Alberta has lost a great lady.

Muriel Manning, wife of Ernest, Alberta’s longest serving premier, and mother of Preston, rumoured to be the next one, died in April at the age of 95. She was never elected to any office, but was certainly a great influence in the Alberta political scene throughout the last 60 years.

The First Lady of the Manning dynasty was a prairie girl from Saskatoon, who moved to Calgary with her mother in 1911 at the age of eight. By the time she was 14, she had a reputation as an accomplished pianist and was asked by William Aberhart to replace the organist on his “Back to the Bible” radio broadcasts, which originated from the Prophetic Bible Institute in downtown Calgary.

The school was founded by Aberhart and attended by a lanky farm boy from Saskatchewan named Ernest Manning, who was part of the institute’s first graduating class. With music, religious and political ambition in common, the couple courted and married in 1936. Aberhart, who had become leader of the Alberta Social Credit party and elected premier the year before, gave the bride away. Manning became a Socred MLA during that same election.

Muriel and Ernest had two boys, Keith and Preston, who were raised on a dairy farm north east of Edmonton and given a sound evangelical Christian upbringing. When Aberhart died in 1943, the senior Manning took over the institute and the “Back to the Bible Hour,” heard across Canada on more than 90 radio stations. He also took over the Socred party and eventually the province, serving as premier for an unprecedented 25 years.

Muriel was known to be a shrewd judge of character, with good political instincts, influencing her husband in both his political and religious life. Some say she would watch with a wary eye, then report to her husband behind the scenes on who was loyal, who was not and what might be ripe for scandal.

She wrote insightful articles for the Social Credit newsletter, The Busy Bee, encouraging its members and reiterating the need to keep organized. She ran her family the way most prairie women ran their homesteads—with firmness and authority. She suffered the loss of her son Keith, affected with Cerebral Palsy, when he died of cardiac arrest in 1986 at the age of 47. She was predeceased by her husband in 1996.

Muriel died peacefully after a brief illness, amid speculation that her only surviving son Preston may throw his hat back into the political ring as leader of the provincial Conservative party. Should he become Alberta’s next premier, he will most likely bring the moral stability that has been the hallmark of generations of leaders who have served for multiple terms, a legacy that began with his father.

Behind every great Manning, past, present and perhaps future, was Muriel. God give you rest.