Besides the basic subjects, manual training, cooking, recreational ac- tivities, gardening and modern agricultural techniques were taught. The Visitor’s regular report comments:

When children are conveyed to school in comfortable wagons, supplied with coverings and wraps, they step to the school platform in perfect condition and ready to work. Good health, bright spirits, physical com- fort — the true circumstances under which good work can be done and thus secured, and what a bless- ing consolidation would prove to the social relation- ships in the districts concerned! J ealousies and bickerings would gradually disappear, for to perpetuate such animosities would be impossible when the young people of the various districts have to sit in the same class and take part in games in the same playground.

This school must have had a far-reaching effect on all who attended for many students graduated with honors and became leaders in their com- munities and prominent citizens in other parts of Canda. Of course not all children were able to attend this consolidated school.

Classes were conducted in two rooms in Southport in 1901, with A. McGregor as principal and Alvira Robertson as assistant. Some time later the school population declined and only one classroom remained in opera- tion until 1936 when enrollment reached approximately fifty pupils. This re- , quired re-opening the second classroom with Austin Kennedy (now living in Mt. Herbert) as principal, and Marie Curley (later Mrs. J. Hayley, now residing in Alberta) as assistant. The classrooms were heated by coal stoves placed in the centre of each room. An outdoor privy and a schoolyard con- sisting of about 800 square feet completed the facilities.

Repairs and improvements were necessary from time to time, and the school board often encountered difficulties in collecting taxes to meet these expenses. One time when the school badly needed painting, the trustees enlisted volunteers to come and paint together. Each person set to work on his or her allotted 10 square feet of the school. But when the job was com- pleted—lo and behold!—it sported various shades of green and was the laughing-stock of all who passed by. The story inspired the following poem from Mr. Yorston, who lived on the Wharf Road.

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