Old Sun Boiler Room

The boiler room and former coal shoot at Old Sun Community College. This large space continues to house the utilities used to heat this large masonry building. A metal door leading to the coal shoot contains graffiti from students and staff that dates back to the early days of Old Sun Indian Residential School.

“If these schools are to succeed, we must not have them too near the bands; in order to educate the children properly we must separate them from their families. Some people may say this is hard, but if we want to civilize them we must do that.” – A Federal Cabinet Minister, 1883

Heating, Water and Plumbing

While there have been technological updates and modernization of the utilities, the boiler room retains much of its original appearance since its operation as part of Old Sun Indian Residential School.

Graffiti covered door in the boiler room. August 2020.

Students at the school were responsible for tasks related to the operation of the school such as laundry, washing dishes, harvesting food from the gardens, serving staff meals, taking care of livestock, and shoveling coal. Children working at these tasks would be assigned them both as daily living chores but also as punishments like having to clean the floor with a toothbrush, which as Mandel Old Woman recounts was a task given to students as young as the age of four years old. Other punishments included locking children up in isolated rooms or in remote areas of the school, likely including the boiler room.

While most of the boiler room at Old Sun is one area, the coal room is separated by a thick steel door, which is original to the 1932 construction of the school. Engraved on the door is a variety of graffiti from children who were in attendance of the school, including names, pictures, and dates that are legible as far back as the 1930s. This door provides a physical connection to the Old Sun residential school and the experiences survivors had while in attendance.

Fire Hazards and Protection Methods

Ruins of Old Sun School after fire, 1928. Courtesy of Glenbow Library and Archives Collection, Libraries and Cultural Resources Digital Collections, University of Calgary.

Archival documents reveal that fires were all too common at many Indian Residential Schools. The original Old Sun School at Siksika, for example, was constructed largely of wood and was lost to fire in June 1928. In this instance, Government investigators determined that the fire was caused by spontaneous combustion within the diary and storage cellar spaces within the building. In other schools, fires originated in basement boiler rooms where coal was burned to heat water as part of the hydronic heating systems. Other high-risk locations included kitchens and laundry areas.

Old Sun Indian Residential School (brick version) suffered its first fire within a year of its completion (1931). A fire caused by a defective heating element in one of the boilers had resulted from a small explosion. Investigators noted that the boilers in the basement of Old Sun were unmonitored at the time of the incident, suggesting that it could have been prevented. A second incident involving boilers occurred in 1947 and required an extended holiday break for students as repairs had to be undertaken to restore heat and hot water to the building. Rather than address the recurring mechanical issues with the boilers, the superintendent investigating the incident approved a night watchman to keep an eye on the boilers.

Many residential schools were located in remote rural areas and therefore were not easily served by municipal fire departments. As a result, the suppression of school fires required easy access to well-maintained fire extinguishers and dependable sources of water. Unfortunately, Government documents reveal that cost-cutting measures prevented many identified fire hazards from being addressed, placing students at significant risk.

To keep students safe, dormitories and classrooms required unobstructed fire routes to exterior stairways (fire escapes). However, there were no national standards in Canada requiring the installation of fire escapes for most of the residential school era. Instead, contractors took it upon themselves to make recommendations about when and where fire escapes should be installed. The general rule of thumb was that fire escapes should be fitted above the second floor of large multi-story buildings.

Water Quality and Quantity

Government inspections and reports indicate that water was not available in sufficient quantities to address fire suppression, nor was it of a sufficient quality to be considered usable as drinking water by students and staff at Old Sun.

Well water quality and supply issues were well documented problems at all three of the schools preserved in this archive. At Old Sun, emergency repairs to well pumps and valves were required approximately one year after the school had opened. In October and November of 1932, reports indicate that the school was left without water for several hours. While well pumps proved to be a constant source of trouble, hydrological investigations revealed that a drop in the water table combined with an inlet pipe that had been laid incorrectly meant that major repairs were necessary. Even after repairs were undertaken, the supervising engineer reported that well tests indicated that only 2/3 of the water necessary for daily operation of the school were being produced. In some cases, it appears that water was withheld by some residential school administrators as a means of controlling and exercising power over the children.

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This image includes modern images of the boiler room. If anyone has historic photos of the boiler room at Old Sun that they would like to submit to this archive, please contact us at irsdocumentationproject@gmail.com or submit through "Submit your Memories" button at the top of the page.

Leica BLK scanning coal room during digital documentation of Old Sun. August 2020. Photo source: Madisen Hvidberg.

The previous, wooden, Old Sun school which burnt down from a fire started in the boiler room. [192-?]. P7538-673 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

The previous, wooden, Old Sun school which burnt down from a fire started in the boiler room. [192-?]. P7538-672 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

The previous, wooden, Old Sun school which burnt down from a fire started in the boiler room. [192-?]. P7538-638 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Students Hilda Lowhorn, Ruby Stimson, Edna Studhorse, Ronald Cutter and Wallace Bearchief assist Laundry Matron Mrs. J. Champness to hang clothing on the line, outside school. 1945. P75-103-S7-170 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Four girls make butter in the kitchens down the hall from the boiler room. [194-?]. P75-103-S7-165 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Girls in kitchen washing dishes. From left to right, Daisy Olds, --, Donna Jean Bear, ---. 1955-1957. NA-4817-19. Courtesy of Glenbow Archives .

Back of the new Old Sun school, showing door into the boiler room next to the base of the chimney. [193-?]. M55-01-P52 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

The boiler room in Old Sun. August 2020. Photo source: Madisen Hvidberg.

Students spent much of their time doing maintenance and chores for the school. Here, workshop boys build a brooder house. [194-?]. P75-103-S7-192 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Students spent much of their time doing maintenance and chores for the school. Here, workshop boys build a brooder house. [194-?]. P75-103-S7-187 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Students spent much of their time doing maintenance and chores for the school. Here, a student stands in the schools' potato field. Crops would be stored in the root cellar near the boiler room. August 13, 1949. P7538-1000 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Students spent much of their time doing maintenance and chores for the school. Here, a a senior boy discs stubble. Fall 1923. P7538-684 from the General Synod Archives, Anglican Church of Canada.

Laser scanning data can be used to create “as built” architectural plans which can support repair and restoration work to Old Sun Community College. This plan was created using Autodesk Revit and forms part of a larger building information model (BIM) of the school. The Revit drawings and laser scanning data for this school are securely archived with access controlled by the Old Sun Advisory Committee.

Eileen Black- She Never Quit Drinking in Her Life

And so there was door leading to the outside, oh, and so there’s a main door. There’s a main door and all of the kids were chased outside at recess in the middle of winter, we have to go outside. And that time they issued those leather boots and brown stockings and we used to wear skirts. That’s what we used to wear, and they weren’t even warm, the jackets we wore. I don’t even remember what kind of jacket we used to wear, all I remember was the intense cold going into that, that playground. Ya [expression] we were so cold, shivering. We cant even talk because we were shivering so bad. We would hurry to open the door and ah ‘cause they would lock the door. We couldn’t even go back in because they locked the door.

And the older ones, all I remember was my older sister Kaamihtaki and I don’t know if Pakitsuaki was part of that… but I remember Veronica, Amatsikamoosaki. I remember her and they were, I can picture them, standing around in a circle around, those big girls, they were surrounding around the younger girls. They were trying to keep us warm.

You know, I used to think I wonder if Matsikamoosaki… sometimes I don’t remember a lot, but every once in awhile, I think of it and think of asking even Rachel, “do you still remember residential school?” But even my sisters… but this is their story. They would talk about what they went through in residential school and how they treated badly. I used to think I was treated bad, but listening to them they were treated way worse by the supervisors, by the workers here and of course the students. They were treated bad. I despise that priest Mr. Cole, I hope none of his pictures are in this building Mr. Cole, because my sister, she has passed away, he sexually abused my sister, that Mr. Cole. And now I understand how, how… why she was the way she was. Why she never quit drinking in her life but she also never dealt with this like I did.

So, the stories that are going to be coming out is what’s going to also help our people to heal themselves and not to feel ashamed. I know some are ashamed cause that is what happened to me… because of what I experienced, what I experienced in residential school, and you hate it and feel ashamed. You don’t want to talk about because of that shame but now we have to put away that shame and I am finding out that when you talk openly about it, people are listening, and they don’t judge you for it but they believe what was happening. So I know my sisters and its too bad they have passed away and they probably would have had a lot of stories to say. So, I’m glad I’m contributing to whatever I can.

– Isitsimani, Eileen Black

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