Dolcy School District No. 2465
The Dolcy School District 2465 was organized by the first school board,
the members of which were: Mr. George Davy, Mr. J.B. Scott and Mr. Jack
Stanyer. The school house was built on the NW ¼ 29-42-4 W4 and ready
for occupation by the fall of 1911: but since classes were held only
during the summer months, actual teaching did not start until 1912. The
name “Dolcy” was derived from “Dolly” the name of Mr. Scott’s favorite
saddle horse.
Some of the teachers who served in the Dolcy School (not necessarily in this order) were: Mrs. W. McPherson, Miss Armstrog, Miss Pierce, Miss E. Caldwell, Mr. Alex Huff, Mr. Pat Perry, Miss I McLeod (Mrs. J. Deyell), Miss L. McLeod, Miss M. Olson, Miss Findlay, Miss Fuglum, Mrs. Franklin, Mr. Rosco Morton, Miss H. Kerr, Miss A. Spilde, Miss Carrington, Mr. Ken Sparks, Miss M. Borden, Miss D. Sume, Miss Anna Murray, Miss V. Dallyn, Mrs. Biggs, Mr. Cosman, Mrs. S. Jackson, Miss B. Barrington.
The largest enrolment was 44 pupils, the last attendance – 13 pupils. Teachers’ salaries in the very early days ranged from $600 per year to $700 per ear. The students rode horseback, walked or drove in buggies to get to school. Janitors were either the teacher, who usually got rent for a teacherage for the work, or $5 per month. In many cases older children were paid $.50 a week for their labour.
The school was in operation until 1951 when pupils were vanned to McCafferty, a two-roomed school. In 1955 the school was closed and the children bussed to Edgerton. The school is now situated on the property of Mr. F. Maull, two miles south of its original site.
Trustees who served during this time were: Kerr, Belton, Mrs. Scott, Smith, Mrs. Nelson, Deyell, Mrs. Hoehn, Stanyer, Peterson, Blackstone, Stewart Scott, Nelson, Keller, Sarginson.
Some of the business conducted by the “board” during those years:
- Moved: That Tangen be paid five dollars - $5.00 for fixing well, moving gate, fixing fence and barn door.
- Moved: That Mrs. Nelson be paid four dollars - $4.00 for scrubbing school floor.
- Moved: That Miss Dempsey be paid one dollar and fifty cents - $1.50 for curtains, providing curtains are there.
- Moved: That secretary write the Dept. of Education to have explained (fully) how teacher is to be paid.
- Moved: That fifteen dollars $15.00 be paid to the secretary of the School Fair – Edgerton.
- Moved: That we get two tons of coal for school.
- Moved: That Dr. Melling be paid $20.00 for services at the school when pupils had the itch.
- Moved: That the incoming school board do their utmost to make the school warmer.
- Moved: That request for Polio Vaccine be made.
- Moved: That smoking is going on in the school and that the teacher should stop it immediately.
Submitted by Mary (Taylor) Whitby
Lyle Atwood tells of one day at Dolcy School.
“In the spring of 1936, I was one of forty-one pupils ranging in age from six to sixteen enrolled at Dolcy School. Our teacher was Miss Dorothy Syme. Serving on the school board was Theodore Smith, John Deyell and Alex Stanyer. Bob Mills was janitor – three dollars a month in winter and $1.50 in summer. How I envied Bob. He could afford denim pants with brass rivets on the pockets and crotch. You could get them right out of Eatons’ catalogue for $1.49. My denims at $1.29 had no rivets.
“We had just survived a very severe winter in which many of us who had some distance to walk would arrive at school with frost-bitten faces. After more than six weeks of sub-zero temperatures, I can remember one afternoon in late February, the snow on the school roof started to melt and form icicles in front of the windows. Miss Syme stopped all studies so that we could marvel at the first hint that spring was coming.
“We welcomed the warm balmy days of April and May with eagerness. At noon, we boys would take our lunches out and sit at the sunny side of the huge wood pile. The talk would usually be about what we could do to make life miserable for the teacher. Trading sandwiches was a popular custom. On this day I made a trade with Jason Smith and on the first bite I couldn’t get my breath. It was made with horseradish, mustard and pepper – a “trading sandwich” he had made himself.
“Gosh, I look back and remember how bad we were! On this particular day, right after lunch we snared enough gophers to make up a twelve-gopher team in binder twine harness, and then tried to get them to pull a block of wood, but they wouldn’t go in the same direction. When we tired of this we killed the gophers, divided the tails and put them in our pockets. You could get a penny each for gopher tails from Artie Nelson, who was then councillor. We learned that if you kept the tails in a lard pail with the lid tightly on you could deliver the pail to Artie who would then remove the lid and wouldn’t bother to count them. He would always take your word for the number of tails.
“This period of time has often recently been referred to as lost years, and indeed, perhaps they were to many of our parents who lived in hopes, after repeated crop failures, that next year would be better, but to me at the age of thirteen this day at Dolcy School was filled with happy and treasured memories.”
Dolcy School District No. 2465
Submitted by Mary (Taylor) Whitby and Lyle Atwood
98-99-100-101