Dr. John R. Doucet (1952-2026)
It is with heavy hearts that his family announced the passing of Dr. John Doucet (“Johnnie”, “Dr. John”, “Uncle John”, “Dad” and “Grandad”) on May 24, 2026, at the Dr. Everett Chalmers Regional Hospital, following a lengthy illness. John was the second child of Lionel and Patricia (Brennan) Doucet of Bathurst, NB.
John is survived by his faithful and ever-loving spouse, Maribeth MacNutt; his sons, Paul (Ruth) and Adrien; and his daughter, Margot (Simon). He will forever be loved by his treasured grandkids: Louisa, Nell, Fiona, and Albert. John is survived by his sisters, Beverly Palmer (Dan), Karen Stubbert (Sheldon), and Paula; and his brothers, Bernie (Adeline) and Alan (Cindy), in addition to many cousins, nieces, and nephews. He will also be deeply missed by his in-laws, Mary Lou (Mike) and John Emery (Peggy).
John was predeceased by his parents, his “Irish twin” brother Calvin (Bonnie), and his wife, Pauline Emery.
John grew up in Bathurst, New Brunswick, in a small house with his six siblings. He developed an early interest in music, mechanics and scouting. He was an avid skier and swimmer. John graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree from St. Francis Xavier University. He later moved to St. John’s to pursue a medical degree at Memorial University of Newfoundland, where he won over the affection of Pauline and her feline companions and began to put down roots.
He worked as a family doctor for ten years, supporting many families through his practice and helping countless people in the emergency room. He then decided to continue his education, pursuing a specialty in psychiatry. This became his life’s passion, and he practiced for 25 years. He was well-known for his kindness, patience, and compassion.
After 30 years of making countless friends and raising their three children in St. John’s, John and Pauline moved back to New Brunswick. John’s work in Fredericton with military veterans and first responders touched many lives, and a new community of patients, colleagues, and friends came to know his kind ways. John made many dear friends in the Capital Region, and their support was instrumental in helping him through the unexpected passing of Pauline in 2010.
For the past eleven years John found love again with Maribeth (Mo). Their home in sunshine gardens is surrounded by a community of loving neighbours, pets and natural beauty. Together they said goodbye to special dog Reese and welcomed Ruby. Friday date nights were a time for music and amazing meals – often with beloved friend Liz. Their Halloween displays were epic and a favourite night of the year for kids from all over – especially big kids John and Mo.
John enjoyed the great outdoors, swimming, a long book, a good joke, and saving his dessert for breakfast. He loved people, and people loved him. John truly believed we are placed on this earth to help others, and that is exactly what he did, both professionally and personally. He will be missed by many.
Rest in peace, dear brother, doctor, father, granddad, partner, and friend.
Dr. Marilyn Trenholme Counsell (1933-2026)
It is with great sadness that the family of Marilyn Trenholme Counsell announced her passing on June 17, 2026, in Sackville, New Brunswick.
Marilyn’s life was long, fulfilling and deeply meaningful. She was profoundly grateful to each person whose friendship and support meant more to her than words can describe. Her faith was the foundation of her strength. She loved to welcome family and friends to her home and cottage with homemade pies, rolls and especially Christmas fare. To the end she loved Maritime fiddle music, especially Ivan and Vivian Hicks and the Sussex Avenue Fiddlers.
She was predeceased by her parents, Harry and Mildred Trenholme, her special friend, Prof. Peter Bishop, and her husband, Kenneth Counsell, a journalist and Citizenship Judge.
She leaves her beloved son, Giles, his devoted wife, Ashley, and her precious grandsons Benjamin Kenneth and Nicholas Giles, and her beloved daughter, Lorna Joy. She is survived by her brother, Harry Trenholme and his wife, Charlotte, as well as their daughters, Darlene, Joanne, Heather and Krista and their families, as well as many other cousins, nieces and nephews.
Marilyn loved school, especially the two room school in Baie Verte and Port Elgin Memorial School. She attended Mount Allison University (BSc 1954), Cornell University (Biology 1963), and University of Toronto (MA 1960, MD 1967), graduating with high honours. She became a dietitian at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal in 1955. Her medical training was completed at the Toronto General Hospital where she later practised and was associated with the University of Toronto’s Medical Faculty (1968-1977).
In 1977, she moved with her family to Sackville, New Brunswick, and served as a family physician in Sackville and Port Elgin, and Sackville Memorial Hospital (1977-1994). Her practice was welcoming to patients including Mount Allison University students; she was known as “the house call doctor”!
Prior to medicine, she served as a nutritionist with the governments of New Brunswick and Ontario. In 1987 she answered the call to public service and thereafter in her words “went through many open doors on the road less travelled”. Elected the first woman MLA for Tantramar in 1987, reelected in 1991 and 1995, she joined the McKenna government, serving as Minister of State for the Family and Minister of State for Family and Community Service (1994-97). In 1997, she was appointed Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick by Prime Minister Jean Chretien (1997-2003) and named to the Senate of Canada (2003-08). She lectured at Mount Allison University on Political Leadership in Canada (2009-13).
As Lieutenant Governor, she reopened Government House, Fredericton, as “The People’s House”, welcoming thousands of visitors annually including children and their families for ice cream sundae parties. She called upon her fellow citizens to help each child achieve her/his full potential and offered Lieutenant Governor’s Story Hours throughout New Brunswick. With IODE she took Born to Read/Goût de lire province wide. A children’s gallery filled the walls outside her office and Christmas at Government House brought old fashioned traditions alive. The new century was welcomed there, December 31, 1999-January 1, 2000 with a grand ball, Indigenous dances and Maritime fiddling.
Marilyn was committed to community organizations, far too many to list. In recent years, she remained dedicated to the Literacy Coalition of New Brunswick, Atlantic Ballet Moncton, Vanier Institute of the Family, and Early Literacy Friends (ELF). In 1987 as MLA, she founded the Sackville Food Bank, and a special recreation program for challenged youth.
Marilyn received many honours including the Alpha Omega Alpha Honourary Medical Society, from the University of Toronto, Honourary Degrees from Université de Moncton, Mount Allison University and University of New Brunswick, Officer of the Order of Canada, Order of New Brunswick, Grace Annie Lockhart Commemorative Award from Mount Allison University, CMA Sir Charles Tupper Award for Political Action in Canada, Dr. William Roberts Award for Political Action in New Brunswick, Championship of Public Education Award (The Learning Partnership), Women of Distinction Awards YWCA and Hadassah WIZO, Peter Gzowski Award, Life memberships in the NBMS, NBTA, IODE, OES, and New Brunswick School of Craft and Design. She was a Paul Harris Fellow, Dame of Grace Order of St. John of Jerusalem, recipientof the Atlantic Ballet Canada Founders Award and the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal. During the International Year of the Family and in recognition of her work as Minister of the Family she accepted an award from the United Nations on behalf of the province of New Brunswick.
In later years she enjoyed her home and cottage, the visits of her grandsons, family and friends, reading and discussing current events and changing times. She never wavered in her belief in democracy and continued her parents’ commitment to service of community. She was inspired by Mother Teresa’s “We can do no great things, only little things with great love”.
Dr. Ann Harvey (1958-2026)
It is with profound sadness that the family of Dr. Ann Harvey announced her passing at the Dr. Everett Chalmers Hospital on Friday, April 24, 2026. Born in St. Stephen, NB, she was the daughter of Florice (nee Richardson) and the late Richard Harvey.
A graduate of Fredericton High School 1975 and UNB (Organic Chemistry) 1979, Ann was awarded a prestigious full NSERC scholarship and went on to study medicine at the University of British Columbia.
Ann is survived by her mother, Flos (Eden Retirement Home) and her loving partner and husband of 15 years, Dino Kubik; stepchildren, Dr. Erika (Marc) of Fredericton, Andrew (Nichol) of Leduc and step grandchildren, Dominic, Miley and Connor.
Ann also leaves her brother, John (Maria); nephew, Matthew (Katie); grandniece, Mila; niece, Shannon, of Fredericton, all of whom she loved dearly. She is also survived by soul sister-in-law, Roberta of Revelstoke/Whistler/Sook/Smithers/Sunshine Village; brother-in-law, Andy (Danielle) and their 14 wonderful children and grandchildren in Halifax. Mentions must include Ann’s favorite uncles, Floyd Richardson (Deer Island) and Raymond MacNeil (Toronto); the adoring extended O’Neill Faction (Cape Breton & Halifax); the Richardson cousins in Fredericton including super-special cousin, Meaghan; and friend-for-life, Chris Kular (Toronto).
Ann’s father, Richard, imprinted Ann with a life-long love of education, learning, and reading. Her mother, Flos, nurtured skills in hosting, seam stressing (sewing her own clothes in medical school), cooking and gardening. Ann’s love, respect, and admiration of her parents were evident to all who knew her.
Dr. Harvey was known as a gifted and compassionate family physician and much loved by her patients in both British Columbia and New Brunswick. Ann started her medical practice in downtown Vancouver, working at both Vancouver General and St. Paul’s on Burrard. St. Paul’s made an impression on our young ‘Dr. Harvey’ as it was one of Canada’s leading AIDS hospitals pioneering the first clinical and compassionate end-of-life care models. Dr. Ann delivered dozens of babies and was known for honoring the age-old practice of house calls to the elderly, some of these being unscheduled drop-ins, should she be passing a patient’s home.
Ann would return to Fredericton at the end of the 1990’s to practice as a locum for her colleagues who needed family time or time to recover from an illness. Ann would become one of the early family doctors involved in the DECH’s Hospitalist Program. When the Covid epidemic struck, Ann stepped forward to take on full-time work with the DECH’s team of dedicated Hospitalists. The demands of the early Covid days would forge friendships with fellow Hospitalist doctors, including the late Dr. Mike Hayter and the late Dr. Eilish Cleary, both of whom Ann dearly valued and loved.
Ann’s passion for sailing, skiing, white water canoeing, sea kayaking and hiking enabled her to form deep and lasting friendships in Whistler, Mactaquac, Fredericton, Campobello and Lubec, Maine. Ann and Dino shared many adventures including a passage, in blinding fog—an outing Dino hoped to abandon just fifteen minutes after departing Campobello. Ann’s confidence in her beloved 28′ Danish Pilothouse, Reliance, saw them safely complete the 40-mile passage to Saint John Harbour. The adventure included a bride-to-bridge VHF radio chat with the Grand Manan ferry to coordinate “action to avoid collision” and concluded with a transit of the Reversing Falls eight hours later in the twilight.
Ann will also be remembered as a wonderful host at the family cottage on Campobello—land farmed by her Irish ancestors as far back as 1837—and at her home on George Street. The George Street home was purchased to provide a place spacious enough to welcome her parents later in their lives. George St. would become home to Ann’s mother, as well as to Dino’s mother, Anna, during the Covid years. Ann and Dino met too late in life to have children, but they met just in time to have mothers.
Dr. James Noonan (1936-2026)
James S. Noonan, age 90, passed away peacefully at SerenaCare in Moncton on Wednesday, August 12, 2026. He was born to William Henry Noonan, KC and Ada Catherine “Tiny” (Sullivan) Noonan in Summerside, PEI on March 10, 1936.
He will be deeply missed by his daughter Jill Noonan (David) and his grandson Matthew Noonan of Moncton; brother Arthur (Leslie), sisters Geraldine Grant and Marjorie Lecky (George), all of Summerside, PEI; sisters-in-law Lois Noonan of Summerside, PEI and Suzanne Simms of Quispamsis, NB, and numerous nieces and nephews.
He was predeceased by his wife Barbara; his parents; brothers John and Gregory; and sisters Shirley Keil and Pauline MacPhee.
Jim attended Summerside High School and later Saint Dunstan’s University (UPEI) where he graduated in 1957 with a Bachelor of Science (cum laude). He received his medical degree from Dalhousie University and graduated with MDCM in 1962.
He began his career as a family physician in Port Elgin, NB before joining the Moncton Hospital staff in 1964. From 1967 to 1971 he served as a resident in diagnostic imaging at Montréal’s Royal Victoria Hospital. Dr. Noonan joined Moncton Hospital’s diagnostic imaging department, serving as department chief for a decade and as president of the medical staff.
Dr. Noonan helped establish the first dedicated angiography suite in the region, the forerunner of modern interventional suites, and was the first radiologist to perform angiography at the hospital. In 2006, the hospital dedicated the Dr. James S. Noonan conference room in honor of his many years of exceptional service.
Dr. Noonan’s contributions to the medical profession and to his community extended well beyond his own area of specialization. In addition to serving as an executive member of the New Brunswick Medical Society for five years, Dr. Noonan was also active politically at both the provincial and federal levels.
He and his wife Barbara enjoyed travelling immensely with trips throughout North America, Europe, and beyond. They particularly enjoyed pre-Christmas trips to New York. Most of all, Jim loved spending time at the cottage in Shediac and swimming in the ocean.
His family would like to express their deepest appreciation for the exceptional care and support that he, and the whole family, received from the staff of SerenaCare Special Care home. They would also like to thank Peter Lightfoot and Bill Allanach for their immense support and kindness.
