Our Lady of Mount Carmel School
10524 76th Avenue
Architect: Edward Underwood
Constructed: 1925
Discussions surrounding a new south-side Separate school started in 1925. It was an absolute necessity in the view of its board. At the time there was nine Catholic school rooms and two-hundred-twenty-nine pupils across South Edmonton. Speaking to City Council, Separate Chairman McGee described their condition as reproachable. They were completely “unsanitary” and one “had been condemned as a firetrap.”
Council must have been swayed, as a city-wide plebiscite was issued soon afterwards. Bylaw No.15, asking Catholic ratepayers for their approval “to borrow the sum of $55,000.00 for the purpose of erecting and equipping a six-roomed brick school building,” went to vote on Monday, June 29th.
Five-hundred-sixty-six Catholics voted. “As there are about 1,000 Separate school ratepayers, over fifty percent went to the polls… Voting showed that those opposed to the bylaw had a majority at only three [of thirteen] polls.” Calderites — who had received a new Separate school of their own only a year prior — thought the question absolutely ludicrous, voting thirty-six ‘against’ versus six ‘for’.
Regardless, tenders soon went out and construction on “Our Lady of Mount Carmel” began that summer. It was to one of four similarly styled schools constructed during the 1920s — the others were St. Francis of Assisi, St. Edmund, and St. Alphonsus. In Separate System parlance they were built to what was known as the “Pavilion Style”. Tony Cashman writes that “each [school] was tastefully tailored to be a variation on a theme, and the central bell tower had suggestions of a church spire, which identified it as a Catholic School.”
These “pavilions” drew interest country-wide for their practical and well thought-out designs. In 1927 the Royal Canadian Architectural Institute Journal singled them out as a remarkable example of modern school planning. St. Alphonsus, identical in every respect to Mount Carmel, was described:
“It is a six room school, all class rooms being on the same floor, and the boys' and girls’ playrooms and toilets in the basement, which is well lighted. There are separate entrances for boys and girls from the playground leading to both playrooms and class rooms. The walls are of brick with hollow tile furring and tapestry brick facings on concrete foundation. The building is steam heated, having the heating equipment in the basement. Adequate ventilation is provided for all class rooms and cloak rooms.”
A gala event was held to celebrate Mount Carmel’s opening. Commencing at 3:00 p.m., Sunday, November 9th, 1925, “the school was solemnly blessed by His Grace Archbishop O’Leary, assisted by Reverend Father Patton and Reverend William Carlton.” “Following the religious ceremony, Reverend Dr. McDugan, rector of St. Joseph’s Cathedral, gave the principal address, in which he spoke of the school as the training ground for the ideal citizen and the ideal Christian,” the Edmonton Journal recounted.
Ninety-six years on, Mount Carmel continues to serve in that role.
Image Gallery:
Sources:
“Ratepayers To Vote Monday, June 29, On New Separate School”, Edmonton Journal, June 11, 1925.
“Public Notice”, Edmonton Journal, June 27, 1925.
“Catholic Ratepayers Approve New $55,000.00 School On South Side”, Edmonton Journal, June 30, 1925.
“New Separate School: Mount Carmel Building Opened”, Edmonton Journal, November 10, 1925.
J.N. Semmens, “Typical Schools of Western Canada”, Royal Architectural Institute of Canada Journal Vol.4, No.11 (1927), 415.
Tony Cashman, Edmonton Catholic Schools: A Success Story (Edmonton: Edmonton Roman Catholic Separate School District No.7, 1977), 127, 128.
