  Was the language a challenge – every day!

Thank you for taking the time to tell us about your experience, Lorraine!