June Callwood will be remembered during a candlelight memorial service and procession in downtown Toronto Tuesday night.

Callwood, a well known social activist and journalist, passed away early Saturday at the age of 82 after a long battle with cancer.

Known as a tireless campaigner for social justice issues, Callwood will be remembered as a procession moves through the city between Jessie's Centre for Teenagers and Casey House, facilities she helped to establish.

Jessie's Centre provides support to pregnant teens and Casey House is a hospice for people with AIDS and HIV.

People have been filing into Casey House since Callwood's death, leaving flowers and signing a condolence book.

She also founded hostels for homeless youth and battered women.

The procession will start at Jessie's Centre at 205 Parliament Street at 7:45 p.m.

Participants will walk north to Wellesley Street East and then turn West towards Jarvis Street. The procession will then go North to Isabella Street and then east, ending at 9 Huntley Street and Casey House.

The Casey House website says that all are welcome to join. It will go ahead "rain or shine" and participants are encouraged to dress for the weather conditions and "bring a flashlight."

Callwood was born on June 2, 1924, in Chatham, Ont. However, she grew up mainly in the village of Belle River, the eldest of two daughters.

Her career as a writer began when she was just 16, working as a junior reporter at the Brantford Expositor and earning just $7.50 per week.

Two years later, in the midst of the Second World War, Callwood relocated to Toronto and managed to get a job as a reporter at The Globe and Mail, where she eventually met her husband Trent Frayne, a sports writer there.

The couple married when Callwood was 19, but she continued to use her maiden name at a time when The Globe didn't hire married women, according to the biography provided by Casey House.

In the late 1940s, she picked up her pilot's licence. She would take up gliding in the early 1990s.

Callwood's activism started in the 1960s and her career as a writer also spanned decades.

Her book titles include The Law is Not for Women (1976), Portrait of Canada (1981), Trial Without End (1995), the story of Charles Ssenyonga, who infected several women with AIDS, and The Man Who Lost Himself (2000). Callwood co-wrote How to Talk With Practically Anybody About Practically Anything with U.S. TV personality Barbara Walters.

Some of Callwood's honours include:

• Fifteen honorary doctorates;
• The Order of Canada;
• The Order of Ontario;
• The Canadian News Hall of Fame; and
• The Toronto Arts Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award.

Callwood is survived by her husband, two daughters and son.

With files from The Canadian Press