With thanks to the Chestermere United Way, Mrs. Janice Cook Prairie Waters, and two very generous volunteers Miss Lorraine Gillespie and Mrs. Joyce McElroy, 110 grade two students and five teachers and assistants at Prairie Water Elementary found out how different life was for a Grade 2 student back in 1939. This is the second time that the Chestermere Historical Foundation has arranged for Lorraine and Joyce to Prairie Waters to share their stories. Joyce went to school in Cavendish Alberta, a very small and remote community, 60 miles NW of Medicine Hat. So remote (the school was 8 miles from her home across the bald prairie) that she did correspondence until she was 10 and old enough to take her horse to school. Teachers and students at Prairie Waters were impressed with her exercise book that showed cursive writing was taught then as early as Grade 1. Later Joyce moved to Chestermere, marrying Mort McElroy, and raising their family here. Miss Lorraine Gillespie was born and raised right here, and went to school at Janet School (1 mile east of Janet Siding on the CNR line) and later Rockland School (N of Highway#1a on 68 ST NE) after school consolidation began. Miss Gillespie still resides near Chestermere.
“No iPads, no cell phones, no TV …what would that be like?” Mrs. McElroy asked the classes. By the looks on their faces, the little ones found it hard to imagine. Telling about a radio that operated with batteries also provided puzzled looks and a learning opportunity. Many Alberta students in the early grades had music lessons from Mrs. Mary Mercer via radio broadcasts and later in high school listened to Shakespeare’s plays. An old brown radio was one of the artifacts displayed courtesy of the funds from United Way.
Lorraine had lots of good memories to share about year-end picnics at Chestermere Lake. The only trees around were down where Camp Chestermere now sits so that was a very desirable spot when the June sun burned down. One year they had been studying Mexico so the children had Chili Con carne as a special treat. Another time, Loraine recalls, they got watermelon as a treat–it really felt like the start of summer holidays.
The visit by the King and Queen in 1939 was a very special part of each story told by Joyce and Lorraine. Every Alberta student received a medal, specially minted to honour the occasion. Joyce proudly has hers still. Lorraine described how the Janet School children got to go into town (Calgary) to see the parade and watch the royal train depart. Every one dressed in their finest, they got little bottles of milk to drink, then lined the street to watch the parade with the Queen dressed in powder blue with a big feather in her hat, and King George VI in their convertible. They watched as the train pulled away, the Queen holding her bouquet and waving from the last car.
When hearing about Joyce and Lorraine’s tiny one room schools the Prairie Waters students were in awe to think that there were sometimes only 5 or 6 students in the whole school, with maybe only child in a grade, and that the whole school was smaller than their classroom. And there were even greater exclamations of surprise at the thought of going out of doors in the winter to use the toilets.
The full stories which Joyce and Lorraine shared about school in 1939 will soon be up on the Chestermere Historical Foundation (CHF) website as well as many photographs. Watch for it soon at www.chestermerehistory.org. Read more great stories about the early days in Chestermere in ‘Chestermere A Home for All Seasons’ available for purchase from CHF (contact via the webpage) or at your local Chestermere Public Library.
