Saskatchewan School 1919‑1920

by

Neva (MacLeod) Bishop

November 8, 1997

 

.....From Diligent River on the shore of the Minas Basin, Nova Scotia at a salary of $225.00 per year, I went to Saskatchewan at a salary of $1000.00 per year and thirteen pupils. There were ten permanent residents but three more came as non‑resident, ranch‑owners placed care‑takers on their sections to care for stock during the winter, while they (non‑residents) went south of the border. Thirteen was the maximum enrolment: The regulars were 3 boys and 1 girl from a German‑American family; 2 boys from another American‑German family; 2 girls, whose father was one of the Pioneers of that district, a boy and a girl whose father was an employee of the Provincial Government; a boy and a girl from Ontario and a girl from Alberta whose parents were care‑takers. They were all excellent children and it was a delightful year and a very rewarding and informative experience for me. The grades ranged from Beginners (Primary) to Grade Eight and the subjects taught were comparable to those taught in N.S.� However, there was a difference that astounded me. The Saskatchewan curriculum or Course of Study was as definite, concise and graded or graduated as a dictionary assembled in a book about 5" x 7" and E thick, whereas our N.S. Course of Study was about 7"x 9" and 2" thick and heavy, and anything but definite and concise. The Saskatchewan method made my work much easier.

 

Alameda, Saskatchewan 1919�

 

.....From the shores of Minas Basin, N.S., I went West on the Harvest Special (taking from Monday morning to Saturday evening) to the Prairies of Southern Saskatchewan. Specifically to Holbrook School District about 8 miles north of the town, Alameda. The contrast between my N.S. schools and that of Holbrook was amazing‑ from fifty plus pupils to ten (which grew to thirteen) was almost too much to handle at first. However, when I became acquainted and accustomed, it was a delightful experience.

 

.....The contrast of scenery, general surroundings and administration of schools at every level was very different and interesting. Roads were laid out every two miles exactly east and west, and exactly 1 mile north and south, so locating any one place was easy. Farming areas were measured in squares called sections. A section contained 640 acres and this was divided into quarter sections or half sections as a person could afford to buy or work.

 

.....The school house was small with much the same as N.S. rural schools‑ quite well equipped with necessary articles and furniture. It was located near the centre of the district. Even at that pupils had long distances to travel‑ only 2 of the German boys and 1 girl walked. One German family‑ (all four) rode horseback on one horse. The others drove and stabled the horses in a barn provided for them.

 

.....About the second week of school the School Inspector arrived,(the last thing I expected so soon) curious to meet this stranger from N.S. He was the most helpful Inspector I ever had. After he observed for a time, he dismissed the pupils for a recess and we talked. He wanted to know about my teaching experience, training, etc., and about the N.S. system, etc., etc., then he went over parts of the curriculum and told me that if I taught the course given for each grade no one could point a finger at me. One could teach beyond what was outlined if circumstances permitted (even handwork and crafts were outlined precisely for each grade). The Inspector visited twice more and offered me another school with more pay and more pupils. Incidentally, I won the Lord Strathcona Prize for Physical Education again, as I had at Northport in Nova Scotia. All in all it was a very rewarding year and I have always regretted that I had to come home to N.S. and illness preventing my returning to Saskatchewan the following September.

 

The experience of spending the night in the school house due to a Blizzard I have described elsewhere.

 

.....Perhaps a bit about other aspects of my year in Saskatchewan might be interesting or amusing. In Holbrook School District, it was the custom for the teacher to board the first part of the term with the Stevenson family, and in the spring move to the Waddington home and family who spent the winter at their home in the town of Alameda, leaving their ranch in the care of the hired hands.

 

.....I arrived in Alameda on Saturday evening and was met by Mr. Stevenson (who was also a Trustee) in his trusty Model T Ford.

 

.....The Stephenson home, where I was to stay until spring, was a large square house well furnished and comfortable‑ the mark of a successful homesteader from Orillia, Ontario, who had taken up land in Saskatchewan. When he had proved his land he returned to Ontario to marry his fiancee. For some reason the fiancee had changed her mind but Mr. Stephenson was determined not to return to his home alone, so after a three week courtship he married a good woman somewhat younger than himself. She was a good wife and mother to their two girls‑ eleven and thirteen years old at this time. She was also a good manager and an excellent cook.� A thoroughly nice person, but I think she was disillusioned. However, she made the best of it.� I won't say she was unhappy, but the permanent expression on her face was that of discontent (since that I have seen the same expression on a woman's face, where I knew it was the result of a disappointing marriage).

 

.....Mr. Stevenson was a man who got great pleasure when he could get a rise (his word) out of someone. I was soon a victim. The day following my arrival was Sunday, and it being a very hot day, we (the family, hired man and I) were outside on the large verandah. I was sitting on the edge of the verandah with my feet touching the ground, when suddenly a large brown snake dashed out past my feet. Naturally! I leaped to my feet and screamed, and naturally caused much hilarity! Everyone else had know the snake was at home and that it frequently came forth when people were around.

 

.....The next rise was more embarrassing for me. The drinking water came from a deep well (480 ft.) and contained mineral of some sort, which had a laxative effect to new drinkers. Also, at first, it seemed as if the more you drank the more you wanted. Water had not been too plentiful on the train, nor the best quality, so I was more or less dehydrated. The day being hot I drank frequently with the result that visits to the out door plumbing facilities were very, and I mean very often. This, again, was the cause of much hilarity and joking. I was not amused!

 

.....My first score came Monday morning when we were getting ready for school. The two girls and I were to drive to school a two‑wheeled cart drawn by a white horse named Biddy‑ mule would have suited. I was told that I would have to harness the horse, hitch it to the cart, feed it at school, etc. etc.,

 

.....What Mr. Stevenson didn't know, until then, was that I had been driving horses and harnessing them since I was probably ten or twelve years old. Therefore he was not presenting me with any problem nor providing any laughs for himself!

 

.....The Big Event, soon after school started, was the arrival of the threshing gang and equipment at the ranch. The equipment consisted of the steam engine for power, the threshing machine itself, and 2 or 3 cabooses which housed the crew or gang. All this equipment went directly to the grain‑field where it was going to operate. There would be several teams and wagons to haul the stooks to the thresher in a continuous line so no time was wasted. Also teams carried the threshed grain from the machine to storage bins. Work began early in the morning and continued until too dark to see. Then the crew ate.

 

.....In the house, preparation for this event had been going on for sometime as the men had to be fed well‑ dinner at noon and supper after shut‑down. As well, a lunch was served to the men in the field at about 4 p.m.� Mrs. Stevenson was good enough to delay the lunch until the girls and I got home from school so I could see this operation. Never have I seen so much food devoured in such a short time! But no loitering or take‑five afterward. Everybody went immediately back to his particular job and the women returned to the kitchen to prepare the evening dinner which would be after dark.

 

.....This threshing went on for several days or a week or longer depending on weather and the crop‑ 1919 was not a bumper crop. A plague of grasshoppers caused much damage and loss. It was interesting the following spring to see farmers, with advice and help from the government, trying to control or destroy the grasshoppers by spreading poisoned bait (mainly bran and molasses laced with poison) around their tremendously large fields of grain.

 

.....As the grain was threshed it was funnelled into a certain type of wagon and hauled to portable granaries set up near the threshing place. From these granaries the grain would be transported to the grain elevators situated at the nearest railway station. In 1919, there was a good market for Canadian wheat in North Dakota, U.S.A. and exchange on money was high. As a result, a convoy of several wagons would load with wheat and cross the Border. I don't know the distance, but the trip took 3 or 4 days. Remember, this was with horses and wagons.

 

.....Snow came on October 31 and stayed until April. The cold was terrible ‑44F (degrees) one morning, but we managed and I enjoyed the school very much, except the night in March when we were forced to spend the night in the school house. The Waddington children had moved to town and we missed them.

.....The MacKenzie family (who had come from Ontario in the autumn to operate the hog farm next to us) spent Christmas with us at the Stevenson's home. A pleasant day and only slightly homesick, but poor Mrs. MacKenzie suffered a terrible case of homesickness which upset her two younger children.

 

.....On New Year's Eve, some of the folks, including Mr. Stevenson's niece and I, went into town to a dance.� The temperature was ‑38F (degrees) which cooled our enjoyment a bit before we got home in the early morning hours.

 

.....When spring came and the Waddington family returned from town, I went to live with them, according to the custom. It was a delightful home and family which I enjoyed very much. With the young son, I learned to ride bare back and shoot gophers. You may think gophers are cute little creatures. True‑ but they are also a pesky nuisance and menace. They damage crops and make burrows dangerous to live‑stock. For example: the Waddington's had a beautiful mare newly broken to harness that spring and showed great promise as a saddle horse.

 

.....When the horses are freed from their harness after working they usually look for a drink of water. This particular day Stuart unharnessed the horses and let them loose.� As usual they made a rush down the little slope to the slough (pronounced slew and meaning water‑hole). The pretty little horse stepped in a gopher hole, broke her leg and had to be destroyed.� Therefore, my conscience was clear when I nipped a gopher. Besides that, Dick got one cent for each tail he turned in at a certain place in town.

 

.....The Waddington family was made up of Father (a government employee), Mother, Ruth, Dick and (hired man) Stuart. The house was a bungalow style, large and comfortable and the property was nicely landscaped with some hardy, deciduous shrubs and an evergreen hedge on the north and east to protect the kitchen garden.

 

.....Spring is a beautiful time in the West‑ the air seems so mellow, the sun so bright and miles of green.� As soon as the snow melted on a tiny mound a prairie crocus just popped up and meadow larks seemed to be everywhere. Later more flowers, new to me, appeared‑prairie lilies, wild roses and a pretty little plant call shooting star.

 

.....The greatest disadvantage of spring was the sand storms. These sand storms came after the land had been tilled and planted, if there was a brisk wind, which there usually was, the soil, being very fine and light, drifted with the wind just as snow drifts, piling up against the smallest obstruction. If the grain had been sown but not yet sprouted, it drifted with the soil causing great loss to the farmer. Apart from the loss the sand was most obnoxious! It would sift through the smallest opening or crack to cover window sills, floors, etc. It would even penetrate through one's clothing. By the time Ruth, Dick and I had driven from school we were practically unrecognizable!� The first step in getting clean was the brush down. I leave the rest to your imagination. Fortunately this phenomenon lasted only until the grain sprouted enough to hold the soil in place.

 

.....By the way, Ruth, Dick, and I drove a pretty dapple grey horse named Polly. Quite a contrast to Biddy.

 

.....One interesting event in spring was discovering a wild duck,s nest. There was a tiny brook near the school with a small bridge across it. A mother duck has chosen to build her nest just under the end of the bridge. Of course we didn't want to disturb her, so we drove slowly over the bridge‑ especially so as the time drew near when we reckoned the eggs would hatch. At last we had our reward. One morning there she was in the water with nine or ten little puff balls floating around her.� She took them in a few circles as if to say, See what I have done, and then they all headed down the little brook and that was the last we saw of them. We often spoke of them and hoped they reached their goal safely.

 

.....Spring days soon passed, and with June I began to think of returning to Nova Scotia (I had planned to spend the summer visiting other parts of Saskatchewan, but circumstances changed that). The school term ended with the usual tearful goodbyes and I was to leave for home on Monday, June 28, 1920. On the Saturday before leaving, I experienced the second terrible power of nature (the other was the Blizzard in March). It was a beautiful sunny afternoon. Mrs. Waddington, Ruth, Dick and I were busy in the house. Stuart had gone to a field to harrow some summer fallow. Suddenly we heard a noise and saw Stuart with the horses on the gallop going past the house and into the barn. We thought the horses had run away, but, then as we went outside to see what really was wrong, we heard the noise‑ a roar.� Before we could get inside, it came‑ lightning, thunder, hail, rain and darkness. It didn't last long, but when it was over one would think we had been transported to a strange country. The shrubs were stripped of their leaves and twisted out of shape, the grass was shredded. Worst of all, the vegetable garden, which we all had tended so lovingly, was pounded into the ground so it looked as if a disc‑harrow had driven over it.� Next day we went for a drive around the district. The devastation was unbelievable, but limited to a swath about one half mile wide, cutting diagonally across fields from the north‑west.

 

.....Fortunately the Waddington's buildings were not damaged. The Stephenson's, where I had spent the winter, were not so fortunate. Their house was badly damaged, chimneys were blown off and windows blown in.