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By Harry Kleinhuis

‍That ancient looking lectern—that hunk of timber—was, according to Einar Finson, the school's handyman back in the 70s, something salvaged from the old Eastgate house after it burned.

Now, I'm not entirely sure if that was true. Einar could often tell a good story. But he was also historic and could probably remember many of the buildings that existed at one time on the school's property.

When I first saw that piece of wood, it and some granite building stones were roughly stacked in a pile between the school entrance and the old workshop and rapidly rotting away, sort of like 'ashes to ashes.' It seemed logical that a piece of it might be made into something on which speech makers might rest their elbows, especially since a new building at that time (dining hall) was being constructed.

A couple of other pieces of timber from that pile were used as supporting posts for the sign at the entrance built by a 'work crew' from the grade 9 or 10s who were conscripted to learn something about stonemasonry and basic building skills.

'Eastgate' was gone by the time I was hired on as a teacher during those 'phoenix' years of Rosseau Lake School's rising from the ashes. Apparently, it was one of the older buildings, and originally a log structure which was rebuilt and added onto over the years. Couldn't find a picture anywhere on the internet recently, although the Rosseau historic people might have one on file somewhere.