Dorothea Mitchell (1877–1976), also known as Lady Lumberjack, was a pioneer filmmaker in Canada. Mitchell co-founded the first amateur film group in Canada, the Port Arthur Amateur Cinema Society, in 1929, and made three feature-length films: A Race For Ties (1929), Sleep Inn Beauty (1929), and The Fatal Flower (1930 but left unfinished). The society's first film, A Race For Ties, has the distinction of being the first amateur feature length film in Canada. Mitchell was also the first single woman granted a homestead in the province of Ontario in 1911, served as station master at Silver Mountain Station, and ran a sawmill, which earned her her nickname. She published an autobiography, Lady Lumberjack, in 1968. Lady Lumberjack and other works written by Mitchell were republished in an annotated collection in 2005. Early life Dorothea Mitchell was born in England in 1877. The family, including her younger sister Vera, moved from England to Bombay (now Mumbai), India, for her father's work in establishing railroads throughout the British Empire. Dorothea and Vera were educated as colonial elite in India and were taught etiquette and dancing, as well as other pursuits. Mitchell's mother also encouraged her daughters to learn some traditionally masculine skills as well, such as carpentry, riding, and marksmanship. Shortly after the family returned to England in the 1890s, Dorothea's father died. The family's upper class status in India reverted to middle class in England, and Dorothea began working various jobs to support her mother and younger sister. Biography Mitchell emigrated to Canada on her own in 1904 for employment opportunities, first landing in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She worked various jobs, among them teaching dancing and swimming lessons, while waiting for her mother and sister to join her in Hamilton, Ontario, part of the Greater Toronto Area. When illness delayed her mother and sister's arrival to Canada, Mitchell left Hamilton to work for a mining engineer in Silver Mountain, Ontario, in 1909. Although the job's tenure was brief due to the economic decline in the silver mining industry, Mitchell remained in the region and began working for the Canadian National Railway (CNR) as a station master, and also operated the general store. Realizing the value of lumber, Mitchell purchased a sawmill and hired workers, earning her nickname of "Lady Lumberjack". The nickname is suitable for Mitchell according to those who knew her; they describe her as proper and ladylike, yet