Cantley 1889 Articles

University of Wilson’s Corners

Wilson’s Corners (WC) is a small rural farming community which straddles the boundary between Cantley and Val-des-Monts. It had a general store, post office, boarding house, sawmills, blacksmith, mica trimming shop and its own school ...

By Mary Holmes

“University of Wilson’s Corners” was our neighbour’s answer whenever someone asked him where he went to school, usually followed by a puzzled pause. Its official name was The School Commission or Municipality of St-Jean/ John-de/of-Wakefield.

The school was built on property of the Morris family on the north side of Townline Road, now chemin des Cavernes. It was a one room schoolhouse with multiple grades as was typical of those times. Many generations of WC children were educated in this school.

The first school was log. According to my aunt, her father attended that school in the mid-1870s. She said that she started to school in the log building which seems to suggest that the school was replaced during her school time (1910s). She reminisced that she attended school first in May and June 1910 before her sixth birthday in August to get used to the situation and then started full time in September. There were 25 to 30 students in the school. The school was closed in January and on winter days that were too cold or stormy.

The school population was drawn from the Catholic and Protestant and anglophone and francophone communities. Students came by “shank’s mare” (walking) from the village and the farms in the vicinity of the school. Some were lucky enough to get a drive by horse and sleigh/ wagon by a family member or someone passing by on the road. Some even got lost on the way to school and ended up in the opposite direction at the Blackburn Creek with nothing to do but fish!

Some teachers were homegrown and some were from away. There is a record of a young woman, Miss Murphy, who came from Ormstown, Quebec to teach at Wilson’s Corners, circa 1924. Unfortunately, she died from a burst appendix since medical help was too far away. One teacher, Eleanor Feeney, came from Huntingdon, Quebec to WC around 1926 and stayed when she married a WC man, Willie John Cleary. Her future husband’s young relatives remember that she did not cut them any slack in the classroom.

In 1936 and 1937, Murray McGlashan attended his first school years in the WC School. His teacher was Monica Birt from Cantley. Another Cantley girl, Yvette Chenier (her mother was a Cleary) taught for a year at the WC School around 1948. The only qualification needed was completion of high school. Yvette had attended Sacred Heart Convent in Ottawa for high school. Former student, Mary Cleary, a WC girl, returned to the school as a teacher. She was a very fine teacher and went on to have a long career as a teacher and principal in schools in Gatineau/Hull.

One male teacher in the 1940s is remembered for his foresight. Times were very tough. Some of the children came to school in winter with bare feet inside rubber boots or without mitts. He purchased wool and needles and taught the children how to knit. One of those students could still knit himself a pair of socks in his 70s.

Nelson Lawlor and his classmates attended their first school year at the WC School in September 1955. They then moved to the already established school, currently a private residence at 12 St. Elizabeth Road and the predecessor to today’s École Sainte-Élisabeth, 51 chemin Sainte-Élisabeth. Officially, the assets and liabilities of the WC School had been taken over by the School Municipality of Cantley effective July 1, 1955.

This is only the beginning of the story. If you have any information, memories or pictures about our little “university”, Cantley 1889 would be glad to hear from you: info. info.cantley1889@gmail.com.

For the history of École Sainte-Élisabeth, read Echo of Cantley, September 2017 - Volume 29 no. 3