Historic Sites of Manitoba: Campbell School No. 186 (RM of Elton)

Campbell School was built in 1884 on the southeast quarter of 17-11-17W, in the Rural Municipality of Elton, on one acre of land purchased for $2 from school trustee Archibald Nicol. The one-room schoolhouse had as many as 52 students at one time, in 1887. It closed in 1940 due to low enrollment and students were transferred to other nearby schools, many of which were formally consolidated in 1953 into Justice Consolidated School No. 696. The Campbell School building was sold and moved, and later demolished.

The site for a commemorative monument for the former school was donated by present landowner Ross Farley. A monument at the site was dedicated to the pioneers, trustees, teachers and pupiles of Campbell School, by former teacher Mary Highfield Collins (1930-1932), at a ceremony on 19 September 2004.

A guest book next to the monument lists the teachers at the school through the years: Annie Isobel McVetie (1884), W. H. Cantwell (1884), Asenath Way (1885-1886), George Pentland (1887), Ada Lowder (1888), John Danby (1889), W. C. Gillander (1890), William H. MacCracken (1890), George Anderson (1891), S. D. Cameron (1892), A. V. Knowlton (1893, 1897), Maggie A. McKellar (1894), Violet Kyle (1895-1896), Jacob L. Arbuckle (1897-1898), Agnes Moore (1899-1900), Emma H. Clarke (1901), Alice L. Irwin (1902), Isabel L. Rutherford (1902), Frances Winnifred Palmer (1903-1904), Gertude McNabb (1905), Jasmine Rutherford (1906-1907), Estelle Thompson (1908-1909), Ada Gilroy (1910), E. Gray (1910-1911), E. M. McLauchlan (1911-1912), Alice Peck (1913), Winnifred Pope (1914-1915), Margaret McCann (1916), L. Speers (1916-1918), J. Courtice (1918), C. Senkbeil (1919), Elsie E. Allen (1919), C. Thorsteinson (1920), E. Rice (1920-1921), L. Daisy Mallock (1921-1922), Dorothy Neabel (1922-1925), Marjorie Boyd (1925-1926), Mary Snyder (1926), Edith Smith (1927-1929), Marjorie Turnbull (1929-1930), Mary Highfield (1930-1932), Clara McNeil (1932-1933), Beth Dick (1933), Leslie Boles (1933-1934), Alice Rusenel (1934), Miss W. Borley (1934-1935), Lillian McKenzie (1935-1938), Florence E. “Betty” Stout (1938-1939), Marian Gaudin (1940), Gwen Wilkie (1940).

Campbell School commemorative monument (September 2011) Source: Gordon Goldsborough Site Coordinates (lat/long): N49.91624, W99.76287 denoted by symbol on the map above

Sources:

One Hundred Years in the History of the Rural Schools of Manitoba: Their Formation, Reorganization and Dissolution (1871-1971) by Mary B. Perfect, MEd thesis, University of Manitoba, April 1978.

Obituary [Mary Highfield Collins], Winnipeg Free Press, 25 October 2014.

This page was prepared by Allan Drysdale and Gordon Goldsborough.

Page revised: 25 January 2021

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