Sister St. Martin

In 1963 all my older work mates at the railroad finally persuaded me to go back to school. They said they did not want me to end up like them in a job which paid well but had limited opportunities.

I decided to take up teaching as all my brothers and sister had before me. My sister was a teacher in Saskatchewan. My oldest brother had been a teacher before he became a jet pilot. My other brother was an engineer who was teaching civil engineering technology at MIT, the forerunner to Red River College of today.

I could not afford to do the three-year program at the University of Manitoba. I opted for the one-year teacher training session at Manitoba Teachers College located in the old School for the Deaf in Charleswood.

I graduated with mixed reviews. I experienced all kinds of classroom teaching and methodology. Some of my “professors were good. Some, I thought, were horrible. The latter tried to convince me that what they were espousing would stand me in good stead in the classroom. I decided I would never use their ideas but rather do the opposite of what they proffered.

I went back to work at the railroad for the summer to earn some much-needed salary. I was uncertain about taking up the teaching profession. I considered becoming a permanent railway employee again. I had all the skills and training to be successful. IBM machine training in Montreal was offered. But then there was the appeal of two months of summer holidays on the teaching plus side. Little did I realize that those two months were of absolute necessity “to recharge your batteries” if you were doing your teaching diligently.

I finally decided to commit to teaching. To my dismay I discovered there were no positions left open in the city. The nearest place offering any positions was at least a two-hour drive from the city. Should I be offered a position in one of these rural areas, it would mean that I would have to live there at least during the teaching week. That did not appeal to me. It was looking more each day that I would be returning to the spareboard at the CNR and starting up again with minimal seniority.

I still checked the want-ads in the daily papers and one day an ad for a private school caught my eye. They must have been desperate as there was but one week until the fall session began. I quickly arranged an appointment for an interview at the school which was a parochial Catholic school on Munroe Avenue in East Kildonan. It went by the name of St. Alphonsus or St. Al’s. I was to be interviewed by two board members and the principal of the school. One of the board members was a Mr. Jim Baty who would become a great friend and strong ally. The principal was Sister St. Martin.

As we sat around a table in the small staffroom of the school, we were sizing each other up. Sister St. Martin was in full habit. She was wearing a black gown with a belt around her waist. The skirt part came to midcalf. She wore a white hair cover that was tight to her head. Over this was a dark veil which covered her head and shoulders effectively so that only her face was visible. Around her neck was a white bib collar from which a crucifix hung. She wore rimless eyeglasses and there was no makeup on her face. Nor was there a smile. She looked more formidable to me than any previous teacher or employer I had ever had.

Suddenly I began to have some doubts as to whether I really wanted to qualify for this teaching position. Mr. Baty posed questions to me of the softball variety. Every once in awhile Sr. St. Martin would fire a hardball question at me. I fielded them as best as I knew how. After all my teaching experience was limited to two three week sessions in someone else’s classroom that I had while in Teachers’ College.

It appeared that they were for some reason desperate to hire a male teacher. I was there. My body was warm. I didn’t appear to suffer from any physical or mental deficiencies. I was young and I was a practicing Catholic. I was hired for the magnificent gross pay of $2500 for the year. No mention was made of deductions or pay during July and August. This meant I would be teaching at a salary that was about 40% of what I was netting at the railroad.

I resigned from my railway position and I showed up at the school a few days before opening day. It was an eye opener for me. Sister St. Martin greeted me and took me around to meet some of the other staff members. There were 4 other nuns who would be teaching along with Sr. St. Martin, one other male staff member, and the rest of the staff were women, mostly married, and of varying ages from 20 to almost retirement age.

My classroom was on the second floor of the school near the back entrance. My class looked like it would be at 40plus grade six students depending on who showed up on opening day. The other male teacher was located next door and he taught grade seven. He also taught all the phys-ed which now would be split equally between the two of us. He also told me that he would be leaving at the end of this school year which was why they were so anxious to hire another male teacher. His job was to “show me all the ropes” so I could take over his duties next year.

Sr. St. Martin continued to be a bit of an enigma for me. While her appearance and often very stern countenance did not appear to change, I noticed a softening in her attitude toward me. She was gentler in her conversations and became generous in her relating to me the assignments I was now going to be doing in addition to my classroom duties. I soon realized she was trying to get done what was best for her students and teachers with the very poor resources she had to work with.

As the year progressed and we all started to fall into a routine, she and I began to have daily meetings about what was happening and how some situations could be improved. She began to rely on me for more and more input as the other male teacher began to relinquish more and more duties to me. I also began to realize that I really enjoyed teaching, I liked my students, and I certainly liked the staff members who were openly protective of this young kid in their midst.

I was almost overcome with horror when I learned that I was make almost twice as much money as some of the other staff members. Sr. St. Martin told me not to worry because my workload with all the extra-curricular things I did in the school more than justified the difference in pay. I still felt uncomfortable in that because I was a male, I received a higher rate of pay than the women on staff. I felt that was unfair. She said the other staff members were aware of the difference but that they were content in doing just their classrooms and not have to worry about afterschool work. Most were married and had families to go home to after school to look after.

In the end, I lasted 5 years at the school and Sr. St. Martin became a close friend, a great advisor, and certainly she was a completely different person in my mind than when we first met.