Weekly Ponderings: People brought character and culture to Peace River (Part 18)

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Last Ponderings we were introduced to Peace River Crossing’s second school teacher, Jean Cameron Kelley, as we accompanied her on part of her 26-hour journey. She rode in the first vehicle to make it to the community, population 350, under its own power from Edmonton 107 years ago – December 1913. A curious crowd awaited – some, perhaps more interested in the car than the new teacher.

The reason the 25-year-old Miss Kelley was the second teacher in the village was to fill the vacancy left by the first. Apparently, Miss Margaret Anderson, “a young teacher from Scotland, who under siege of local bachelors, had finally succumbed and married one of them, David Learmouth, resigning her position after only six months of teaching”.

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Because of the short stay of Miss Anderson, the school board under the chairmanship of H.A. George, who went to Edmonton to fetch Miss. Kelley and return with her and the vehicle, devised a binding contract he invited her to sign. It read: “The teacher hereby binds herself not to marry during the term of this contract.”

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A source suggests she did not sign the contract, but rather agreed she would not marry during the school term, however, she matter-of-factly declared she would pursue matrimony, or anything else that took her fancy. The same source said the board agreed to her terms, “even though a school-teacher’s certificate was a ‘man-hunter’s licence”.

Before we get down to the seriousness of school education, Miss Kelley, in her Peace River Remembers account of memories of her time in the village, educates us on some of the background of the 26-hour Edmonton to Peace River Crossing trip. She explains it took that long because the vehicle lacked headlights, thus safe travel was limited to daylight hours – approximately five and a half hours each day. On arrival, the quartet of chauffer Dean Bell; George Cliffe, H. A. George; and Miss Kelley toured the community before heading across the frozen Peace River and up George Hill to the homestead of H.A. and wife Louise (Auger). Many refer to the George Hill as the West Hill, but back then it was known as the George Hill – still is to some. The college structure, standing on what was his homestead land, is the H.A. George Building.

The day after her arrival was New Year’s Eve. “We all went to the dance, which was held in the dining room of the new log hotel [New Peace Hotel, owned by H.A.]. Mr. George had his piano moved there for the occasion and there was a fiddler, also a large crowd of people, both white and native, all of whom seemed to be having a wonderful time.

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“There was a surplus of men, so there were no wallflowers. My foot being too painful [remember the blisters from too close and lengthy association with a charcoal foot warmer en route from Edmonton] I ended up at the piano accompanying the fiddler for the evening. At the stroke of twelve, there were twelve revolver shots from outside, whereupon everyone kissed the ones nearest him or her. Mr. George had prepared me for this and also told me that on account of this custom, New Year was called Kissing Day by the natives.”

On New Year’s Day, there was more socializing for Miss Kelley, this time out of town, necessitating another drive. It was along the Shaftesbury Trail [on River Lot 12] to the home of MLA T. Allan Brick [and wife Nancy Gray], “son of the Reverend Gough Brick, an Anglican missionary, who founded the Mission at Shaftesbury, about 12 miles up the river” [where Bridgeview Gardens is today].

“We had a wonderful New Year’s dinner there. There was a stuffed turkey and vegetables and cranberry sauce and a real English plum pudding. In another account, Jean writes of “Nancy’s wonderful cuisine”.

“We spent the night there, and I learned the local meaning of the word ‘camp’. It did not mean roughing it in the open, or in a tent, it simply meant that you spent the night somewhere. So, we camped at Brick’s that night and the next day drove home and moved across the Peace [River] to Mr. George’s town house, a large storey and a half house, which was destroyed by fire early in 1966. The house was across from the community’s first agricultural fair grounds and as early newspapers suggest – the first airport, as well as what is now part of T.A. Norris Middle School/Glenmary Junior/Senior High grounds.

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The first school in Peace River began in the White House ballroom – a large room on the main floor “used as a sort of ballroom when [H.A., the Hudson’s Bay factor] gave a dance for his trappers in the spring at the conclusion of the fur buying business of the winter. This large room was also my schoolroom, where I taught by day and at night rolled down my bedroll on the floor behind the stove and slept there. In a couple of weeks, one of the upstairs rooms was furnished and set up for my bedroom.”

Back to school – elementary that is – holidays now a thing of the past. The first day of school in January 1914, 10 pupils showed up. By the end of June, the number multiplied to 50, including Bertie, Alice and Ethel George; Teddy White; Simon, Freddie and Alice Gullion; Emma Brick; Mary, Robert and Jimmy Hodgson; Mary, Henry and Paul Smith from Fort Vermilion; and Mabel and Willie George (children of H.A.’s brother Willie]. “When I met H.A. George’s children the first thing Bertie, a boy of nine, wished to know was if I could speak Cree. I told him, no, and he said that it was OK, then they could be saucy to me in Cree and I would not know what they were saying.”

The students comprised all eight grades. The increased number of students diminished the usefulness of the room, prompting the construction of a building designed specifically with the purpose of a school in mind, opened for students for the fall te

“It was located on what we called the ‘first bench’, just a little south of where the railroad crosses the road up the Grouard Hill [the part that now goes under Hwy. 2]. It had a bell tower with a bell, which I believe had been in some building in England, and which Mr. George procured,” writes Jean.

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In a Record-Gazette article dated June 23, 1965, Miss Kelley recalls only children within walking distance of the building went to that school. “Walking distance might mean two or three miles and a six o’clock morning start for the children, ranging through eight grades of school.” That’s when walking distance meant actually walking the distance, not being carried by bus. In reference to regular schools of the time, Kelley says the idea caught on in the North, where parents did their best to provide their children access to the three “Rs” – reading, writing and arithmetic.

As you can imagine, there is more about Jean Cameron Kelley to tell – next Ponderings.

Sources: Peace River Remembers; Peace River Museum Archives and Mackenzie Centre files; Fort Vermilion Mercy Flight of 1929; Alberta Aviation Museum, Edmonton; Record-Gazette; Edmonton Journal, June 6, 1936; New York Sun; Alberta Dental Association Updater, October 1997; Archives Canada; Answering God’s Call, Rolland C. Smith; Joseph Cardinal, Feb. 26, 2009; Don Weaver; Alliance Review; Métis Archives; Portrayal of Our Métis Heritage by J. Overvold; Land of Hope and Dreams; Bricks Hill, Berwyn and Beyond; Peace River Record, April 25, 194; Delayed Frontier, Lure of the Peace and The Last Great West by David Leonard; I Remember Peace River, Alberta and Adjacent Districts, 1800s-1913; Land of Twelve Foot Davis by McGregor); Turning the Pages of Time, History of Nampa and Surrounding Districts; Colourful Historic Pioneers of Peace River by Muriel Oslie; Western Producer, June 24, 1976

Beth Wilkins is a researcher at the Peace River Museum, Archives and Mackenzie Centre.