Historic Sites of Manitoba: White Bank Lea School No. 593 / White Bank Lea Cemetery (RM of Oakview)

A monument to the White Bank Lea School is contained within the White Bank Lea Cemetery, in the Rural Municipality of Oakview. Organized formally in February 1889, a school building operated at NE1-14-22W from 1889 to 1929, then at SE12-14-22W (near this site) from 1929 to 1955, but was closed from 1943 to 1945 due to low enrollment. The school closed in 1955 and the district was dissolved two years later. The monument was erected by former students, teachers and descendants on 15 July 1979.

Among the teachers who worked at White Bank Lea School through the years were Etta Gothered (1892), Mr. Tindell (1901), Miss Teeple (1906), Miss Genung [Stewart] (1908), Miss Oversby (1911), Miss Jackson (1913), Edna Bissett (1914), Edna Burgess (1915), Miss McKaye (1917), Euphemia Riddell [Howard] (1918-1920), Marjorie Fraser [Ward] (1922), Francis Chisolm [Thompson] (1923), Miss Ruggleson [Bell] (1924), Miss Greyson (1925), Lily Campbell [Airey] (1926-1928), Marjorie Pollock [Henry] (1928-1930), Alice Wiltshire (1930-1934), Jean Stenhouse (1934), Eunice Porter (1935-1938), Dave Mylrea (1938-1940), Wilf McTavish (1940), Alice Robertshaw [Elliott] (1941), Doris Simms [Henry] (1942), Shirley McCallum [Fagg] (1945), Mabel Ramsey [Wright] (1946), Ann Seruik (1947), Molly Cormack [McLellan] (1947-1949), Eunice Gregory (1949), Jean Mair [Brooks] (1949-1951), Nora Fleming [Gray] (1951), Shirley Seater [Whelpton] (1951), Metro Koroscil (1952), Faye Nichol (1953), and Faye Cantelon [Ewanick] (1954-1955).

White Bank Lea School (no date) by W. C. Hartley Source: Archives of Manitoba, School Inspectors Photographs, GR8461, A0233, C131-1, page 93. Whitebank Lea School commemorative monument (July 2012) Source: Gordon Goldsborough Site Coordinates (lat/long): N50.15887, W100.34799 denoted by symbol on the map above

Sources:

Threads of the Past: White Bank Lea No. 593, 1889-1955, unpublished pamphlet, 1979.

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.

A list of burials in this cemetery is available from the Manitoba Genealogical Society, including a searchable online database available to members at the MGS Manitoba Name Index (MANI). Some additional information is contained in the 1996 MGS publication Carved in Stone: Manitoba Cemeteries and Burial Sites, revised edition, Special Projects Publication, 106 pages.

This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.

Page revised: 22 January 2021

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