FRANCES ANN LATTER

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FRANCES ANN LATTER

(nee DENISON)

March 22, 1924 - December 17, 2025

Gracious to the end, Ann Latter, spent the final days of her 101st year savouring moments of Tchaikovsky and English hymns and warmly meeting a steady line of people who came to wish the “Queen” of MP3 tearful farewells. She did not leave the world alone – nor lonely.

Ann expressed how fortunate she felt, and her love for family and the healthcare workers she’d befriended. Having witnessed over a century, her worldly curiosity was coupled with a gentle focus on the immediate and personal. Misericordia’s hard-working staff echoed what her family knew well: she was good humoured, generous, decent to all and beautifully mannered.

Ann is survived by her children: Joan Latter (John); Doug Latter (Jane) of Calgary (father to Patrick, Kate and Winston); Tim Latter of Banff (father to Max and Emily); and Sally Sweatman (née Latter, mother to Conrad, Beau and Sophia). She’s also survived by great-grandchildren Henry, Nora and Felix Podwalski and Finneaus Sweatman, as well as nieces Shanly Palk and Alix (Palk) Arnett. She was predeceased by her brother, Major Hugh Denison; husband, Douglas Latter; sister, Molly (née Denison) Palk; brother-in-law William Palk; and nephew, Hughie Palk.

As the youngest child of Edith Denison (née Daly) and Alexander Latimer (Lally) Denison, Ann grew up on McMillan Avenue in Crescentwood and attended Rupert Land’s Girls School where she excelled at math. Sunday mornings were spent at St. John’s Anglican Cathedral then later at St. George’s Anglican Church where Ann also volunteered.

Ann’s father exemplified the Denison motto, perseverando (perseverance), by making his own luck: investing early and wisely in the automobile industry during the postwar boom. Ann inherited his keen sense of money management. Like her culinary and other creative talents, it was used in service of her children and grandchildren, whom she declared her proudest achievements. Ann’s oft repeated (and final) words of advice to them: “Don’t spend your capital.”

Ann worked as a stenographer, meeting Doug in 1946 at the Winnipeg Badminton Club. He’d fought in the same war that claimed Ann’s brother Hugh and carried himself a little roguishly for her parents: known for picking up his date by driving onto the lawn and up to the doorway steps. When asked of her husband of six decades and what attracted her to him -- after a thoughtful pause, she replied: “I wanted someone tall.”

Ann, proudly traditionalist on some counts, also led her quiet rebellions. At first glance, Doug seemed her temperamental opposite: blunt, aloof, a cigar chomping maverick. Still, she said he suited her and declared their marriage a good thing. She navigated the domestic order artfully and they shared a comfortable, low-key life.

Doug and Ann embraced one interest in particular. They loved to travel. Perhaps most memorably, the family of six took a train bound for Montreal and Expo 67 then boarded ship for Europe where they spent two life-changing months in England, France and Ireland.

In the late 50s, Ann and Doug built on Park Boulevard—a home full of books and music, just down the street from Molly and her family. Christmas was spent with Granny Edie Denison and the Latter grandparents, Cora and Percy. Summer brought the simple pleasures of fishing, sailing, and tin boat excursions at Lake of the Woods, thanks to property purchased by Lally and Ede in the ‘30s.

After Doug “retired” from sales, the cottage became their permanent summer residence. Doug chipped away – with a will undeterred by age and, sometimes, by market realities – on his laptop on investments and other enterprises. Doug loved to dance to calypso music and took Caribbean business trips until his 90th year. Molly and Bill had the cottage next door, forming a lively extended family universe. Games of Risk and Clue, water fights and sailing connected the Latter and Sweatman grandchildren along with gentle teasing from the older Arnett cousins.

After retirement, the Palks and Latters spent their winters in neighboring condos in Vero Beach, Florida. In her final years, Ann spoke often and fondly of Bill, Molly and their daughter Alix who sent monthly flowers to her aunt “Pansy” until Ann’s last days.

Doug’s death in 2008 initially seemed to leave Ann adrift. Moving to the Shaftesbury and then Misericordia Place in 2016 proved just the thing to rejuvenate her. She settled into care naturally – Ann delighted in life’s small creature comforts and being doted on, something she’d done for so many others – and found a new independence of mind and spirit. Having followed American politics avidly from Watergate onward, she stayed informed and tracked US news daily. While others sometimes grow hardened or reactionary in their old age, the opposite was true for her.

The “Miz” was a true home to Ann for nearly a decade, and she befriended its diverse staff. Her cousin “Bunty” McDonald lived on the floor below, and Ann’s private caregivers Denise and then Gerri were faithful companions. On Ann’s last day, Erin Loschiavo, Misericordia’s Recreation Facilitator, told Ann’s family that, “Some residents change the way you see your work in long term care. Ann did that for me, and I am thankful beyond words. I am truly honoured to have shared this chapter of her life.”

Ann’s children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren recognize that same honour, shared across their entire lives. Despite her self-effacing ways, she was the matriarch who held a family together for 70 years. Ann’s long and wonderful life will be celebrated later in 2026.

As published in Winnipeg Free Press on Jan 24, 2026