
Author Mary Graham is a documentary journalist and film historian with a Bachelors degree in Arts and graduate degrees in Journalism and Marine Law.
Her book "A Stunning Backdrop: Alberta in the Movies, 1917-1960" was published in October of 2022 by the Bighorn Books imprint of the University of Calgary Press. It won the 2023 Alberta Book Publishing Awards "Regional Book of the Year" and the 2023 PubWest Bronze Medal for Cover Design.
Mary's research for A Stunning Backdrop included communal work with 10 Nakoda Elders from Mini'Thni (Morley) over several years to recapture their unrecognized contributions, and illustrate their historic importance, to film making in Alberta. She has appeared as a feature film specialist at CBC Radio and ARTE, the European Culture Channel. In 2017, she was nominated for an Alberta Literary Award. A second book, on film making in Alberta after 1960, is underway.