The Gnadenfeld School District was established in June 1911 however the district operated no classroom (and received no provincial grant funding) until 1920, at which time a one-room schoolhouse was built in Gnadenfeld (SW27-1-1W) in the Rural Municipality of Rhineland.
Among the teachers who worked at Gnadenfeld School were John J. Heinrichs (Fall 1920 - Spring 1921), Jacob G. Siemens (Fall 1921 - Spring 1922, Fall 1926 - Spring 1927), Cornelius H. Hiebert (Fall 1922 - Spring 1924), ? (Fall 1924 - Spring 1925), Henry S. Schellenberg (Fall 1925 - Spring 1926), Andrew Rieger Sobering (Fall 1928 - Spring 1929), ? (Fall 1929 - Spring 1942), Jacob J. Enns (Fall 1942 - Spring 1943), Justina B. Wiens (Fall 1943 - Spring 1945), John Wiebe Driedger (Fall 1944 - Spring 1946), Annie Kehler (Fall 1946 - Spring 1947), Mary Regehr (Fall 1947 - Spring 1948), Helen D. Peters (Fall 1948 - Spring 1949), Lawrence Giesbrecht (Fall 1949 - Spring 1952), Susie E. Hildebrandt (Fall 1952 - Spring 1953), Helen Friesen (Fall 1953 - Spring 1954), Isaac Dyck (Fall 1954 - Spring 1957), Susann Enns (Fall 1957 - Spring 1958), Peter P. Giesbrecht (Fall 1958 - Spring 1962), Erdman Friesen (Fall 1962 - Spring 1963), Ronald John Harder (Fall 1963 - Spring 1966), and Bill Bergman (Fall 1966 - Spring 1967).
In 1967, the district became part of the Altona Consolidated School District and later the Rhineland School Division. The school building was later moved to Altona West Park School for additional classroom space. A portion of the former schoolyard on which a teacherage stood was sold for residential purposes and, as of 2014, the renovated teacherage still stands. The remainder of the schoolyard was sold to the farmer who owned the adjacent farmland.
The original Gnadenfeld School building (no date) by G. G. Neufeld
Source: Archives of Manitoba, School Inspectors Photographs,
GR8461, A0233, C131-2, page 145.
Gnadenfeld School (circa 1966)
Source: Bill BergmanSite Coordinates (lat/long): N49.07419, W97.52590
denoted by symbol on the map above
Altona East topographic map, 62H/4 East, Edition 1, Series A743 [UFS Reference Collection].
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.
Summative half-yearly returns for school districts (A 0051), GR0571, Archives of Manitoba.
School division half-yearly attendance reports (E 0757), Archives of Manitoba.
Manitoba School Records Collection, Gnadenfeld School District No. 1593 - Daily Registers, GR2656, Archives of Manitoba.
We thank Al Schmidt (Altona and District Heritage Research Centre) and Bill Bergman for providing additional information used here.
This page was prepared by Nathan Kramer and Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 14 March 2026
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