For a place that never really made it onto the map, there was a time when a lot of things were happening in Bidford.
The Bidford School District was established in July 1885, named for a settler’s home town in England. The first school was built that year on NW16-4-22, and was later moved close to the farm buildings of Mr. & Mrs. Andrew Potter on the SE quarter. It became the nucleus of the district, and hosted Methodist church services, Sunday school, prayer meetings, concerts and political meetings.
A nearby poplar grove, known as Potter’s Grove, was the site of the most important community assembly and social event of the year - the annual Bidford Picnic. Baseball was the favourite sport, and teams from nearby districts like Wapaha, Kirkwood and Westhall participated in the day’s activities.
In some ways it had a lot in common with many other rural districts, but in one way it was a bit unique.
As in many communities the church was an important element. The Holiness Movement Church in Canada was founded by Rev. Ralph C. Horner in the late 1890s. Horner was a former Methodist who had withdrawn from the church because of doctrinal differences. The Bidford Methodists were part of that movement, perhaps fueled by a visit to Bidford by Bishop Horner himself in 1896.
In 1897 the Holiness Movement Church built a little white chapel across the road from the school, which was similar in design and function to many others built by the “Hornerites,” as they were often called. The church opened on September 3 with a three day convention. In 1906 a manse was built nearby, making Bidford one of the few country churches to have a resident pastor. Their services, and particularly their annual camp meetings, were characterized by evangelical fervour and zealous congregational singing. Churches in the holiness movement tradition emphasized a sober (and strict) lifestyle, especially with regard to modesty and the consumption of alcohol.
In the early twentieth century, Canadian society was being transformed by the forces of industrialization and urbanization. It was a time of change and challenges. Poverty, crime and alcohol abuse were concerns to many. The views of Canada’s Protestants were evolving - the social gospel, already evident in Canada in the late 1800s, spread among the leaders of Canada’s evangelical churches. During the Great War the central tenets of the social gospel were transformed into a critique of Canadian capitalism and the character of Canadian society. The influence of this critique was evident in the fall of 1918, when the General Conference of the Methodist Church adopted a program of social reconstruction which called for the dismantling of the capitalist system and its replacement with a new co-operative social order.
It was a rather interesting combination of conservative social values and radical or progressive political beliefs.
The movement was not limited to the fine folks of the Bidford district - Holiness Movement Churches were also built in Killarney, Deloraine and Elgin - but at least two young men from Bidford went on to become ordained ministers in the faith.
A detailed survey of ‘agriculture, educational, social and religious life’ in the Winchester, Whitewater and Morton municipalities was undertaken in 1914 by the Methodist and Presbyterian Churches. It made note of the Methodist circuits of Elgin and Bidford planning to merge and thought it unwise that the Pastor lived in Elgin and the Bidford parsonage was “no longer the home of the religious leader of that large community.”
In the mid-1920s the manse was sold to a local farmer and before long the church closed. The drive to nearby towns for church services was becoming much easier and society was already becoming less rural. The influence of the Holiness Movement was in decline and eventually ran its course.
The cemetery that served the district in the pioneer day was closed and its occupants moved to Deloraine Cemetery in 1917.
A new school was built at the SE corner of 16-4-22 in 1918 and served the district until 1964. The Bidford Picnic was an annual event until the school closed, and ball games against neighbouring community teams continued to be a favourite activity. Today an attractive monument, dedicated in 2000, marks the site.
The Bidford District still merited an occasional byline in the Deloraine paper into the early 1960s.
The location of the Bidford Holiness Movement Church almost passed into history unmarked and forgotten.
Luckily, the mention of an annual camp meeting in the Deloraine newspaper, plus asking ‘the right person’ in the Bidford district, has led us to confirm where it was built. In time we hope its story will be told, on location.
Bidford
Bidford Holiness
Movement Church 1914
Sources: Mitchell, Tom.. Beatrice Brigden and Radicalism in the Methodist Church. Manitoba History, Number 19, Spring 1990 Jan McClelland, Deloraine-Winchester Historical Society ‘Rural Survey, Turtle Mountain District, 1914 Cooperating Organizations of the Methodist and Presbyterian Churches
