The first butter making school

In 1953, the Government of Canada listed the Saint-Denis butter making school in the Directory of Federal Heritage Designations. A plaque accompanying this recognition was placed near the butter making school. The text below is inscribed on it. It aptly describes the school’s founding purpose

Édouard-André Barnard (1835-1898), Jean-Charles Chapais fils (1850-1926) and Damase Rossignol (1848-1901) founded Canada’s first dairy industry school near here in 1881 Trained as a lawyer and agricultural journalist, Barnard studied agricultural practices in Europe for the Quebec government in the 1870s. He then oversaw the creation of a school for teaching butter and cheese making in order to improve the quality and yield of the province’s dairy factories and to increase sales at home and abroad. The school closed in 1884, but a butter factory remained on the premises until 1965.

Federal Directory of Heritage Designations