COLUMN: Tales from the Gravel Ridge – Building community by looking out for each other

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Building a sense of community requires, to a significant degree, that we care about the wellbeing of those whose lives are associated with our own, in one way or another. We might well apply the legal concept of “neighbour principle” to such a group. If we become part of a community that is already well established, our responsibility whether we recognize it or not is to in due time develop an awareness of how we fit into this group or community.

Rosengard was already well established, both geographically and culturally, when I was born. The gravel ridge which provided a very important roadway for part of the community, was a natural geological and topographical feature. To my mind this reality had a significant impact on all of us, and on the evolution of our district.

At the time of its establishment on April 4, 1927, the Rosengard School District No. 2168, was administered by the Official Trustee of the department of education of Manitoba. The Rosengard School had already become a well functioning educational institution long before a local board was elected in 1949. Reports of School Inspector, Mr. A.A. Herriot clearly confirm this fact. In his report to the board of trustees, Mr. Herriot states that based on a visit to the School on October 19, 1937, “Attendance is high and steady. September average 48.45, present today 51. Children have made fine progress with spoken English and all but the very young speak it readily.” This is truly impressive, given that the early teachers were new Canadians, whose first language was not English, nor were their prior educational studies in English.

Rosengard students and their parents building community, 1938.
Rosengard students and their parents building community, 1938.

Private schools already existed in the Rosengard area prior to the English language school that was established under the auspices of the provincial department of education. Significant mental and emotional adjustments will have had to be made by parents whose children had attended the private schools. No doubt they were anxious regarding the possible loss of the German language, as their children would now be educated in English. Closely related to this concern was the fact that the new curriculum would be one prepared and controlled by the department of education.

Added to these challenges regarding the education of their children, long-standing families of Rosengard whose forebears had arrived in Canada during the 1870s, were now also responding to an influx of fellow Mennonites, newly arriving from Ukraine during the 1920s. This approximately 50-year spread between the arrival of these two groups also called for considerable adjustments on the part of all concerned from both groups. Each group had over this 50-year time period evolved differently, as their circumstances required.

These two somewhat disparate groups now became neighbours. It must surely have been necessary for both groups to respect each other’s differences. For the earlier established group it required a significant degree of grace and forbearance to welcome this influx of Mennonites . To my mind it speaks to the phenomenal capacity for neighbourliness that all of us possess. It also speaks to our ability to love each other, and to care about each other.

In 1932, Lord Atkin of the British House of Lords in the case of Donoghue v Stevenson, no doubt reflecting on the Gospel account of the Samaritan who assisted the man who was beaten and robbed, applies that story to the legal case he was hearing, as follows: “The rule that you are to love your neighbour becomes in law, you must not injure your neighbour; and the lawyer’s question, ‘Who is my neighbour?’ receives a restricted reply. You must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbour.” This decision has come to be called the “Neighbour Principle.”

There is no doubt in my mind that the longer time residents of Rosengard, who had their own history of hardship and deprivation, went far beyond neighbourliness, as they accepted the newcomers in the 1920s into their midst with love. For the more recent arrivals from Ukraine, it too required humility and grace to live within the context of their new neighbourhood.

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