Local history resources:

1. As the Roots Grow: The History of Spruce Grove and District, Esther Lunan, 1990
2. City of Edmonton Archives (including a 1930 and a 1949 map of the area)
3. Parkland County & Spruce Grove GenWeb

Rose (Clevette) Craig who attend Clymont School as published in "Spirit of the Community at the Millenium" by Parkland County. As it is not readily accessible, we share the text here. The Edmonton Archives has a map of the area around the time with the names and places mentioned in Mrs. Craig's memoir.

"The site for the very first Clymont School was on the southeast corner of Section 33 Township 51 Range 26 W/4. It was a small log house, well built and secure and most surly have been the home of the first settler on the land, a man by the name of Dueterbaum. In the year 1918, the land had become the property of Mr. Charles Carleton [Today, Carleton's property is the Hilltop Farms area on TWP 515A]. Because there were a growing number of families and no building as yet available, it became our first school. It was a veritable fairy land playground area for there was a slow moving creek that flowed through the grounds, and no boundaries to the actual school area.

It was at this little log school house that I came to begin Grade 1 - a homestead child and quite a lonely one. I think for there were five and a half years between myself and my brother. It was a wonderful world to me and I think Mrs. Hadden must have been a gifted Grade 1 teacher for me to have the memories that I do. I learned to read and what a world of treasurers that opened up for me! The things there were for Grade 1s to play with - sewing cards with large needles and brightly coloured wool, long coloured stickers and short ones too, and plasticine.

Then there was the outdoor fun. There were students of all sizes and ages. There was a wonderful old creek that meandered here and there, back and forth it seemed to me. across what is now Highway 60, so convenient for someone to fall into, not always by accidents, I suspect. There were wild and wooly games to be played...and acres upon acres in which to run, play and breathe. There were nice little girl games too. London Bridge, in and out the windows, dominoes, and who has the button? Sometimes Mr. Carleton would be haying on the pastureland. Miraculously he often seemed to be there eating his lunch, sitting in his democrat, under a huge canvas umbrella with his horses tethered nearby, when we came out of school for noon house intermission. So there we would be too, the students of Clymont School visiting him. Visiting with an adult made us feel very important.

It was more than a two mile walk following the uplands and old First Nations trails from school to home. Two large family groups came south and I was the loner in the gang. they were a fascinating bunch of characters - the boys quite proficient in the use of words not found in the dictionary. There was an older sister who tried to keep order. On the way home there was a lovely old gnarled tree where the youngest members of the group, myself included, use to play marbles. Meanwhile the older members sat under the tree and did homework. Near the end of the trip home we had to pass through a deserted yard complete with a huge cavernous root cellar. The people who bought the land had visions of growing rich producing potatoes. Since their dream never materialized, the buildings were empty and it was quite eerie sometimes going past them especially if you let your imagination run riot.

But this fun beginning came to an end for me, for with winter came blocked trails and no way to get to school. The problem was solved by sending me to attend a school in the city while living with an aunt, uncles, and cousins of various sizes and ages. Strangely enough I can remember little of my attendance at the old Garneau School, perhaps because it was so boring. I must have been in Grade 2, but so were the other thirty pupils-all the same size, all doing the same thing. The happiest day of my life was when I came back to the old school log house. How much more pleasant to be able to listen in on the work of other grades when your own work was done.

In 1922 when I was in Grade 4, there was a need for a larger school and a site was chosen half a mile south bordering what is now Highway 60. This site was closer to the of the district. The land was purchased from Mr. Pischinger [~500 meters south of the current Clymont Hall location now a private acreage] and the school was typical of schoolhouses being built all over Alberta. It had five full-length windows facing east into a beautiful treed area. Across the road to the west was a whole quarter section with no one living on it - our playground for all the years I remember going to Clymont School. People were very proud of their new School District No. 3435. Mr. Biederman was our first teacher and pleasant memories linger because he often went to the city for the weekends and nearly always brought us back candy treats.

The years passed pleasantly enough with few highlights. There was some difficulty with long division and the teacher who kept my nerves in a state over doings of a little girl in the book "Captain January". I recall the check on robin's nests every night on the way home. There was a nest under every bridge.

At the end of Grade 8, Evelyn Carleton and I received a diploma from the Department of Education, a real event in our lives. For the first time, Grade IX would be taught in the Clymont School and there was three graduates, Evelyn Carleton, Rose Clevette, and Elizabeth Fleming. Robert Leitch was the teacher that year and what a wonderful year! Whole new worlds opened up - algebra and geometry, early civilizations, compositions, and literature. I walked home on cloud nine, reliving the lives of Sohrab and Rusteim in the epic poem of the same name. No doubt Mr. Leitch had a real flair for teaching grade nine, although I heard recently from another student of the same era that he hated teaching! It was a surprise to me.

Then, followed the high school years in Edmonton at Strathcona High School. I was glad to go, for it was the year of the great polio epidemic and all schools were closed until October. With school closed, I was caught in the potato harvest and picking potatoes was not a very pleasant past time in my estimation. I was glad to come home for the Christmas holidays.

By the time I graduate from normal school, so had hundreds of others and the [Great] Depression was in full swing. (Normal School was a two year training program for teachings).

There were hundreds of applicants for every school, consequently there was no school for me. My best friend never did get a school and many teachers lost their jobs because the school boards had such a wealth of applicants to choose from. An official trustee governed Clymont School District at the time. It is to the credit of the people of Clymont, that they petitioned the official trustee to hire a home grown product to teach their children - ME!
 

School started September 1 that year and it even snowed that day. The school population had greatly increased since my time, and 35 children eyed me suspiciously that morning. One of them was my own brother, one of the three Grade IX's. I must somehow get through their grade. Was ever a teacher confronted with more problems? The first week I thought I'd die, the second I wished I could and in the third week I made up my mind I had to beat it! By the time convention time came in October the way to success had begun. Meeting with other teacher friends helped enormously. I don't think the convention speakers were of much assistance but I did come back fired with a new enthusiasm and desire to win. By the time the first school inspection came about in May, everything was progressing nicely. There were a few episodes behind me now and I could look back and laugh.
 

There was the time I looked out of the window and saw my brother holding a colleague by his neck. He was pumping water over his head. I think the victim had been bragging about the number of pages he had finished in algebra and the recipient of the bragging had decided enough was enough.
 

The Depression was in full swing and only the Grade IX's had textbooks. No one could afford textbooks and the blackboards had to be loaded every night, cleaned off at noon the next day and loaded again for the afternoon session. Often the blackboard had to be used after 3:30 for testing the Grade IX's before you could begin filling it for the next day. After all, this is not yet the day of the duplicating machine. The more work you had prepared, the easier the next day was going to be.
 

In Grade 5 of my first year, I had the most wonderful little helper. She was a little girl, who I think had suffered polio. We never spoke of her disability. Every day she worked diligently by my side, all through the noon hour, preparing lessons, marking and correcting work. She was my mainstay in working for the Christmas concert. When she left to continue school in the city at the end of Grade 9, she was sorely missed. I still hear from her and can hardly believe that she is now entering her sixties and I into my seventies.
 

There was too, the episode of my two darling sparkling little grade two's, a dark headed little boy and a little red-headed girl. They had gotten into mischief by damaging someone's lunch kit, and then had hidden the evidence. I caught up with them about an eighth of a mile down the road and brought them both back to school. After a lecture and pointing out the grief they had brought to the lunch kit owner, I said "What do you think I should do to you two?" The pert little red head piped up and said "I think a darn good licking would be the best thing." What would you have done? Well, yes, I did and it neither broke their spirits, nor cured their antics, but it did much for my emotional well being. Evidently the little girl felt that was the way things were settled in her family.

Sports and especially competitions between schools were handled at this time outside of the school system, but Christmas concerts were the order of the day. People came from miles around and perhaps five schools would have Christmas concerts on different evenings and they became quite competitive. How we worked for those concerts, teacher and pupils alike.

Dances were put on before the concert to raise money so that each child could received a present, a bad of candy, and an orange. We had to shop for all the presents, wrap them and have everything ready for the concert night. No need to promote public relations, the concert did it for us.

In Grade 5 was one little boy I think of and honour his memory, for he passed away early in life. He was blond, thick set, no too well co-ordinated body wise, sort of a bull-in-a-china-shop type, but stubborn to the nth degree. We were planning our concert theme and lining up material when he suddenly rebelled. "No more concerts for him". He'd had enough and no amount of persuasion could change his mind. He would have been such an asset for what we had in mind. As the work progressed we needed a doll, and no one seemed for have one - but Sig turned up one morning with the most beautiful doll. Not only that, but he persuaded his Dad to provide us with a beautiful ceiling high tree that year.

During my six years at Clymont I had a boyfriend (later my husband) with a 32 Model Coupe. He called at the school every Friday night to take me into the city to spend the weekend at his folks home. Roads were often bad and he couldn't always make it by 3:30. My charges were always hopeful that he would arrive early, for it might mean getting out five minutes early. I'm sure they studied my face after I had managed to look out of the west window many times and were as happy as I was when the results were positive. When dances and club meeting were held at the school, Monday mornings were rather unhappy for everyone. Perciles would be lost, books misplaced, and papers destroyed. I used to get many letters from a mother of a large brood of children, and the salutation usually began "Dear Rose", but on a Monday morning after a dance, I would usually find myself being addressed "Dear Madame".

After Christmas, the Grade IX departmental examinations loomed on the horizon - so a teacher's life was not an easy one. There must have been six Grade IX graduating classes during my tenure.

Grade I and IX's were the grades that stand out in my memory. The grade I's because they had no inhibitions and were exactly what they were. Many mothers would have been horrified if they ad known the family secrets bared to the ears of a teacher. The Grade IX's were easily inspired - I suppose just as I was a few years before.

Arbour Day (May 5) was clean up day and how we all worked cleaning those huge big windows, everything was scrubbed and wood-work washed. One year we planted little spruce trees across the frontage of the school yard, and many were still there when the road past the school became Highway 60 and demanded more land.

Only happy memories remain of my six-year tenure at Clymont School. Certainly it was not all "beer and skittles" but the unhappy times are forgotten. I have only the highest regard for the children who passed through my hands and so regard must be there for their parents who taught them to have respect for me"

The Clymont Community League added:

"Billy Garner organized Clymont's first club in 1937, making sports a more meaningful part of a student's life. A girls softball team was organized. It competed with teams in Edmonton and emerged the overall champion!

In 1950, Mrs. May Huberdeau started her ten-year term as teacher at Clymont School. A larger school was once again needed when Clymont became part of the oil industry. The solution required a two-room school. Irvington School was purchased and moved to the Clymont School site. This separated the schooling into elementary and primary rooms. Mrs. Victoria Browning taught the primary classes while Mrs. Huberdeau taught the elementary. As the oil boom  ended, the school population declined and the school closed in 1959."