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Coal bucket similar to the one used at Scapa school.
1941
Brooks, Alberta, Canada

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Blanche Coutlis remembers:'I often talk about the Scapa coal stove I started in the dark and then left for breakfast. An hour later, the schoolroom was still dark because it was full of dense smoke. No fire burned, but smoke had filled the room. I'd dislodged the stovepipe.

Another time, a willful student used the coalstove to melt a red wax crayon which immitated realistic, dripping blood. He put some near his ears and chin. I was relieved to discover it was only crayon and not blood."

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Coal stove in early country shools
1941
Brooks, Alberta, Canada

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"Gopher Tails and Syrup Pails" written by John Charyk contained remembrances of many country school teachers. Blanche Coultis wrote: "My first teacherage was at Brown S.D. 4617, eighteen miles west of Pollockville, Alberta, during the school term 1935-36. It was a one-room affair, covered with rubberoid, with a slanting roof. This building was not insulated, but the large kitchen range kept us warm, as my sister and I did our homework with our feet snugly ensconced in its big oven.

That particular stove, or my over firing of it, was the cause of our almost burning down the teacherage during a blizzard. When my sister and I returned to the teacherage at noon on a stormy day, we found the wall behind the stove on fire. In a trice I dumped the coal from the coal scuttle I was carrying, and we used it to scoop up snow from a snowdrift just outside the front door. We managed to put out the fire by dousing it with this snow. I can tell you that it was a very close call.

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Coal shovel
1941
Brooks, Alberta, Canada

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Alexandra Readers published in 1919
1919
Brooks, Alberta, Canada

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Alexandra Readers were used in many of the schools where I taught. This fourth and final reader in the series contained Gulliver Among the Giants, The Charge of the Light Brigade and Robinson Crusoe.