Martin Browne - Cleaning Schools and Cheering Hearts

Schools are named for all sorts of prominent people but seldom has a school been named for a school janitor.

Rose and Martin Browne on their 50th Anniversary

Lloydminster is the exception, and that is largely because Martin Browne was an exceptional person. For more than 40 years he kept our schools clean and well maintained but more importantly he was always there to provide a friendly smile, some encouraging words, and a sympathetic ear to generations of students, and teachers.

Martin Browne came to the Lloydminster area in 1906, from England, with his wife Rose and their (at the time) three children. They settled on a homestead almost 20 miles south of town. Martin was a stone mason by trade but there was little work of that line in Lloydminster. Never-the-less he did work in Lloydminster while Rose and the children maintained the residence on the farm, part of the “proving up” necessary to earn title to the homestead. Martin would walk home on weekends, carrying the week’s groceries and other supplies on his back.

Eventually the entire family moved into Lloydminster and, in 1912, Martin got the job as school janitor. At the time, there were five different “school” locations. Some were rental facilities upstairs in commercial buildings. Martin had to begin his rounds by 5:00 AM to get all the coal and wood heaters going so that the rooms would be warm by school time. He usually came home for breakfast around 8:00 AM and then it was back to the schools to pump the water, fill the stoneware water coolers, stock the necessary wood and coal, and after school, sweep all the classrooms, clean the blackboards, and clean and resupply whatever toilet facilities there were. It was usually late in the evening before he made it home for supper.

After the Lloydminster Public School was built in 1925, Martin’s job was confined to the one school, but what a school – eight classrooms, offices, a daunting basement, and, of course, the much storied fire escape tubes that spanned the sides of the two-story building. He was also expected to maintain all the lawns on the large school grounds and shovel snow in winter. Despite all this work, he had time to be around the building, helping find lost mittens, cheering a student’s success, or commiserating with a teacher’s predicament. He had an unofficial “office” beside the boiler room in the basement of what would later be called the Meridian School. Outside the door he kept an old apple box in which people could deposit notes concerning jobs that needed to be done around the school. Come February 14, each year, it would be filled to overflowing with Valentine cards from students at every grade level. He also received Christmas and end of term gifts as well. All of this testified to the fact that for generations of students, he was the adult in the school that they were most likely to regard as their friend. Folks in the community viewed him as a cheery figure as well, riding by on his old bicycle at exactly the same time every morning, whistling a happy tune.

Martin Browne set another record when he worked for the Lloydminster Public School Board until he was 82 years of age. Later, the Board decided to name a new school after him. Martin Browne Elementary School had only four class rooms when it opened in 1958. Martin was not able to attend the dedication ceremony and never saw his namesake school. He died in May of 1959, just short of his 88^th birthday. However, his name lives on in the school, and in the hearts of generations of former students who remember his cheerful acts of kindness.