 After hitchhiking through Europe, she returned to Canada and became involved in politics, working on Nova Scotia Progressive Conservative leader Robert Stanfield's campaign which won an upset victory in the 1956 provincial election.Later the same year, she was hired to work in the national office of the Progressive Conservative Party under leader John Diefenbaker, as secretary to the party's chairman, and worked on Diefenbaker's 1957 and 1958 election campaigns.In 1959, she was working as a secretary in the office of Prime Minister of Canada John Diefenbaker.