We Are Pleased to Announce our Newly Appointed Co-Presidents Louise Profeit-LeBlanc and Marylou Miller

Dear Friends of the Patricia Locke Foundation,

As we entered the new Gregorian year of 2023, Patricia Locke Foundation is pleased to announce our newly appointed Co-Presidents Louise Profeit-LeBlanc and Marylou Miller, who have accepted this position of service effective immediately. We are honored and overjoyed in embracing our two sisters in promoting the mission and vision of the Patricia Locke Foundation inspired by the legacy and propelling force of the Patricia Ann Locke (Tȟawáčhiŋ Wašté Wiŋ); and established and developed by the visionary First President, Kevin Locke (Tȟokéya Inážiŋ).

Louise Profeit-LeBlanc is originally from Nacho Nyak Dän First Nation of North Eastern Yukon, Canada. She devoted her life to preserving the stories of the Tagish of Southern Yukon. She is the niece of Angela Sidney CM (1902 – 1991), a storyteller and author. Louise grew up listening to stories told in her family, and later recorded elders’ stories. She saw first hand the transformative power of stories, and kept them alive for the last 50 years. Stories allowed her to venture into acts of service including establishing the Yukon International Storytelling Festival and collaborating with the Yukon Heritage Branch to ensure that a story of the place is recorded for each toponym. She worked for the Canada Council for the Arts and co- founded the Society of Yukon Artists of Native Ancestry. As part of her responsibility on the Canada Council for the Arts, she travelled extensively including the entire north and later to Greenland, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Australia, and New Zealand. She served in and chaired the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of Canada. Louise was appointed as Baha’i Auxiliary Board Member serving Alaska and the Yukon regions for many years. She traveled throughout South America on the Trail of Light and served on the Local Spiritual Assemblies of Mayo in White Horse and now in Wakefield Quebec. Being personally connected to Kevin Locke and his mother Patricia Ann Locke for many years, Louise is excited about the next chapter of her work with the Patricia Locke Foundation. She expresses, “My work for over 10 years in a National Posting working with other Indigenous art administrators across all artistic genres has and continues to be flourishing in Canada. Art is an expression of the Creator which lies latent in each one of us. It has the power to lift the spirit and bring about a higher level of understanding of creativity and how that is connected to all humanity.”

Marylou Miller is of Tlingit heritage from southeastern Alaska. She has been serving on the Board of the Patricia Locke Foundation since its inception in 2018. Marylou was adopted out of her biological Indigenous family at a very young age and was raised in a large adopted family. As a child she learned subsistence life skills including gardening, fishing, cleaning and jarring salmon, sewing, picking berries and making jam. Her high school years were pivotal for Marylou when she traveled around to Indigenous villages in Alaska. These trips brought her close to her native Tlingit heritage, motivating her to learn drumming, dancing and how to speak and understand the Tlingit language. Marylou majored in music in college and continues to be a lover of music both singing and playing instruments. She is a proponent of the role of variety of Indigenous visual and vocal arts in promoting health and well-being for the individual and communities. Marylou served as a member of the Baha’i National Spiritual Assembly of Alaska, and then as an Auxiliary Board member in Alaska before moving to Ohio. She currently lives in Ohio serving as a member and Secretary of the Regional Baha’i Council for Michigan, Ohio and Indiana. Marylou’s passion lies in working with children and youth.  She stresses that the most precious treasure a community can possess are the children because of their role in paving the way for the future of that community. Marylou engages community building activities particularly targeting capacity building with the children and youth, and sees her role in the Patricia Locke Foundation as a catalyst to society building. She states, “Children and youth can use the programs that are offered through the Foundation to become empowered to experience a way to grow their material and spiritual powers to help others, and positively shape the world around them.”

Collectively our Board thanks each and every one for your continued support of our mission and current projects as we pave our path of service.

Board of Directors of the Patricia Locke Foundation