Beeman School 1911-1951, All the Provisions

(A close up of a historical marker in the shape of a small school. It says Beeman School Location. The camera pans past the sign to show a bed of short green grass and beyond it a field of tall yellow grasses. The film’s title appears: All the Provisions. Beeman School).

(Fred Lyczewski shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Fred Lyczewski: I went to Beeman school, it was northeast of Beiseker. To give you a little history, I was born in Bow Island. When I was two weeks old, we moved to the farm, where I am living now. The school was three miles from our place.

(Vera Schmaltz shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Vera Schmaltz: For lunches we didn’t have the fancy lunch kits, we had jam pails or syrup pails. We would have jam sandwiches most of the time, and an apple and a couple of cookies or a piece of cake.

(Leonard Hagel shares memories from his home over zoom)

Leonard Hagel: We each had our Roger’s Golden Syrup cans for lunch buckets, which also were handy to use for carrying water to drown out gophers.

(Frank Schwengler shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Frank Schwengler: We had the regular black lunch pail, but it didn’t work to good on the back of the horse, it would jiggle around and mess it all up, but it was still filling.

(John Richter shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

John Richter: It’s pretty tattered, but it got used for other things after.

(Monty Metzger shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Monty Metzger: Probably my best sandwiches that I got was homemade headcheese. But we had peanut butter sandwiches, and jam and meats. We ate, there was always lots to eat.

(Vera & Frank Schwengler share memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Vera Schmaltz: Once in a while, my mom would buy a loaf of bread and we just loved to have that bought bread.

Frank Schmaltz: If you get a banana, then you were lucky.

Vera Schmaltz: Oh I forgot about that- no we never had bananas I don’t think.

(Leah Uffelman shares memories from her home over zoom)

Leah Uffelman: I will never forget those long brown stockings, they were so miserable. You kept them up with a garter belt or a pantywaist. A pantywaist was something like a muscle shirt that you had to wear under your clothes and the garters were hooked onto the sides with those and they were made of rubber. To keep those stockings up was really miserable.

(Frank Schwengler shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Frank Schwengler: Usually we would wear a little better stuff when you went to school, you had a better jacket and a little more classic, it wasn’t too classic, but it wasn’t too bad.

(Matt Schmaltz shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Matt Schmaltz: I know in those years, a lot of boys wore suspenders on their pants, belts were not fully in use yet.

(Vera Schmaltz shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Vera Schmaltz: Most of us wore hand-me-downs. We would wear pants and a blouse, and the pants were often too big, so we would wear suspenders to hold them up, or often we wore bib overalls. Nothing fancy, just warm clothes in the winter. Clothing was through the catalogue. Groceries was always through the local store.

(Fred Lyczewski shares memories at the Beiseker Golden Years Club)

Fred Lyczewski: They got them from the store, Eaton’s or Sear’s catalogue lots of times. They had big thick catalogues, you did all your shopping there. Anything from houses to soap.

(Adrian Wolfleg sits in the Niitsitapiisini: Our Way of Life Gallery in the Glenbow Museum in front of a large tipi)

Adrian Wolfleg: Times were tough in that time, because you couldn’t order something online and have it delivered to your doorstep, you had to go out and get it and if something happened with the vehicle, you walked or if you had access to horses, you were a step ahead.

(the Beiseker Station Museum logo appears).