William Currie was born on February 28, 1834 in Lanark County, ON. In 1860, he moved to St. Mary's, where he worked in mercantile and grain businesses until 1879, when he emigrated to Manitoba. The following year, he took up homesteading along the Assiniboine River, at a site known as Currie's Landing. He received and forwarded frieght from steamboats travelling the river. From 1893-1902, he served as baliff for the Brandon District, before resigning and moving to Brandon where he engaged in the real estate and fire insurance business.
Currie married Ellen Creighton of Blanchard, ON in 1861. Together they had six chrildren: Robert Wilson Currie, Margaret Anne Currie, Harriet Ellen Currie, William James Currie, James Weldon Currie, and Lottie Louise Currie.
William Currie died on March 30, 1931 in Brandon, MB.
Scope and Content
Item is a studio portrait of William Currie.
Notes
History/Bio information taken from the Manitoba Historical Society website (http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/people/currie_w.shtml)
Photograph shows the Bradley Bros. threshing crew of Wheatland, MB posing in a field. Faint writing in pencil on the back of the photo reads: Bill Le Paga(?), Tom B, Dave R., Andy R.
From the back of the photograph: Members of the Wolsley expedition were quartered in the house in 1885 (Northwest Rebellion) and the Hessons moved into the house behind (roof just showing). It had 1882 carved under the front gable.
Custodial History
Donated to the Brandon College Library by Hilda Hesson in 1967.
Scope and Content
Photograph of the Hesson home and family in the 1880’s. The house was located on First Street just north of Rosser on the east side. The man in the buggy was known as Joe.
Very poor. Item has been broken in half on a diagonal from top to botton. Upper right corner is missing. Various tape stains and some tape residue on the bottom left.
History / Biographical
Lottie Louisa Currie was born on September 9, 1876 in St. Mary's, Perth, ON, to William and Eleanor Currie. She came to the Brandon area with her family in the 1880s. Currie worked as a bookkeeper and stenographer for Smith & Burton, from at least 1906 until the business ceased operations in 1917.
Currie continued working in bookkeeping and accounts, first for Brandon Gas & Power Co., then for the Manitoba Power Commission. She appears to have retired around 1942. She is not listed as living in Brandon between 1943-1945, but was once again a resident by 1947. Currie was a member of the First Presbyterian Church, a charter member of the Brandon Business and Professional Women's Club and in 1916, she passed her examinations for the St. John's Ambulance Association.
Lottie Louisa Currie died on November 25, 1972 in Brandon, MB.
Smith & Burton, a grocery store that also had mail order and china departments, was founded by E.B. Smith and John Burton in the 1886. It was housed at a few locations in downtown Brandon; their location at 829 Rosser Avenue is the one that mostly likely appears in the photograph.
Scope and Content
Item is a portrait of office employees at Smith & Burton, grocers. Lottie Currie, daughter of William Currie, is shown standing on the left.
Photograph shows the Manitoba Agricultural College located at Treesbank, MB. Photograph shows a large barn-like structure comprised of brick and a wooden silo in the side yard. A steam engine is processing a field crop (corn perhaps) that is then being funneled into the silo.
View is looking east northeast. Photograph shows the front steps, main entrance and west side of the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium (WMCA). Brandon University's Education Building is in the background.
View is looking northeast. Photograph shows the southwest corner of the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium (WMCA). Victor Tolgesy's sculpture Explorer is in the foreground.
Photograph shows a float advertisement for the Manitoba Agricultural College. The photograph was taken at Treesbank, MB. The banners on the float read: "Prosperity like a Tree" "If the Roots Suffer, the Leaves Wither and the Trunk Dies."
Photograph of the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium (WMCA). View is looking northeast from 20th Street. Victory Tolgesy's "Explorer" in the foreground.
Photograph is a proposed model for a centennial auditorium for western Manitoba prepared by Ward and Macdonald Associates - Architects. View is southeast from the northwest corner of Princess Avenue and 20th Street. The model includes the proposed auditorium as well as a number of buildings on the Brandon College campus.
View is looking east southeast. Photograph shows the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium (WMCA) under construction. There are two signs in the foreground. One lists the names of the architectural firm, the engineers, contractiors and subcontractors involved with the project. The other reads: Site of Western Manitoba's 100 Centennial Project New Auditorium
