In 1904, widowed and orphaned, Mary Schäffer Warren (1861-1939) bucked Victorian convention to reinvent herself as a mountain explorer, determined to complete her late husband's botanical research in the Canadian Rockies. What began as multi-day trips into the wilderness turned into multi-month expeditions that culminated with her 1908 journey to present-day Maligne Lake in Jasper National Park and her 1911 government-commissioned survey of the region. In Wildflowers, Ward recruits a team of creative women to revisit the 1908 expedition and explore Schäffer Warren's legacy through the modern lens of adventure and creativity. Through backcountry adventure, historical research, modern animation, and mixed media, the film connects past and present and demonstrates that sometimes we must look back to blaze a better trail forward.
ABOUT MEGHAN J. WARD
Meghan J. Ward is an outdoor writer and historian based in Banff, Canada, and a Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. She is the author of the travel memoir Lights to Guide Me Home (2022) and a children’s book, The Wonders That I Find (2021). As a freelance writer, she has also produced content for films, anthologies, marketing agencies, and some of North America’s top outdoor publications, including Canadian Geographic, Alpinist, Outdoor Photographer, Mountain Life, and Adventure Journal. She loves to explore the wild and the world with her husband, adventure photographer Paul Zizka, and their two children.
