Link to:
Principals | Vice-Principals | Teachers | Photos & Coordinates | Sources
The McConnell School District originated nearby, in 1884, with the formation of the Viola Dale School District No. 326 in the Municipality of Hamiota. When the community was bypassed by the Canadian Northern Railway, most of the buildings were moved here in 1912. The village of McConnell was established, named for Andrew Delaney McConnell (1858-1940), who had sold land for a townsite to the railway. Soon afterward, the McConnell Consolidated School District No. 326 was created, with responsibility for the operation of the Viola Dale School No. 326 and also the Ellenville School No. 871. The arrangement proved temporary when, in May 1913, local electors decided to dissolve the consolidated district while rural schools continued at Ellenville, Holylea, Viola Dale, and Watson.
The McConnell School District No. 1711, as the newly reduced district was known, commenced operations in January 1914, with classes held in the local community hall until a school building could be constructed later that year. In early 1920, consolidation was tried again, with the formal merger of McConnell School with the Viola Dale and Ellenville schools. In 1937, a larger school building was erected and the old building was sold to W. Gregory of Decker.
McConnell School closed in 1967, with remaining students going to Hamiota School of the Birdtail River School Division. The former school building was used for a time as a community centre. A monument near the building was erected in July 1983 to commemorate the village of McConnell, which thrived here from 1911, when the railway line arrived, to 1979.
Period
Principal
1925-1926
C. Ray Arthur
1926-1927
Kenneth Donald Bruce (1892-1968)
1927-1930
Weston Sweet (1899-1994)
1930-1931
George Wesley Darnell White (1891-1947)
1931-1936
Caroline Cumming (1885-1979)
1936-1939
Walter Thorvaldur Fredrickson (1907-1974)
1939-1946
?
1946-1951
Charles Linwood “Charlie” Miller (1891-1958)
1951-1952
Harvey Hedley
1952-1954
Thomas W. Kelly
1954-1957
William C. Davison
1957-1959
Mrs. Eva Mundell
Among the teachers who worked at McConnell School were Miss McMillan, Myra McPhaden, Ethel McFaddin, Miss Craig, Miss Aikenhead, Lena Shaw, Elsie Shier, Edna English, Sarah Davey, Albert W. Craigie, Marion Sawyer, Lottie Richardson, J. O. Wilson, Elizabeth M. MacIntosh, Winnie Hutcheson, Leonard Krueger, Rev. Hunter, Pearl Privat, Ruth Fairlie, Kay Moore, G. Hinds, Hazel Robinson, Ada Pauline Herkes, Elva Mclenahan, Winnie Spears, Ab Richardson, Molly Morrice, Rena Smith, Verna Hughes, A. D. Morgan (1939-1940), Edna Kernaghan, Roy Webb, Charlotte Lynch, Richard Nielsen, Gertrude Simpson, Anne Arbuthnott, Nora Orchard, Francis Wilson, Joyce Schwalm, Wilma Miller, Edna Park, Eva Tibbatts, Allan McCulloch, Joan Stanbridge, S. L. Theriault, Margaret McKinnon, Winnie Fowlie, Grace McCallum, Viola Skoglund, Irma Clark, Lois Baker, Donalene Mclachlan, Marion Gallant, Myrna Cavers, Bernice Smith, Marla Magarrell, Dorothy Burnside, Isobel Smith, Lorna Richardson, Emily Twerdun, Agnes Findlayson, and Mrs. Couch.
The original McConnell School building (no date) by J. B. Morrison
Source: Archives of Manitoba, School Inspectors Photographs,
GR8461, A0233, C131-3, page 21.
The original McConnell School building (no date) by J. B. Morrison
Source: Archives of Manitoba, School Inspectors Photographs,
GR8461, A0233, C131-3, page 21.
The McConnell School building is visible in the background of a view of McConnell taken from the top of the local grain elevator (circa 1914)
Source: Natalie Macintosh, 2014-0042
The second McConnell School (no date) by J. P. Sigvaldason
Source: Archives of Manitoba, School Inspectors Photographs,
GR8461, A0233, C131-3, page 21.
The former McConnell School building (circa 1986)
Source: Historic Resources Branch, Public School Buildings Inventory, slide 524.
McConnell commemorative monument by the former McConnell School building (October 2011)
Source: Gordon Goldsborough
The former McConnell School building (October 2011)
Source: Gordon Goldsborough
The former McConnell School building (September 2021)
Source: George Penner
McConnell commemorative monument by the former McConnell School building (October 2011)
Source: Gordon Goldsborough
McConnell commemorative monument by the former McConnell School building (September 2021)
Source: George PennerSite Coordinates (lat/long): N50.26922, W100.52968
denoted by symbol on the map above
See also:
Manitoba Communities: McConnell
Annual Reports of the Manitoba Department of Education, Manitoba Legislative Library.
McConnell: Little Town Lost by McConnell Women’s Institute and History Committee, 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 Study of Public School Buildings in Manitoba by David Butterfield, Historic Resources Branch, Manitoba Department of Culture, Heritage and Tourism, 1994, 230 pages.
We thank Natalie Macintosh, Nathan Kramer, and George Penner for providing additional information used here.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 1 October 2021
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