Dorothy D. Peacock 1904-1997

The following is from the Dorothy Peacock Elementary School website.

Miss Dorothy Dickson Peacock was employed as a teacher by the Langley School Board (British Columbia) from September, 1924, until she retired in 1969 - a total of 45 years of service.




Dates and Locations
Sept. 1924-June 1936, Murrayville Elementary School - 12 years
Sept. 1936-Dec. 1937 Belmont Elementary School - 1 1/2 years
Jan. 1938-June 1958 Langley Prairie Elementary School - 20 1/2 years
Sept. 1958-June 1969 Aldergrove Secondary School - 11 years
Total 4 5 years

Her Biography: Miss Dorothy Peacock was born in Miami, Manitoba, on June 12, 1904, the daughter of the Reverend T. R. (Thomas Robert)Peacock, a Presbyterian minister.

When Dorothy was 1 1/2 years old, her mother died, and she was sent to live with relatives. She was reunited with her father, who had remarried, in Chase, B. C. where she took her elementary schooling. Her high school work was taken at Kamloops and King Edward High School in Vancouver, where she "boarded out" in both places.

In 1920 the Peacock family came to Murrayville where Reverend Peacock was minister of Sharon Presbyterian (later United) for 5 years. Dorothy did not spend much time with her family in Murrayville because she was attending Normal School (teacher training).

When she graduated from Normal School in 1921, she could not get a teaching position because she was not yet 18 (as the law then required), so she went to work for the B.C. Telephone company as a switch board operator in Vancouver. By September 1924 she was being considered for a supervisory position. But, in early September, 1924, an incident occurred at Murrayville School that caused a teacher to resign. Mr. J. W. Berry, Chairman of the Langley School Board, offered the position to Dorothy. In a decision that changed her whole life, she accepted and entered the teaching profession.

Dorothy's first class in 1924 and their
1993 Class Reunion







She spent the next 12 years teaching grades 3 and 4 at Murrayville, which was a 4 room school. Then, at the request of the School Board she moved to the one-room Belmont School on Bradshaw Road (40th Avenue). The reason? The School Board kept hiring beginning teachers for one-room schools, and the 55 students at Belmont proved too much for them to handle.

Miss Peacock needed only a year and a half to settle the school down. Her reward? She was moved to Langley Prairie Elementary school where she taught for the next 20 1/2 years, including one year as principal.

In September, 1958, she was asked by the School Board to go to the new Aldergrove Secondary School to teach home economics, there being a shortage of home economics teachers. This was even before she was qualified to teach in a high school. However, she received her Bachelor of Education Degree in 1964, by summer school and night school classes. At Aldergrove she was noted for her success with boys' cooking classes, long before the advent of Chef Training programs.

In 1969 she retired after 11 years at Aldergrove and 45 years in the district. Her last Principal at Aldergrove was N.A. Sherritt, whom she had taught in grade 3 at Murrayville School, 41 years earlier.

During her 45 years as a teacher and her 28 years of retirement, Miss Peacock was active in many professional, community, and church organizations. She was President of the Langley Teachers' Association from 1949-1951. She served on the Board of the Langley Memorial Hospital for 9 years, from 1970-1978. She was an active board member of the Langley Arts Council. She was an Honourary Life Member of the BC Teachers' Federation and a charter member of the Langley Retired Teachers' Association.

Dorothy played golf until she was 89 years old. Her biggest asset was her sense of humour. She was famous for her ability to reduce a meeting to shambles with one well-placed remark.

After a short illness, Dorothy Peacock died on September 21, 1997, at the age of 93.

Our thanks to Mr. N.A.Sherritt for this Biography"

(From School website)

Rev. Thomas R. Peacock 1867-1958

Click on the above title for information about Dorothy Dickson Peacock,
the eldest daughter of Rev. Thomas R. Peacock.

Thomas Robert Peacock was born September 30th, 1867 in King Township, York County, Ontario. He was the sixth child and the third son of Hugh and Ellen. He appears in the census in 1871 in King Township and in 1881 with his family in Bruce County near Walkerton. I have been unable to find him in the 1891 or 1901 Canadian census records.

The 1958 death certificate of Rev. Peacock (died Langlely, British Columbia) states that he was a retired United Church minister, had last practised his profession in 1933, and that he was a minister for 31 years. We can therefore conclude that he became a minister in 1902 at 35 years old when he was living in Manitoba. His death certificate also states that he had lived in BC for 52 years which would make his arrival 1906.

Thomas Peacock married his first wife, Minnie Hattie Dickson, on September 30, 1903 in Brandon, Manitoba. Their daughter, Dorothy Dickson Peacock was born June 15, 1904 in Brandon; however, her mother died when Dorothy was just an infant. In 1906 Dorothy was living with Thomas and Annie Dickson, her maternal grandparents in Brandon. Her father was in Miami, a small community 100 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg. His occupation is not given but he is 38 and widowed. According to his death certificate, he was a minister at this time.

Thomas Peacock probably migrated to British Columbia in 1906 to a Presbyterian Church. We know that he was in Murrayville at the Sharon Presbyterian Church (later United) for 5 years from 1920 -1925, but his earlier churches are not known. His first church might have been in Miami, Manitoba and he may have gone to Agassiz, BC before Murrayville. He was in Wonnack, his last church, from 1930 to 1933.

He married his second wife, Helen Banks Todrick January 12, 1910 in Central Park, Vancouver. Helen had been born in Wawanesa, Manitoba. To this union was born a daughter, Kathleen Isobel (Kay), on August 5th, 1911. The 1911 census gives their address as James Street, South Vancouver when Thomas was 43 years old and Helen 23. Helen died a few years later on July 10, 1914. Her burial record states that she died of tuberculosis. Helen is buried at Mountain View Cemetery in Vancouver (Grave No. - Jones*15/016/009) but there is no grave stone. Rev. Peacock married a third time to Hectoria McLean in 1921 in Burnaby.

For an interesting article about Thomas' eldest daughter, Dorothy Peacock, click on the title of this post. There is an elementary school in Langley, B.C. named after Dorothy. There are also photos of Dorothy, her sister, and a cousin.

I spoke to the gentleman who wrote the family history for the website. Dorothy taught him as a boy, and much later, she worked for him when he was a school principal. He said she was moved around as an elementary school teacher because she was able to control the students. In later years, she took courses to become a high school teacher and taught home economics. He described her as tall and thin, out-going, vivacious and with a sense of humour that could crack up a school staff meeting.

Rev. Peacock died in 1958 and is buried in the Murrayville Cemetery in Langley. His daughter, Dorothy, continued to live in the family home until her death in 1997.