The West Brenda School District was established formally in April 1885 and it operated a school on the northeast corner of 20-4-26W in what is now the Municipality of Two Borders. The school closed in 1957 and, henceforth, students from this area went to Melita Consolidated School No. 440. The district was dissolved in 1960. The former school building still stood at the time of a 2012 site visit. Some records for West Brenda School are held at the Antler River Museum in Melita.
Among the teachers of West Brenda School were Ida M. Crowell (1887-1888), ANnie Munro (1888), Mr. McQueen (1889), Henry Thompson (1889-1890), Hattie B. Jackson (1890), Marie Morrison (1890-1892, 1894), Aggie M. Yeomans (1892-1893), Lena A. Ross (1893-1894), Clara Bastedo (1895), Florence H. Barrager (1895-1896), Thomas Drew (1896-1898), Andrew Slater (1898-1899), Vina C. Dobbyn Porteous (1899), Belle Bartholomew Edmanson (1899-1900), Edith Demorest (1900-1901), Maggie Robb (1901), F. Ethel Main (1902), Harry Lewis (1902-1903), Ethel Main (1903-1904), Elva V. Edmanson (1904-1906), Mary Bodkin (1906-1907), Jennie Graham (1907), Minnie Dalzell (1907-1908), Laura Laughlin (1908-1909), Ella J. Taylor (1909-1910), Reita Smith (1910), Jessie E. Hamilton (1910-1911), Mrs. Beger (1911-1912), Laura McLeod (1912), Pearl E. Leigh Wilson (1912-1913), Clara Dewitt (1913-1914), Edna Muldoon (1914-1915), Marion Forsythe Coates (1915-1916), Margaret Beveridge (1916-1917), Gertrude Bray (1917-1918), Marion Reid Robinson (1918-1919), Helen Steedsman (1920-1921), Hazel Dale Oberlin (1921-1922), Gertrude Slater (1922-1923), Wilda Manson (1923-1925), Muriel Cobb Orange (1925-1926), Margaret Potter Renton (1926-1928), Lillian Popkin (1928-1929), Faith Hill (1929-1930), Eva Swartzman Durnin (1930-1931), Ruth Howden Boulton (1931-1934), Hazel Aldis Babcock (1935-1936), Antoinette Huybrecht (1937-1939), Gertrude Conrad (1939-1940), Calista Atkinson Brown (1940-1941), Fred Williams Nelson (1941-1943), Ruth MacKinnon (1943-1944), Ardyth Yerex (1944-1945), Eldera Sissons Park (1945-1946), Doreen Cowling Scharf (1946-1947), Olive Potier (1947-1948), and Kathleen Wark Ross (1948-1950).
West Brenda School (no date) by George Hunter
Source: Archives of Manitoba, School Inspectors Photographs,
GR8461, A0233, C131-1, page 38.
The former West Brenda School building (circa 1986)
Source: Historic Resources Branch, Public School Buildings Inventory, slide 126.
The former West Brenda School building (September 2012)
Source: Gordon Goldsborough
The former West Brenda School building (September 2021)
Source: Rose Kuzina
The former West Brenda School building (September 2021)
Source: Rose Kuzina
Interior of the former West Brenda School (September 2012)
Source: Gordon GoldsboroughSite Coordinates (lat/long): N49.34076, W100.89100
denoted by symbol on the map above
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.
Our First Century, Town of Melita and Municipality of Arthur: 1884-1984 by Melita-Arthur History Committee, 1983, Manitoba Legislative Library F5648.A78, pages 262-263.
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 Rose Kuzina for providing additional information used here.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 15 September 2022
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