Victoria School

Victoria School is a Municipal Heritage Property that comprises one municipal block in the Town of Duck Lake. Completed in 1914, the property features a two-storey, brick building on a well-maintained green space. The site also includes two non-contributing buildings.

The heritage value of Victoria School resides in its association with one of the first two Protestant Separate School districts organized in Saskatchewan. Permissible under the North-West Territories Act of 1875, separate schools were created to protect the rights of religious minorities through education. Typically, these schools were Catholic, but Duck Lake was the contrary. A predominantly Catholic area, the Protestant community established the Duck Lake Protestant Separate School Board #187 in 1890 in order to provide a Protestant-based education. Named after the reigning monarch, the school operated out of a log building until 1914 when the new structure was completed, and remained only one of two Protestant separate school districts in Saskatchewan for 24 years. Victoria School served the community until 1944.

Heritage value also lies in the building's architecture, which is representative of elementary schools constructed in many towns and villages in Saskatchewan in the early twentieth century. Designed specifically to meet the needs of optimistic or rapidly growing prairie communities, these two-storey structures were designed to be easily adapted, should student enrolment increase. By locating the main entrance, hallway, and stairway at one end of the building, rather than the centre, an easily-constructed addition could be attached. In addition to its functionality, the building's brick construction, symmetrical windows, arched doorway, and projecting bell tower and entranceway impart a sense of authority that was important in the establishment of education in Saskatchewan.

Well-maintained and on its original location, the building continues to serve as a public facility and now houses the town library.

Source:

Town of Duck Lake Bylaw No. 9 of 1982.

The heritage value of Victoria School resides in the following character-defining elements:

-those features that speak to its representative school architecture, such as its spatial design and layout, the symmetrical windows, the towered entranceway, and rounded-arch doorway;

-those features that reflect its use as a school, including the signage and flagpole;

-its original location on a well-maintained green space.