Pauline Ida King Obituary

Polly King, a longtime community volunteer, died Feb. 20, 2024, at home in Ottawa, just five days short of her 99th birthday. She leaves her son, John C.P. King of Toronto, daughter Terry King of London, England, John's wife Jennifer, and grandchildren Sheila King of Toronto and James King of San Francisco. Her loving husband for 71 years, newspaper editor, writer and broadcaster Charles King, died in 2019.

Born Pauline Ida Trueb in Vancouver on Feb. 25, 1925, she moved to Ottawa in 1957 and London in 1962 before returning to Ottawa in 1967. Between 1979 and 1987, she was the Ottawa social columnist for The Globe and Mail and later for the Ottawa Citizen. Friends in the diplomatic community called her "the Queen of Rockcliffe.". She served as president of the Ottawa branch of the Canadian Mental Health Association, as president of the Ottawa chapter of the Japanese cultural organization Ikebana International, on the boards of the Ottawa Congress Centre and the National Gallery Association, and as a volunteer with the Riverside Hospital Auxiliary, the Women's Committee of the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, the May Court Club, the Theatre Ballet of Canada, Girl Guides of Canada and other groups.

Polly's ashes will be taken on June 1, with those of her husband, to St. Paul's Anglican Church in Vancouver, where she was baptized and married and where her father-in-law, Canon H.G. King, was rector.