Features
At age 83, Joan Druxman has come full circle in her career
By BERNIE BELLAN The February 21, 2001 issue of The Jewish Post & News had an article titled “It’s a Comedy Night!”
That article went on to describe an upcoming event in which State of Israel Bonds would be honouring Rabbi Alan Green. Among the comedians to be appearing at the event was to be “Joan Druxman-Jones.”
Now, 22 years later, State of Israel Bonds doesn’t have an office in Winnipeg, Rabbi Green doesn’t live here any more (although he will be returning this weekend as the Shaarey Zedek’s Rabbi in Residence during Shavuot) and, as for Joan Druxman-Jones, well, she is back in Winnipeg – after having left in 1990 – and after having had a tumultuous series of career changes throughout her life –and, after having dropped the Jones in her name and gone back to Joan Druxman.
Joan Druxman was the guest speaker at this year’s kickoff Remis Forum luncheon on Thursday, May 11, at the Gwen Secter Centre.
I had never met Joan prior to that Thursday, although advertisements for her well-known women’s clothing store, “Joan’s Boutique”, were a regular feature in our paper for years. Once she took the podium at the Gwen Secter Centre it was easy to see how Joan had been a successful model for years. She still maintains a shapely figure and, even at 83, Joan is quite an attractive woman. (Is it okay to say that, I wonder? Who knows what’s permissible nowadays to write about a woman – or a man, for that matter, when it comes to physical appearance?)
But, more than anything, what struck me in listening to Joan tell her life story was her ease in speaking, her quick wit, and her self-effacing sense of humour.
As Simone Cohen Scott noted in an email sent out to Remis Forum attendees (and, by the way, anyone can attend a Remis luncheon. Just let the Gwen Secter Centre know you’re coming by the Tuesday of that week’s luncheon. Call 204-339-1701.), I took “voluminous notes” while Joan spoke.
So, here’s my account of the story Joan told: Born in Winnipeg, Joan (whose maiden name was Zelcovich, she said), grew up in Estevan, Saskatchewan, and moved back with her family to Winnipeg when she was 15.
Joan explained why her father decided to move to Winnipeg. He had owned a successful hotel in Estevan, but many of the patrons of that hotel were rough-hewn oil workers from the area around Estevan. “My father wasn’t about to let those oil workers anywhere near his two teenage daughters,” Joan said. (She had a younger sister at the time they moved here.)
But, the summer before the Zelcoviches moved to Winnipeg, they spent part of that summer at Clear Lake.
There were a lot of Jewish girls at Clear Lake, Joan noted, but they snubbed here because of the way she dressed. “They thought I was a hick,” she said.
That fall though, when Joan began attending Kelvin High School, and she was introduced by the teacher to the other students, the other girls couldn’t wait to be her friend, Joan said. This time she was dressed to the nines, she noted – something that has been very important to her ever since, she also observed.
As she noted toward the end of her talk, “I firmly dress the way you want to be treated.”
But from where did get Joan derive her impeccable fashion sense?
“My mother subscribed to the New York Times Magazine. It was the Vogue of the day,” she said.
Sure enough, when she was only 16, Joan got her first job working at the Mirror Room in the Hudson Bay store while she was attending high school.
After attending Kelvin for a couple of years Joan decided to attend the University of Manitoba. (In those days, she explained, you could take Grade 11 at the university.)
As things turned out, however, and as Joan observed, university was not for her.
“I hated it like you can’t imagine,” she said. “When I got 17 in Biology I knew university was not for me.”
So, Joan decided to enroll in the Angus School of Commerce (which was owned by Janice Filmon’s father at the time) where she obtained her diploma in typing and shorthand. “I was a wiz on the Dictaphone,” she noted.
But, she had to find a job after graduating. “I saw an ad for a company called Gunn Garment, which was owned by Harry Silverberg and Dave Kaufman, and which was managed by Max Duboff.”
“I became Max’s secretary and house model,” Joan said. “That’s how I became a model.”
It was during her time at Gunn Garment that Joan was introduced to the man who was to become her husband, Winnipeg Blue Bomber George Druxman.
“Marilyn Trepel called me up and told me someone had seen me at a wedding. Would I like to meet him? He’s one of the Blue Bombers,” Marilyn said to Joan.
As a Bomber wife, Joan was asked to appear on a local television show along with other Bomber wives where they would each be asked to cook a favourite dish.
“I made blintzes,” Joan noted.
As luck would have it, “two guys from Manitoba Sugar saw me and asked me to do a regular cooking show on TV.”
It was while appearing on her own cooking show that an editor of the Winnipeg Tribune asked Joan whether she would like to become food editor of that paper, and shortly thereafter, the fashion editor as well.
The next step in Joan’s career came when she was asked whether she would like to become the fashion coordinator for the Hudson’s Bay Company in Winnipeg, Saskatoon, and Regina, also the manager of the Fashion Room in the Bay.
But, as Joan recalled, “at the time the Bay fashions were all centrally coordinated. I hated them all. I decided to go out on my own.”
Thus began the longest segment of Joan’s varied career: as owner of Joan’s Boutique.
It was no simple matter, however, for a woman to strike out on her own in a business at that time, which was in 1976
Having been divorced from George Druxman (who died in 1999), Joan was mother of three boys at the time: Trevor, Greg, and Adam. Two of the boys were married by then.)
“I wanted to set up in an old house,” she recalled.
“I went to see a bank manager who said to me: ‘I’ll have you know fashion retailing is the riskiest business there is.”
Not one to be discouraged, however, a former classmate of Joan’s from Kelvin, Brian Aronovitch, told her there was a house at 34 Carlton owned by lawyer Ken Houston – who wanted to rent out part of the house.
At the same time Joan was introduced to another bank manager who was supportive of her dream of opening her own boutique.
“I opened Joan’s in 1977,” she observed. “Business just took off. It was bursting at the seams.”
Ever on the eye for another opportunity, it was while out for a walk in the neighbourhood of the Carlton store that Joan said she saw a rooming house for sale at 22 Edmonton.
“It was a tax sale,” Joan noted. And so, in 1979, Joan Druxman opened Joan’s Boutique at her new location on Edmonton, where she was to remain for the next 13 years.
“I gutted it and had clothing and accessories on the first and second floors,” she said, “with a hairdresser on the third floor.”
Ever restless, however, Joan decided to move to Vancouver in 1990.
“I saw things there that weren’t happening in Winnipeg,” she observed, including a very large Japanese population.
Joan opened her first store in Vancouver at the corner of 12th and Granville, but soon she came across a better opportunity at Berard and Granville. She approached a former friend from Winnipeg, Karen Simkin, who had also moved to Vancouver and who had opened a little gift shop.
“I invited Karen to move to that new location with me,” Joan said.
Karen’s husband, Garry Simkin, was fully supportive, and so the two women opened a store that was a combination clothing and gift ware store.
As mentioned though, Joan had taken note of how many Japanese tourists there were in Vancouver. Accordingly, as she explained, “I went to Simon Fraser University and learned how to read and write Japanese” so that she would better ingratiate herself with Japanese customers.
Things were going along well until their landlord told Joan and Karen that he was going to be raising the rent to $250,000 a year. (And remember, this was the 1990s. One can well imagine how exorbitant that amount would have been back then.)
So – another career switch for Joan was in the offing: “I decided I’d like to be an actress,” she observed. At the same time she started doing stand-up comedy (as noted at the beginning of this article.)
Ever eager for new challenges, however, Joan decided to apply for a green card and move to Los Angeles –where she began studying acting while working for Nordstrom’s.
“I also got my California real estate license,” she added.
But this was all before Obamacare, Joan noted. “Medical insurance was costing me $1500 a month.”
Joan decided to move back to Winnipeg where, once again, she opened “a little store.”
In 2020, however, with the onset of the Covid pandemic, Joan found she “couldn’t get stuff from Europe” and, as a result, she had to close her store.
“So, I walked into the cosmetics department of the Bay (Polo Park store) and said, ‘I want to see the Chanel manager.’ “
As luck would have it, that manager happened to need someone at the Chanel perfume counter and Joan was hired on the spot.
Which brings us full circle to where Joan started when she only 16 – working again at the Bay.
“Here I am at the Bay working five days a week – and loving it,” she said. “Without a bank manager, without a landlord, and without the tax man.”
But, as Joan observed, she still dresses to the nines – even though now she takes the bus to work. (It stops right in front of her apartment and drops her off right at work, so why not?)
As she noted though, you can imagine the looks she gets from other passengers who see an immaculately dressed woman getting on their bus every day.
One time, Joan said, her regular bus driver asked her: “Are you a celebrity?”
Joan told him she wasn’t, but one day that bus driver happened to be shopping at the Bay with his wife when he spotted Joan at the Chanel counter and said to his wife: “I know her. She rides my bus.”
That’s Joan Druxman for you – more twists and turns than a Gerry Posner story. Some day she ought to write a book. Hey, there’s an idea for her next career move!
Post script: We were informed that the day after Joan Druxman spoke at the Gwen Secter Centre she was involved in a terrible accident when she was coming out of work at the Bay.. It seems that Joan was caught in the midst of a situation where some young boys had been fleeing the store after having stolen some jeans. One of them ran into Joan, knocking her to the ground – which broke her hip. At last report she had undergone hip replacement surgery and had been released from the hospital.
Features
Musings from Dizengoff Street – by Bruce Brown (updated August 14)
(August 14, 2026) Despite three years of varying degrees of warfare. Moody’s biannual report of the Israeli economy was quite positive. Basically, the report saw no pressures on Israel’s credit rating. While the macro data remains strong, Israel still faces a complex geopolitical situation further complicated by upcoming elections (we pondered about how crazy that is in an earlier muse). And Israeli’s inflation rate for the first half of 2026 fell to a historic five year low of 1.2% (vs Canada’s 2.6%). As for my own pocketbook. Haven’t had an infamous Israeli bank overdraft in years. So all is fine.
If that’s not enough economic voodoo talk for one musing. According to one famous barometer. Israel moved to second place in the Economist’s Big Mac Index. Introduced in 1986, this tasty indicator compares the purchasing power parity across countries by measuring the price of a McDonald’s Big Mac -which most can relate to- against the benchmark U.S. burger. So while a Big Mac in the U.S. costs $6.22. In Israel it costs $7.67, the second most expensive place to buy the hamburger in the world, Switzerland being the most pricey at a whopping (no reference to Wendy’s) $9.04. While the cheapest Big Mac can be enjoyed in Indonesia at only $2.38. Canada ranked 22nd of the fifty-four countries considered, at $5.85. Parity. Smarity. I’m going for my Big Mac fix. Just after I finish writing this muse….
(August 11, 2026) Bravo Boy George. We certainly will dance again! And what better way than with his new reggae tune. Now Boy George is dealing with a hostile backlash against his just stand for Israel. Having to withdraw from London’s East End production of Jesus Christ Superstar where he was going to play – guess it. King Herod. Never a big Culture Club fan, but I am anyway -as a sign of support- going to download his greatest hits to my Spotify library. And hoping to have a chance to buy a concert ticket should Boy George perform in Israel. Kind of reminds me of Bob Dylan’s 1983 song Neighborhood Bully. Also in defense of Israel. I’m going to download that song as well. Although don’t think he was hounded the way Boy George is now. Sign of the times I guess.
+++++
Coming clean. I sometimes find myself chanting, to no one in particular, that snappy little ditty ‘from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.’ Now why can’t we come up with something as catchy. With such an impressive gene pool of great Jewish songwriters. George Gershwin. Irving Berlin. Burt Bacharach. Carole King. Neil Diamond. Leanard Choen. Paul Simon. Gene Simmons, Amy Winehouse. Bob Dylan. And yes, even the Buddhist Boy George. And still… gurnish! No wonder we’re losing the global PR battle
(August 8, 2026) Outside Basimta Café in Central Jerusalem. Love the red shirt against a tiny sea of black. Not sure I am shrugging because of the ultra-orthodox uproar over a Jerusalem café operating on Shabbat or the lack of an ultra-orthodox uproar over a Jerusalem café operating on Shabbat. For the last six weeks Israeli headlines shouted about the cafe chaos. With the ultra-religious blocking entrances and storming the café. While shouting ‘Shabbos! Shabbos!’ Upsetting the secular amongst us just wanting to enjoy our Saturday iced matchas. So the wife and I thought we would check it out. And. Yes. Buy something to support the business. Uproar. Not. Blocked entrances. Not. Storming the café. Not. Albeit there were police barriers separating the devout protesters from the coffee drinkers. The protesters being just a few dozen black clad, pious Jews. Mostly teenagers. And yes. Shouting ‘Shabbos! Shabbos!’ Certainly underwhelming in its reported mayhem. Reminds me of the famous saying misattributed to Mark Twain – “If you don’t read the newspaper, you’re uninformed. If you do, you’re misinformed.” But I did enjoy my iced matcha.
(August 6, 2026) Here we go again. Another round of forever negotiations. As someone who negotiates for a living. The way things are going in the straits. If I had to recommend a book on the subject to a new hire. Between The Art of the Deal, A Presidential Edition by Donald J. Trump or The Real Art of the Deal by the Mullahs of Iran with a special forward by the IRGC. Well. I would choose the latter.
(August 3) Bravo Yoav Segalovitz, Liberal Yesh Atid MK and Monsour Abbas, United Arab Ra’am MK and party head. For breaking a glass ceiling where a Jewish lawmaker joins an Arab political party. No less a political earthquake in my little shtetl. Which can significantly impact coalition block arithmetic and posturing and strategy in the upcoming elections. Now Ra’am can be considered a legitimate ‘Zionist’ partner when forming coalition blocks and potentially pushing the ‘center left/right’ party over the 60 seat majority threshold. In our crazy parliamentary democracy defined by a multi-party (about fourteen!!), proportional representation system. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, Israel’s proportional representation model of governance is the best parliamentary democracy system except for all other forms of working democracies. Stay tuned for more amateurish political musings as we move towards Israel’s 26th national election – five of them held since 2019.
(August 1) Although both sides say they are open to diplomacy. Neither really trusts the other. And American military action, or its threat, continues. I read headlines in the middle of the night -it’s a nervous habit lately– that the Dynamic Duo of Trump and Netanyahu may again strike in unison. Possibly this weekend. Yikes! Prompting me, at 2:30 AM, to dash around the house stocking my safe room. Bottled water. Canned food. Medicines. Documents. The beat goes on….
If it’s crazy here. It’s insane in Italy. With a recent online ‘Jew Hunt’ in the Milan area. Before being removed, the digital forms urged reportings of Israelis and Italian Jews staying in local hotels. The infamous Global Sumud Movement -yes, the one coordinating ‘peace and humanitarian’ flotillas to Gaza- was somehow connected. Although they deny involvement?! This deranged decree was looking to identify Zionist tourism and Zionist neo-colonization in Italy. I’ll stick with stocking the saferoom.
Then there’s New York Mayor Mamdani, a Global Sumud Movement supporter, threatening to arrest Prime Minister Netanyahu if he comes to New York. But since discovered he has no legal right for such a grandstanding, antisemitic, anti-Israel, anti-Western, anti-democratic antic. Maybe Mandami should be arrested! Or at least impeached. For being a grandstanding, antisemitic, anti-Israel, anti-Western, anti-democratic mayor.
Here’s a post Bruce sent us Friday, July 31:
WARTIME MUSINGS
Should credible threats against FLOTUS and ‘FSOTUS’ (first son..) not be justification to attack first.
As for yesterday’s summit. Netanyahu really can’t win. Explainer. If Trump now attacks without victory its ’cause of Netanyahu. If Trump now attacks with victory its ’cause of Trump. And, in Israel, if Trump doesn’t attack -victory or not- Netanyahu failed in his eighth meeting with Trump. And if Trump does attack -victory or not- half the country will vilify Bibi anyway. Missing a permutation?
Ya. I know. Kinda’ need a definition of victory for that musing to work.
And here in my little shtetle. We go to sleep unsure if there will be a code red in the middle of the night. And if not. We wake up thinking it will be tonight. How do you define stress?
Seemed like an appropriate way to end this musing.
Bruce Brown is a former Winnipegger who made aliyah to Israel over 35 years ago. Bruce first began writing for us – in his own inimitable style, in 2012, during what was known as “Operation Pillar of Defense.” His occasional musings on aspects of life in Israel that were far from what you’d typically read in other reports from Israel were hugely popular – both in the print Jewish Post & News and on this website.
We’re now glad to report that Bruce is back writing for us – this time on a regular basis. We will post Bruce’s reports as they arrive – with the date of each post at the beginning of that post.
Here’s some information about Bruce – and awards he’s received for his writing:
Bruce Brown. Canadian born. Now living in Israel (for a long time). Bruce works in Israel’s hi-tech sector by day and, in spurts, is a somewhat inspired writer by night. He received the American Jewish Press Association’s award for writing excellence in 2019 and 2025. And wrote the 1998 satire, “An Israeli is….” Bruce’s musings are political, social, economic and personal. With lots of biting, contrarian, sardonic and irreverent insight.
Features
Alberta’s regulated online casino market hits one month: what changed for players
A month after private operators went live, Alberta has quietly become the country’s most closely watched gambling market. Here’s what the new rules mean for the people actually playing.
A year ago, playing at an online casino in Alberta meant using sites that operated in a legal grey zone, with no provincial oversight and little recourse if something went wrong. That ended on July 13, 2026, when the province’s regulated iGaming market officially launched, opening online casino and sportsbook play to licensed private operators for the first time. The market is overseen by Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis (AGLC) and run through a new Crown body, the Alberta iGaming Corporation.
Alberta is only the second province to open a competitive commercial market, following Ontario in April 2022. What set the launch apart was its scale on day one. Twenty-two operator sites went live at midnight, with more than 50 licensed by AGLC to follow. Brands plenty of Albertans already know, including DraftKings, FanDuel, Caesars and theScore Bet, now compete directly with the government’s own Play Alberta platform.
For players, the real change is less about new games and more about ground rules. Licensed sites must meet standards for identity verification, deposit and loss limits, data protection and dispute resolution. If a payout is disputed or an account frozen, there’s now a regulator behind it rather than an offshore support desk in another time zone.
That framework is also reshaping how sites compete. Speaking to Bookies.com, an independent authority on licensed online casinos in Alberta, one industry observer noted: “Twenty-two sites going live on the same day is unusual. It forces operators to compete on trust and payout speed from the first weekend, not just on marketing spend.”
That pressure shows up in the details players tend to overlook, like withdrawal times, the clarity of bonus terms, and how quickly identity checks clear before a first cash-out. In a crowded field, those are the things that decide whether someone stays with a site or moves on after a week.
The province has been candid about the point of all this. Officials say the regulated system is built to pull players away from unlicensed offshore sites, redirecting that activity to operators that answer to a regulator and pay into provincial revenue. Service Alberta minister Dale Nally, who oversees the AGLC, has framed boxing out that grey market as the core goal.
We’ll keep following how this develops across the country in our Local and Canadian News coverage, where provincial policy shifts like this one tend to land first.
One month in, the market is still finding its shape, and the operator lineup will keep changing as more of the 50-plus licensees come online. But the headline for players is simple. Albertans now have a legal, regulated way to play, with responsible-gambling tools and the recourse that a licensed market is supposed to guarantee. For a lot of people who were already online, that’s the part that actually changed.
Features
The Types Of Gaming That Are Popular Across North America
Gaming in North America covers almost every style imaginable. Consoles remain a huge part of the culture that changes all the time. Older gaming hobbies like board games still fill living rooms and hobby stores.
People can always find a way to play that suits their interests and preferences. That could be online or offline.
That variety is part of what makes the region so interesting from a gaming point of view. There is no single dominant style. A lot of people prefer quick mobile games that they can play on the go. There are also superfans that sink hundreds of hours into console adventures. It isn’t all about high tech; plenty still enjoy games that have been around for generations.
The common theme is choice. North American players now have more ways to play than ever before.
Classic Casino Games Have Found New Life Online
Casino games have been popular across North America for a long time. The way they are played has changed dramatically in recent decades and brought them to new audiences.
Traditional games such as blackjack and roulette are still easy to recognize. The rules remain familiar to a lot of the population. The technology surrounding them has moved forward at a breakneck speed.
Roulette shows this change. The experience once meant gathering around a physical wheel and watching the ball bounce between the numbered pockets. That same basic format now works online in several different ways.
Digital roulette recreates the wheel through software. Live dealer versions stream a real wheel from a studio using high-definition cameras. Players can follow the action on a laptop or smartphone without losing the simple appeal that made roulette popular in the first place. People who want to play roulette varieties online even have a lot of choice for how they do so.
Slot games have changed even more.
Modern online versions can include detailed animations and new mechanics that would be difficult to reproduce on an old mechanical machine. Newer styles such as crash games have also grown alongside more traditional casino titles.
Casino gaming has essentially become another branch of digital entertainment. People have so much choice that they may turn to ‘games of the week’ as recommendations for a new game to try out.
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Board Games Are Still Going Strong
Board games remain extremely popular across North America. There are even festivals in the area celebrating the choice in board games.
Part of their appeal is social.
A board game creates a reason for people to gather around the same table for competition. They usually debate at least one rule before the night is over!
Classic games still have huge audiences. Chess and Monopoly are instantly familiar. The modern board game scene has become much broader.
Games such as Ticket to Ride and Wingspan helped introduce more people to strategy-heavy tabletop games without making them feel impossible to learn.
Hobby gaming has also become a culture of its own.
Dedicated stores host game nights and board game cafes have turned tabletop gaming into an evening out rather than something that only happens at home.
In an age of screens, cardboard is doing surprisingly well.
Console Gaming Remains A Giant
Console gaming is still one of the biggest parts of North American entertainment.
Living-room consoles have become far more than machines for playing one game at a time. They now act as entertainment hubs for multiplayer gaming and detailed worlds.
Sports games remain popular. Action games and open-world adventure games also draw huge numbers of players.
The appeal is easy to understand.
Console gaming offers impressive graphics and deep experiences without requiring the same level of setup that can come with a gaming PC.
Controllers have evolved too. They have added better feedback and more precise inputs. Online multiplayer has become standard and easier for most players.
PC Gaming Has Its Own Massive Audience
PC gaming occupies a slightly different space. It tends to attract players who like flexibility.
Hardware can be upgraded over time. Digital stores offer enormous libraries ranging from blockbuster releases to tiny experimental projects made by one person.
Strategy games and simulation titles have especially strong roots on PC.
MMORPGs also remain closely linked to the platform. Large communities spend years inside these imagined online worlds.
Competitive gaming has helped keep PC gaming at the center of esports too.
Genres such as tactical shooters and real-time strategy games continue to attract players who enjoy fast competition and highly skill-based play.
Social And Multiplayer Games Keep Growing
You might assume that the online world is isolating gamers. But it is actually fair to say that gaming has become much more social over the last decade in many ways.
People increasingly play with friends who may live hundreds or even thousands of miles away. Cross-platform technology has helped with being able to connect players reliably.
A group no longer always needs identical hardware to play the same title together. Console and PC communities can sometimes mix. Voice chat keeps everyone connected during a session.
The conversation happening during the game becomes just as important as the game itself.
There is no single type of gaming that defines North America. A serious mix is probably the clearest trend of all.
Gaming has stopped being tied to one device or even one kind of player. It now covers everything from a quick game on a smartphone to an all-night board game session or a huge online adventure with friends.
