This post was originally posted at my Brethren-focused website, O Brethren! I am not sure I currently agree with everything herein, but thought I’d repost here anyways — I’ll post new stuff as it comes up.
My brother-in-law recently gave me a copy of a slightly creased, but in relatively good quality, folded notice for an “Annual Conference of Christians Gathered in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ at Edmonton, Alta., December 27th, 28th, 29th 1907.” The notice (which I have scanned below) is very useful for understanding more about the early history of the Brethren in Edmonton.
As I discussed in a previous post, the earliest evidence of an assembly in Edmonton comes from the biography of evangelist J.J. Rouse, where it indicates that there is an assembly by 1905. This notice, which includes in its announcement the comment, “we are again permitted to send you a hearty invitation to our Annual Conference,” suggests that there has been conferences held in Edmonton at least since 1906.
There is contact information listed on the inside first page of the notice: “E. Smart, 326 Fourth St.” In the Henderson’s Directory for 1908 (the earliest year available on the invaluable Peel’s Prairie Provinces), there is an entry for “Smart, Edwin, bootmaker W.G. Robinson h 356 Fourth St.”1 The next entry is, “Smart, Harry cash boy Acme Co lvs 356 Fourth St.” Elsewhere in the same directory, “Scoble, Robert, bkpr J A Lockerbie rms 356 Fourth” is also listed at this address. It is unclear to me whether the address listed in the notice is a typo or whether the address in the notice is for the assembly itself and the address in the directory is Edwin Smart’s home address.
The conference is listed as taking place in “Hourston Hall”. Although Hourston Hall is listed in several places in newspapers and directories of the period, I was not able to find a photo of it. One listing indicates that it is next door to the Windsor Hotel. The Windsor, which was later renamed the Selkirk Hotel, has been recreated at Fort Edmonton Park (although it appears that what has been recreated is a later building than the wooden structure that would have been in place at the time of the conference — see the photo for this blog post).
I am most intrigued by the names that have been included in the notice: Turnbull Allen, Henry C. Gaebel, and John Meenely. Other than J.J. Rouse, there are not very many records of individuals involved in the earliest assemblies. (In the truly excellent online historical overview of North American Assemblies by R.L. Peterson, the earliest name in Edmonton is William Cummings.)
Of the three men listed, only Turbull Allen was easy to trace — perhaps understandable given his somewhat peculiar name. Good information exists on Turnbull Allen via the genealogical route. Born in 1837 in Coldingham, Scotland, he married Mary Ann Calder in Ontario (then Canada West) in 1859. In 1896, he received a land grant and moved to Alberta. He and Mary Ann had 10 children. Prior to moving to Alberta, Turnbull was a labourer on the Great Northern Railroad. He died in 1912 during a trip to Chicago, Illinois. He was buried in Edmonton. His obituary in The Witness (1912) provides more information: “Turnbull Allan, Edmonton, Alta, aged 75. Saved over 40 years ago through reading a tract in Eastern Canada. Came to Edmonton 20 years ago. In assembly since its commencement. Death resulted from an escape of gas in the bedroom of a Chicago hotel where he was staying on his return from visiting relatives at a distance.”
On BrethrenPedia, Turnbull Allen is listed as a contact for the Paisley Meeting Room, a Brethren assembly located in Paisley, Ontario.2 (MyBrethren lists Turnbull Allen as the contact for Paisley in its December 1879 list of assemblies in the United States and Canada. Based on the dates in his obituary, this would have only been a few years after his conversion). Given that he and his family are in Alberta by as early as 1896 and that he was Brethren significantly prior to his arrival, Turnbull may hold the honour of the first known Brethren person in the Edmonton area.
There is much more to be gleaned from this little advertisement, so perhaps stay tuned. I have collected a few other examples of Annual Conference notices, which I hope to explore in future posts as well.
- W.G. Robinson was a store that specialized in leather products (and also, in one advertisement, “a nice line of silk socks”). A 1904 advertisement described it as “The Big Shoe Store.” ↩︎
- BrethrenPedia indicates that Paisley Meeting House is an Exclusive Brethren assembly; however, on MyBrethren there is a note that the date of the lists (1879) is 5 years before the Grant Division, which affected how Exclusives understood themselves in North America. Furthermore, the fact that Turnbull’s obituary appeared in The Witness, which came out of the Open section of the Brethren, also complicates how “closed” Turnbull’s assembly affiliation may have been. ↩︎