Ms Susan Wilson, the Island's first Bermudian female chartered accountant, counts former Progressive Labour Party leader Mrs. Lois Browne-Evans among her Bermudian role models.

But while the latter has been at the forefront of a social movement that is credited with forcing universal adult suffrage, the former has been a veritable wheeler-dealer behind the business and political scenes.

Mrs. Browne Evans is a household name, Ms Wilson still shuns the media spotlight.

They are separated by a gulf of political differences. One is black and the other white.

But together, they are "frontierswomen'' in the fabric of the Bermudian mosaic.

This is a profile of one of president and CEO of Masters Ltd. Ms Susan Wilson.

An hour flew by last Wednesday afternoon as Business sought to learn more about the woman who undertook almost a decade ago what then appeared to be "mission impossible'' -- turning around Masters , a large, but long troubled retail outlet.

Now respected by a business community that has seen what she can do, Ms Wilson still remembers the early taste of the cold impersonal world when she was excluded, simply because she was a woman.

She started in Bermuda with Cooper & Lines/Coopers & Lybrand at a time when it was not fashionable for a woman to aspire to be a CA. She was one of the earlier women in the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants.

In 1968, she moved to Canada with her then new, Canadian husband and found that Coopers & Lybrand in Canada, by policy, didn't hire women.

"So I had to give up my career with Coopers & Lybrand and go work for Price Waterhouse, who did hire women,'' she said.

In an age where discussions can centre around racial discrimination, Ms Wilson, will remind people that it has not always been so easy to be a woman.

She said: "People don't realise it. To be a woman in business has been a far greater struggle than people imagine.

"If you think about which woman made the greatest impact for women, you'll know it was Lois Browne-Evans. Even before her politics, she was a trial lawyer, a professional woman in a day when it was just not done.'' Ms Wilson is not a feminist. Only grudgingly will she accept having also been one of Bermuda's women pioneers, in the business world.

No matter the mistakes of old Bermuda, she still contends: "By accident of birth, I'm most fortunate to live in the most wonderful place in the world.

Wonderful, not just because of its physical beauty, but also because of its relative peace and harmony. Because of its people.'' She deliberately sent her children to single sex boarding schools, although she believes that Bermuda's public school system is far better than it's given credit for. Her children went to private school here, and overseas.

She herself attended Bermuda High School, in the days it was a public school.

She also spent some time in the summer months at the Technical Institute. She graduated from Tufts University with a mathematics degree, heading initially for a career in teaching.

Still fresh from qualifying as a CA, she became Government Auditor in 1972, a rarity in those days. Another head of a Government Department was actually Bermudian.

She recalls heads-of-department meetings, where her only Bermudian colleague was then Director of Planning, Mr. Erwin Adderley.

She recalled the resistance to her being given a top Government job.

"It's something that you learn to live with, and learn to cope with. You learn how to deal with people and you know in the end you will win them over.

"I remember in my younger years, having to do that much more, to work that much harder, and be that much better for "equal consideration'' (her quotation marks).

"And unfortunately, I think that it is still like that today, maybe not for all women, but for a lot of the younger ones coming up.

"Any racial inequality that people feel that we might have had in Bermuda is far outweighed by sexual inequality and the latter will go on for a long time.'' If we are a product of our experiences, she admits her struggle made her better.

"It was such a difficult and illogical thing to deal with, it taught me how to deal with stressful problem situations, and in some ways, it has helped me with my people skills, although no one knows me for my tact or diplomacy. But sometimes, in situations that really need it, I do know how to be tactful and diplomatic.'' Since virtually the advent of party politics, before she was old enough to vote, Susan Wilson was one of the "behind-the-scenes'' contributors to the United Bermuda Party, especially in Pembroke West.

She is removed from that life at the moment, saying she stepped back after the last election. She takes a break after each election. This time she has not gone back.

"But,'' she says, " I know what's going to happen. It will be just like last time. (Dr.) David (Dyer, Pembroke West MP, UBP) will coax me into coming back and working the next campaign. He always could wind me around his little finger.'' And although she was asked to run for office, it was never what she really wanted to do, for one reason or another.

One of the reasons was that she had her hands full, post-divorce, as a single mother and businesswoman. Her children are grown now. Her son, Kevin, has a degree in architecture and is working toward his CA. Daughter, Julie, has her own business, Inter-Spec, importing office furniture.

"She is doing extremely well and gets no help from mommy. Nothing. She does everything herself and doesn't ask me for a penny. I don't interfere in any way and she doesn't even ask me for a whole lot of advice. I've been to her office once, just after she set it up.'' Advice couldn't come from a more able business person. Apart from Masters Ltd., Ms Wilson is also on the board of Bermuda Computer Services and Lines Overseas Management. There are also about a half a dozen other private boards.

She is on the Permanent Arbitration Panel, and is involved overseas with an extremely large charitable trust that operates global business interests.

"I get very involved in that. The reason I do it, and do it for free, is that the end object is to assist medical science. We have some really interesting projects going on around the world. There's an AIDS research centre in Russia and all kinds of other things.

"It could end up helping to find a cure for cancer or the cure for AIDS or something. We have some incredible research going on. Some of the scientists tell us about projects, when they are seeking funding, that I just can't believe.'' In the mid-1980s, she was working for a Bermuda venture capital company that had purchased a significant share of Masters Ltd. from a British insurance company, repatriating the shares that were off-Island since the 1950s.

Masters' portfolio of property was especially desireable.

Some of the other shareholders of the exposed Masters could be forgiven for thinking that the venture capital group wanted to get in so that they could strip the company.

Instead, under Ms Wilson, who took over the reins in early 1986, the strengths and the weaknesses of the firm were identified and a plan of action adopted.

Surprisingly, the entire reorganisation, including the eventual halving of staff, occurred without any significant job losses. It was done through attrition and re-training.

It was more than surprising to those who knew of the debt noose that was strangling the once proud retailer. Largely as a result of her initiatives, Masters has been turning a profit in recent years. And the company is looking to emerge as a significant player, again.

Back to politics. Does she share concerns with the community about Bermuda's political reality? Political disharmony? Yes, but she chooses her words carefully.

"I don't want this to come out the wrong way. But you know, they (Parliamentarians) are up there fighting each other. It's always who can score the most media points. Let's face it. That's what it's all about these days.

"And it's not just germane to Bermuda. It's probably even a bigger problem in the US, the UK and other countries. But even here, we have what I privately call "media politics''.

"They play to the headlines in The Royal Gazette . They play to the news bites on the news. And they've all lost sight of you and me and the man on the street.

"Having been very involved in the UBP, and very involved in the central campaigns and the branch work and everything, even I've gotten to the point where I feel that this party political process has lost sight of the man in the street and we are going to destroy the country as they fight it out for power. That's what it's all about, power.'' Inevitably, the conversation comes round to the "I-word'': Independence.

"Independence from what?'' was her first thought on the subject. "At what cost?'' She makes it clear that because she believes in democracy, if it's the will of the majority of the people that Bermuda should assume nationhood, she will have to accept it.

"I'm as Bermudian as the next person. If Independence is the will of the people, so be it. I will still be there to do my part.'' But even though she has long supported the political strength of the UBP, she is convinced that Independence is the wrong road.

Her perception is that some black Bermudian professionals who want Independence, see it as a path toward the redistribution of wealth across racial lines. But does one necessarily lead to the other? "We've got independence in every possible way we need. What are we going to do? Have fancy offices in New York, Washington, London, Paris and Bonn? Who the hell is going to pay for it all? "Let's use the British! We feel they used us back in the colonial days. And they did. We were their dollar earners during the war. Well fine. It's now time for us to use them! "So let's use our association to our advantage and they won't interfere with us. The fact that we are a dependent territory does not affect your daily life, or my daily life, how we live.

"But, it affects the Island in terms of attracting international business, in terms of stability. The British court system, there's none better. So let's use it all.

"Everything that we've worked for. What are we going to do, just hand it to the Cayman Islands?'' Susan Wilson knows someone who has been materially involved in the independence of other Island jurisdictions and with the hindsight perhaps, of 20/20 vision, now believes they universally made a mistake. And there are a lot of influential people in those island states, according to her source, who agree.

"They are now saying that they want to be like Bermuda.''