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This cache is one of Calgary's 10 oldest active caches. |
Politics
While Calgary was never a political centre, it was the home of many famous politicians. It seems these people knew a good place to settle when they saw it. One such person was Helen Letitia Mooney.
Born in 1873 in Ontario Helen, commonly called Nellie, moved to Manitou, Manitoba in 1890 to teach. As was normal in this period the young teacher boarded with a local family, the Rev James and Annie McClung. Annie McClung was a strong champion of women's rights, suffrage and temperance. She was a strong influence on the young Nellie. Nellie married the McClung's son Wesley and the couple moved to Winnipeg in 1911.
During this period, Nellie involved herself in writing and became a popular author writing about rural and western life and wrote several sympathetic works of the struggles of the farm family.
Nellie and Wesley moved to Calgary, where Wesley owned a pharmacy. The McClungs purchased the house located at these co-ordinates in 1923 where they lived until 1932. At this time Nellie was a member of the Alberta Legislature (as a Liberal) and commuted to Edmonton each week, returning to Calgary on the weekends. After being defeated in an election in 1926 she spend a great deal of time in her Calgary home and wrote "No woman can be utterly cast down who has a nice bright kitchen facing the west, with a good gas range and a blue and white checkered linoleum on the floor...." Nellie wrote many of her important works during this period from her second floor bedroom.
Nellie McClung was most famous for being a member of the "Famous Five. Five women; Emily Murphy, Irene Parlby, Henrietta Muir Edwards, Louise McKinney and of course Nellie McClung submitted a petition to the privy council of Canada to define the word "Person" as found in section 24 of the BNA Act. The Privy Council found that the word "Person" included female persons, making women eligible for appointment to the Senate of Canada.
The McClungs lived in Calgary until 1932 when they sold the house and moved to Victoria. The house was sold again in 1952 to Calgary oilman Percy Smith and his first wife Bessie. Bessie Smith lived in the house until her death in 1996. She was responsible for having the house declared a heritige site.
(All references to the Nellie McClung house were taken from the Calgary Public Library "Cornerstone Columns" written by Jennifer Bobrovitz)
Objective
To successfully log this site, you must wander around the area and answer the following two questions:
- Count all of the windows on the second floor. Please note: Do not use a photograph such as this and double the window count. You will get the wrong number. You must walk around the entire house.
Source: Glenbow Museum Archive
- Count the gates on all sides of the fence. Do not include the "car" gate.
Click here to email your answers to the above questions.
Do not post the answers to these questions in your cache log
even if it is encrypted!
Bonus Cache
Also please note that this cache is part of a series called the "Calgary History Tour". There's a bonus cache if you complete the series. Be sure to save all the necessary answers from the various caches in the series for the bonus. It can be found at GC53FE Calgary History Tour - Bonus Cache.
To see all the caches in this Calgary History Tour series and verify how many you've already found, please check out the Calgary History Tour Series public bookmark list located on the right-hand side of this page or use this list below:
- First Nations (FN)
- N.W.M.P. (NW)
- Settlers and Ranching (SR)
- Cowboys and the Stampede (CS)
- Missionaries (M)
Politics (P) <-- You are here.- Olympics (WO)
- Outlaws! (O)
