Message - Details

John McLeish and Frank Chester likely didn’t know it at the time, but in 1911 the two men were in the process of making history. MacLeish and Chester, two plasterers employed by a Winnipeg sub-contractor working on the construction of the Saskatchewan Legislative Building, decided to write a note and left it in a small glass bottle. It wasn’t until October of 1997 that both the bottle and the note reappeared.

An engineer conducting tests of the Dome as part of the rehabilitation project found the bottle, which was tucked away in an attic above the Legislative Chamber near the base of the Dome.

The story surrounding the historic find quickly spread as news organizations across Saskatchewan and Canada reported the story. Below is a story on the find as reported in the February 14, 1998 edition of the Regina Leader-Post.

"Voices from the past"

As the "Message in the Bottle" story spread, more interesting stories came forward. One of those stories came from Daisy Anderson of Silton, Saskatchewan. In a letter to SPMC, Daisy recalled the stories of her father, Arthur White. White worked as a laborer on the building in 1910. Below is her story as reported in the Regina Leader-Post on April 21, 1998.

(link to LP article April 21, 1998)

If you have any information which may help in locating the ancestors of John MacLeish or Frank Chester, or if you have an interesting story to tell us about the construction of the Saskatchewan Legislative Building, Saskatchewan Property Management Corporation would certainly like to hear about it. A feedback form is available on this site, or you can contact SPMC at:

Saskatchewan Property Management Corporation
Communications Branch
1840 Lorne Street
Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada
S4P 3V7
Telephone: (306)787-8676
Fax: (306) 787-8582