The Queen’s community is remembering Nancy McCormack, a faculty member and librarian with the Queen’s University Faculty of Law, who died on July 17 following a period of illness. She was 56.

A member of the faculty since 2002, including five years as Head Law Librarian, Professor McCormack was lauded as a teacher, writer, and librarian. In her faculty role, she taught Torts and Advanced Legal Research for JD students and Legal Research and Writing for graduate students. She co-authored numerous books including the Annotated Federal Interpretation Act, The Practical Guide to Canadian Legal Research, Introduction to the Law and Legal System of Canada, and Updating Statutes and Regulations for all Canadian Jurisdictions. She published widely on the subjects of legal research, Canadian legislation, statutory interpretation, and law librarianship.

“Nancy served with great distinction since joining the Faculty in 2002, including five years as our Head Law Librarian” says Mark Walters, Dean of the Faculty of Law. “Nancy will be missed as a caring and thoughtful teacher, scholar, and colleague, someone valued for her love of legal learning, for her sense of pragmatic wisdom, and of course for her generous spirit and wonderful sense of humour. She was a treasured member of our community.”

In recent months, Professor McCormack was completing her work as the sole editor and compiler of the 5th edition of The Dictionary of Canadian Law (Thomson Reuters), a Herculean task at approximately 1400 pages and 31,000 entries. It is due to be published later in 2019.

Professor McCormack was the keynote speaker at Canada’s New Law Librarians’ Institute, and spoke nationally and internationally on both academic and library-related issues. She served as Associate Editor for the Canadian Law Library Review published by the Canadian Association of Law Libraries. She was awarded the Denis Marshall Memorial Award for Excellence in Law Librarianship in 2014 and the Michael Silverstein Prize, in 2018, for enhancing the understanding, analysis and appreciation of primary law.

The family will be holding a celebration of life at a later date, with flags lowered on campus to commemorate her on that day.