A group of women from Canada, the United States and Australia gathered in Canmore this week to celebrate a milestone few people ever experience together: a 75th birthday shared by women born on exactly the same day.
The women are part of a long-running international research project created by Australian developmental psychologist Linda Gilmore, who has spent years connecting women born on the same day as her – June 12, 1951 – to study how family, culture, opportunity and historical events shape lives over time.
What began as an academic project has evolved into something more personal; a global network of friendships that has seen participants meet across continents, travel together and remain connected through social media and regular reunions.
Gilmore says the idea was sparked during a trip to Cambodia in 2008, when she met a woman her age living in a rural village.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about how different my life would have been if I’d been born in Cambodia instead of in Australia,” Gilmore said. “How privileged I’d been, and how where I was born, the lottery of where I was born, had influenced my life opportunities and experiences.”
As a developmental psychologist, Gilmore says she became fascinated by how people born at the same moment in history could experience vastly different lives depending on where they were raised and the circumstances they encountered.
She set out to find women born on exactly the same day as her and eventually connected with participants from dozens of countries around the world.
Along the way, she discovered something she had not anticipated.
“I’ve also learned in this project the power of belonging to a unique group,” she said. “Many of the women now connect with each other. We get together in various parts of the world. Some have become really good friends, and we have this feeling of connection that is really quite unique.”
Among those friendships is one between Calgary’s June Stevenson and Margie Wyllie of Lacey, Wash.
Stevenson joined the project after seeing a notice on Facebook inviting women born on June 12, 1951, to participate.
“I thought it was kind of a unique opportunity to get in touch with women of exactly my age, and it just sounded really fun and interesting,” she said.
Wyllie’s introduction to the group was similarly unexpected.
After mentioning her birthday online, she received an invitation from Gilmore and decided to participate.
Years later, while planning a trip to Victoria with a friend, Wyllie posted a message asking whether any women from the project lived nearby.
Stevenson responded.
Although she was living in Calgary, Stevenson travelled to Victoria to meet her.
“Within five minutes, I felt like she was my sister,” Wyllie said.
The friendship soon expanded beyond a single meeting.
The pair later travelled together through Amsterdam, Barcelona and Norway, joining other women from the project who had travelled from around the world.
Stevenson said the opportunity to meet people from different countries and backgrounds has been one of the most rewarding parts of the experience.
“We learn so much about each other’s cultures and backgrounds, and it’s quite fascinating,” she said.
While all of the women share a birth date, their life stories often differ dramatically.
Gilmore says participants from various countries experienced different political, economic and cultural realities as they grew up.
Some lived through war, political upheaval or social unrest. Others grew up in relative stability.
“Of course, we have such different experiences because of the families that we’ve grown up in, the various things that have happened to us, including fortuitous life events,” she said.
At the same time, many participants recognize common threads that connect their generation.
Born in the early 1950s, they witnessed sweeping social changes during their lifetimes, particularly for women.
“We’ve become way more independent than my mother’s generation was,” Stevenson said.
Wyllie says the changes are striking when she reflects on opportunities available to women today.
“It wasn’t that many years ago that women couldn’t even have a credit card without a guy – or buy a house,” she said. “I can’t believe how things have progressed.”
The women gathered in Canmore also rejected many stereotypes associated with aging.
Several spoke about continuing to travel, volunteer, pursue hobbies and remain active in their communities.
“When someone says we’re going to be 75, it’s just, what? How did that happen?” Stevenson said.
Wyllie agreed.
“Life is fun, and you can’t waste it,” she said.
Gilmore says that outlook has become one of the defining characteristics of the group.
Although some participants are no longer able to travel and others have died over the years, she says many remain actively engaged and eager to continue meeting whenever possible.
The gathering in Alberta took place a week before the women’s shared birthday on June 12.
There was cake, conversation and plans for future reunions.
For Gilmore, the project continues to demonstrate both the differences that shape people’s lives and the connections that can emerge despite them.
“It’s really special to think that we all arrived on this planet on the same day,” she said.
For more information about Gilmore’s project, head to her website at LindaGilmore.com.au.
