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Since 1987, Irv Drefs and Marlis Duff have been saving pieces of Moose Jaw’s history that every person born and raised here can appreciate, with Peacock teacher Carrie Kiefer joining the effort in 2000 — together, they have created a hidden gem in the Museum of Schools Room at Albert E. Peacock Collegiate.
“Back in the fall of ‘87, Irv Drefs had approached Larry Booth about the number of archivable things and retaining the school division’s history,” explained Marlis Duff, who is now retired from her position as a library supervisor at what was first called Moose Jaw School Division #1, and is now Prairie South School Division (PSSD)
“Irv approached me about helping, and we went for it. We were in basements at schools and in crawlspaces, and it was a really dirty job. Some places we’d put rubber bands around our ankles, around the bottom of our pant legs, because we didn’t know what we were walking into.”
When Kiefer joined PSSD in 2000, Duff joked, she kind of “twisted her arm” to get her to come and help.
“She didn’t have to twist too hard,” Kiefer said, smiling. “I like this type of thing. ... I don’t think there’s a lot of people that really know about it, because we don’t advertise it. Part of the challenge is just to find time to care of it, because we don’t have any dedicated staffing that goes toward maintaining the room.”
Although it’s been a small effort by a volunteer team, they’ve managed to fill a room at A.E. Peacock Collegiate, including items such as a display box housing Albert Peacock’s Order of Canada medal and his various coronation and military service medals.
The room has been renovated to have a museum-like feel, including display windows and cabinets.
Perhaps their most treasured item is a solid wood rolltop desk dating back to at least 1950, and likely before.
“The desk was one of the big, jackpot finds,” Duff explained. “It was actually here in Peacock, in the automotive lab, and they were using it to store stuff. It was full of paint and grease. We worked on it over the course of three solid days, for an hour or two here and there. It was a lot of elbow grease.
“But it’s in excellent condition, and the rolltop still works. ... And when we were refurbishing it, we found a letter with Mr. Peacock’s signature on it, so, it could have been an office desk.”
But the desk is just the beginning: There’s a collection of the old Union Jack flags that flew in Moose Jaw before they were replaced by the current Canadian flag in 1965, sets of solid metal scales from chemistry classes, a collection of relief maps that encompass the entire globe and show the wear of decades of little hands learning about the world, trophies and photos from school teams winning city titles as early as the ‘20s, a Gestetner machine used to make copies before photocopiers were invented, and more.
“We’ve got lots of technology in here,” Kiefer said. “Sometimes, I’ve taken my classes through and they look at the old typewriters and they start laughing at the one that I used when I was in high school, so you know, we have some interesting pieces.”
Many of the items, like one science-experiment-looking piece with what appears to be a boiler and possibly a basic generator attached to a small bulb, are mysteries from the liminal spaces between technological eras. Others, such as a collection of abacuses and a set of microscopes, are examples of tech that retained its usefulness over hundreds of years.
Earlier this year, Marlis Duff, Carrie Kiefer, and Irv Drefs (absent) received the Municipal Heritage Stewardship Award from the City of Moose Jaw’s Heritage Advisory Committee for their work in establishing, building, and maintaining the archives.
If you’d like to have a look at the Museum of Schools Room, the person to contact is Carrie Kiefer, at Kiefer.Carrie@prairiesouth.ca.
