Description of Historic Place

The Turtle Lake School is a Municipal Heritage Property located on Main Street in the Village of Borden. The property features four wood-frame buildings located on five urban lots, contained within the grounds of the Borden and District Historical Museum.

Heritage Value

Turtle Lake School is valued for its architecture, which is representative of many one room schools built in Saskatchewan before 1930. This simple wood frame building was designed to accommodate a few dozen students inside a single classroom where multiple grades would be taught by a single teacher. Built in 1927, the schoolhouse is topped with a simple cottage roof with dormer above the main entrance. The building was moved here in 1985, when the museum was founded, to serve as a representative example of the one room schools once common to the area. As one of the oldest buildings in the community, the school is a local landmark.

The lots that comprise the Borden and District Heritage Museum are valued as a place to interpret and celebrate local history. These five lots were set aside by the village in 1985 as a place to relocate, preserve and interpret historic buildings. A butcher shop and barber shop have been relocated here and restored to how they would have looked during the first few decades of the twentieth century. The property also features a reconstruction of the house located on the Diefenbaker Homestead. John George Diefenbaker, Canada’s 13th Prime Minister, grew up in the area and his parents homesteaded nearby in 1906.

Source:

Village of Borden Bylaw No. 2-85.

Character-Defining Elements

The heritage value of Turtle Lake School to be located on Heritage Park lies in the following character defining elements:
-those elements of the Turtle Lake School that reflect the architecture, such as the wood frame construction, rectangular form, cottage roof incorporating dormers and large interior classroom space;
-those elements of the butcher shop and barber shop that reflect retail architecture of the period, such as the wood frame construction, large front windows, signage and entranceway and the boomtown front;
-the form of the replica of the Diefenbaker home;
-the accessibility of the property to facilitate the relocation of additional buildings and structures that assist in commemorating the history of the Village of Borden and district.