Mary Ellis
Mary Ellis came from the Industrial School at Yale, British Columbia to teach at the First Nation school at Forty Mile in 1902.1) Bishop Bompas moved to Carcross in 1900. He left the school at Forty Mile in the care of a school master and his wife. They left the community and by 1903, Miss Ellis was the remaining missionary and school matron at Forty Mile.2)
In 1903, Nellie Brown, the teacher at Bishop Bompas’ school left Carcross. Bompas closed the boarding school at Forty Mile in June and brought Mary Ellis and the six to eight children in her care to Carcross. He housed them in a small log cabin near the railway station and then moved them to larger quarters in the First Nation village across the river. The Hawksleys and Mary Mellish continued the day school at Forty Mile until 1905 when the First Nations people moved to Eagle, and the school closed.3)
The Forty Mile students were regular attendees at the new Carcross school and the Tagish students attended as families’ seasonal round allowed.4) Miss Ellis, a competent teacher, was responsible for training the girls to cook and keep house. In 1907, Ellis was the matron at the school and Misses Thompson and Hutchison were the classroom teachers.5) Bompas taught some classes until he died in 1906 and Reverend Hawksley took over until 1910 when he transferred to Dawson. Miss Ellis remained as matron until 1909 when Miss Collins took over the position.6)