Harvey Cecil Odell (1892-1975)

Municipal official.

Born in the Rural Municipality of Wallace on 9 November 1892, he was married in 1916 to Margaret Bell, with whom he had two daughters and a son. He operated a grain farm near where he was born. He was chairman of the Board of Stewards of Hargrave United Church, a pioneer member of the Canadian Order of Foresters, president of the Elkhorn Cooperative Livestock Shipping Association, president of the Elkhorn Agricultural Society, and secretary of the United Grain Growers local.

In 1933, he elected a municipal councillor, serving until 1944, when he replaced C. E. Ivens as Reeve of the Rural Municipality of Wallace. He was the first chairman of the Virden District Area Hospital Board. He became a member of the executive of the Union of Manitoba Municipalities in 1949 and became Vice-President in 1953. He presented the UMM on the Hospitals Districts Advisory Board for three years and was on the Board of the Canadian National Institution of the Blind for the same period. He served as UMM President from 1956 to 1957. He was given a Manitoba Golden Boy Award in 1968 for meritorious service to Manitoba.

He died at Virden, Manitoba on 10 March 1975 and was buried in Virden Cemetery.

Source:

1901 Canada census, Automated Genealogy.

Western Municipal News, March 1956, page 78.

“10 Manitobans get Golden Boy Awards”, Winnipeg Free Press, 4 November 1968.

Obituary, Winnipeg Free Press, 12 March 1973, page 42.

Profile revised: 20 November 2009

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