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St. Mark’s prepares for birthday bash
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St. Mark’s Anglican Church in High Prairie was built in 1936.
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Stella Sware
South Peace News
Editor’s note: This story, the second in a series of three articles, is being published in preparation for the St. Mark’s celebrating 100 years in High Prairie June 5-7.
St. Mark’s Church was built in 1909 on the cemetery property. In 1917 a church moving bee, organized by the farmers and the Halldorson brothers, moved the church during the last snow on April 5. The new location is now the home of the Movie Gallery. Contractors from Peace River began work on the rectory in the fall of 1916 and it was ready in January 1917. Rev. White, Mrs. White and the children moved into the house on the corner. The church arrived in April which was more central for the new town of High Prairie.
Canon White remained in High Prairie from 1917-33. During this time he held periodic services at various other centres such as Enilda, Faust, Swan Valley, Kinuso, Slave Lake, Smith, Heart River Settlement, Peavine Prairie, Salt Prairie and Big Prairie.
On June 1, 1933, Canon White took his final wedding at High Prairie, that of Bronislov Buchek and Mary Duban, and on July 2 his last baptism was Sheila May Fevang, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Sigborn Fevang.
In 1930 Eva Hasell, whose Canadian Sunday School Caravan Mission work had been started in 1920, extended her most valuable service into the Diocese of Athabasca. In 1931 she and Iris Syle arrived at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Guy Randall near the West Prairie River. Out of this visit was born the Anglican Sunday School at Randall’s Beach. With funds supplied by Hasell’s mission work a Caravan Hall was built. It served there until the Randalls moved into High Prairie.
Rev. Edward Linfoot succeeded Canon White in 1933. About this time, talk was “we needed a bigger church”. Richard P. Butler donated some lots on the south side of the road. Plans were then made for the new church and the property was secured in June 1936.
Edward W. Pratt and Ed Albertine hauled gravel for the foundation work, using a team of horses rented from Archie Girton. When the railroad had come through High Prairie rather than Grouard, the importance of Grouard decreased and many of those who had been residing there moved to High Prairie, giving their support to the work at St. Mark’s. Among these were the families of Charles A. Walker, Frank Pottage and Verner (Barney) Maurice. With the church building project in High Prairie in mind, Bishop Sovereign secured $10,000 from an anonymous donor in Great Britain; this was made available to the parish.
Peter Wiwchar took a contract to build the church for $435 with material to be furnished by the vestry. Some materials came from St. Peter’s Church in Kapowan. The windows in the nave came from St. Peter’s. The Women’s Auxiliary put in the windows above the altar with hope someday it would be filled with stained glass.
Sixty-one years later a lovely window donated by Irene Fevang in memory of her husband, Bernard, was installed. The altar rail was supplied by Mr. C. Walker. The bulk of the work was done by volunteers and was completed by the fall of 1936.
On Thursday, Oct. 5, 1936, the new church was consecrated by Rev. A.H. Sovereign, Bishop of Athabasca. The anonymous donor was represented by her solicitor, Stanley E. Attenbourough of London, England.
In the summer of 1937 Rev. S.G. West arrived as incumbent. With a new church, the old church was then used as a parish hall.
On July 4, 1940, Rev. G Anthony Crawley arrived as our new rector at St. Mark’s. He also had services in schools, halls and homes here and there in the country.
During his time here, people in Salt Prairie went to work to build a church beside the old trail to Atikameg and Gift Lake, Unfortunately, in 1946 when the building was almost complete Rev. Crawley received a call to go to Chapleau, Ont. to take over the work as a principal of the Indian school there.
The summer of 1946 saw Rev. C. Dickin arrive in High Prairie. That summer the old church building had been sold and the money used to purchase lots west of the new church. In 1947 a meeting of parishioners decided to bring in the Caravan Hall and locate it on these lots for use as a parish hall. E.W. Pratt and his son, Donald, dug out the basement area for the furnace. The Caravan Hall was moved to this spot and became our parish hall and Sunday School classroom. Ernie Trump, Jack Walker and Ed Becker supervised the moving of the building. Now we had a new church and a hall next door which was used for many functions.
This story will be continued in a couple weeks recounting the history from the 1950s onward. Meanwhile, remember we are celebrating 100 years June 5-7 with an old-fashioned church picnic, visit to the cemetery, barbecue and church service. Please watch for further details.
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