Sacred Heart College - Stella Oriens Yearbook (Regina, Saskatchewan Canada)

Page 32 text:

The winter of 1882-3 passed off pleasantly, all drawbocks considered. The town was yet on odd-looking jumble, the streets were neither laid out, nor graded, a sort of diluvian confusion characterizing everything. But materials were at hand for the building of the city, the surveyor and architect had not been idle and cheerful industry merely awaited the breath of spring- tide to lay the solid foundations of a handsome prairie town. Early in ' 83 new buildings began to loom up along Broad Street; the railway traffic increased; arrangements were made for digging a public well; a citizen, Regina Mary Rowell, had been born to the town in December, 1882. Lawyers by the dozens had hung out their shingles and hotels were full, and the lands around Regina for twenty miles were taken up. The Canadian North West Land Company opened their office on Broad Street and the town boasted a school with Miss Laidlaw as teacher. Buildings went up on all sides, and the sound of the hammer was heard far and near. In the middle of April there were fifteen buildings used as stores, two banks, four large feed stables, two carriage shops and four good hotels. Early in May Mr. W. B. Scarth, able and popular managing director of N. W. Land C ompany wired Mr. Lunan to grade the streets, a work immediately begun under contractor Bonneau. Mr. Scarth also intimated his willingness to give $500 towards the building of a bridge across Wascana. In 1883, Father St. Germain said Mass for a group of Metis, and during the course of the same year efforts were made to establish a regular parish by a secular priest. Father L. N. Larche. The first visit of Archbishop Tache was in 1884, when he came to consecrate the little church that had been built on the corner of Twelfth Avenue and Cornwall Street. Bishop Grandin assisted the Archbishop who performed the ceremony in the presence of the elite of Regina. Among the first parishioners were P. Bonneau and Family, Dan Mur¬ phy, Ed. McCarthy, Miss McCarthy, Mrs. Hayes, organist, Mr. and Mrs. Forget, (the first lieut. gov. of the Province of Saskatchewan), Mr. and Mrs. Louis Bour- get, Mr. and Mrs. Waldron whose daughter was the first child baptized in the new church. In the evening a concert was held at which His Honor Lieuten¬ ant-Governor Dewdney and Mrs. Dewdney, together with the notables of the town were present. A large sum was realized which went towards the liquid¬ ation of the church debt. In 1885 Father Larche was succeeded by Father McCarthy and Father Graton arrived from Montreal in May of the following year. First annual exhibition was held on the 2nd and 3rd of Oct. 1884. Money prizes valued at $1500 and entries numbered 986. Showground for horses and cattle was Victoria Square, while the courtroom and vacant store-room in Scarth ' s Building were utilized for exhibits of grain, roots and vegetables. In 1885 an event took place which made Regina, for the time being, the centre of the world, for on May 23 of that year, Louis David Riel was taken THIRTY

Page 31 text:

I. Four As guaranteed in this subject (Bridge). — 2. Phyllis, high on a snowy hill. ■ 3. Fran. 4. Margaret finally outgrew the doghouse. — 5. Fran hasn ' t hung up yet. 6. Peggy (Sonja Henie) O ' Flanagan. - 7. Margie, Helen and Vivian (The Normalites). 8. N.B. A Set Up . — 9. Peggy, Helen Margie. A skating we will go. — 10. Phyll on her way home. Seven P.M. no doubt. — II. Senorita O ' Flanagan. — 12. School is just one r round of pleasj

Page 33 text:

prisoner by Captain Young of the R.N.W.M.P. On July 26 he was tried. The little square building on the corner of Scarth and Victoria was supplied with a telegraph office and from its wires were flashed to a thousand and one points each hour ' s proceedings of the trial which ended in conviction. After several respites Riel was finally executed at the police barracks on 16th of November. He died calm, resigned, brave, passionless, and forgiving , assisted on the scaffold by Father Andre. The nascent city of Regina had also its martyr, in the person of Father Graton. On Saturday, March 7, 1891, Father Graton was returning from one of his many missions, to Regina, where his ministry was needed the following day. He pushed on through the snow until his horses gave out. When his companion returned with fresh horses, he found the priest dying. He went off again to seek aid but before he arrived Father Graton had died, a martyr to his duty. Such were the picturesque beginnings of the city which is now an edu¬ cational, religious, and military centre. With the vitality of youth, Regina has come smiling through a period of combined drought and depression, and in this year of her diamond jubilee the Queen City of the plains can really boast that she is sixty years young. —F. S. Rev. Father Hugonard and Indians, 188 ' ) THIRTY-ONE