The Val Marie Elevator: A Living Heritage Project

A S H O RT HISTORY OF THE VAL M AR I E EL EVATOR COM M IT T E E J u d i t h Wr i g h t , w i t h c o n t r i b u t i o n s f r o m M a u r i c e Lemire, Diana Chabros, and other past and present elevator committee members askatchewan grain elevators have been disappearing for decades, but thanks to the work of the Val Marie Heritage, Culture and Youth Grain Elevator Restoration Committee, the heritage elevator in Val Marie has new life.

Maurice Lemire, 78, and Past President of the elevator committee, remembers what inspired him to try to save the elevator: “Every day I walked past the old elevator and every day another piece of siding or a shingle had fallen off.”

His reason for wanting to save the elevator was clear: his father, Arthur L. Lemire, was the elevator’s first agent and ran the elevator for 32 years. Arthur came from Quebec to the Coderre area, south of Gravelbourg, in the mid 1920s. He was one of the few bilingual speakers in the Alberta Pacific Grain Company.

Lemire remembers spending time at the elevator growing up: “We swept up the dust, and my brothers cooped the cars – closed the openings on the box cars with heavy planks and paper to prepare it for hauling grain.” His dad gave him and his five brothers haircuts at the elevator when business was slow. The straight-backed chair that served as their barber chair – with a board laid across the arms for added height – is still there in the elevator office.

After his father retired, the elevator continued to operate for another forty years. In 1967, Canada’s centennial year, the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool constructed a second grain elevator in Val Marie, south of the original elevator.

Around 2000, when the railroad stopped serving Val Marie and semi-trucks began hauling grain to the new concrete terminals at larger centres, the old grain elevator stood empty.

In the year 2000, the Village of Val Marie decided to purchase the derelict elevator from the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool. Then Mayor, Robert Ducan, was responsible for preserving the village’s heritage buildings. After some time passed, Lemire approached the village council about doing something to save the elevator, whose condition was deteriorating. He called together