On March 30, 1891, Moose Jaw residents turned on their electric lights for the first time.
The road to the modern moment had not been smooth.
Fierce verbal battles had raged in and out of the town council chamber when councillors gave the contract for providing Moose Jaw with electrical power to a Winnipeg firm instead of to the Moose Jaw Electric Light Company, the only other applicant.
The town was up in arms.
The Moose Jaw Times not only accused council of allowing private animosities to influence its decision, but of trying to bribe the local company into withdrawing its application.
In the end the councillors were forced to rescind their previous decision and award a five-year franchise to the Moose Jaw firm, with a few provisos: the town was to get four free lights, and the company was to have the entire operation ready to go by March 1, 1891, just four months away.
Work was running considerably behind schedule when on Feb. 15 the Times reported: “The Electric Light Company has erected upward of seven poles . . . and these make a big difference in the appearance of our town.”
The plant itself was still in the course of construction “across the river in the vicinity of the race course,” on the site of the later power plant on Manitoba Street East.
Finally, at the end of March, a month later than promised, lights were turned on for the first time and 200 customers, including shops and private residences, put away their coal oil lamps.
Electric power was available every evening from 6:30 p.m. to 12 midnight at a cost of one and one-half cents per hour.
“The test was highly satisfactory, and the beautiful soft mellow light given out was pronounced to be a great improvement on the old system,” reported the Times.
“The local company deserves great praise for installing in our town a system of lighting equal to that of any large city in America.”
“The mere fact of having electric lights has given the town a standing,” the Times observed.
“Looked at from the narrow standpoint of dollars and cents, electric lighting may be a trifle dearer than coal oil, but we consider it the duty of every citizen who has a grain of public spiritness to support a public institution such as the Electric Company.
Besides, continued the Times, “electricity creates no gases, is not liable to explosion, there is no unpleasant odor of oil, no leakage on the carpet or clothing, no broken lamp chimneys and lastly, no cleaning of lamps.”
But old ways die hard. After a year in operation, the company found itself losing money because not enough people were willing to convert.
In December 1892, the plant was sold to Arthur Hitchcock, a local banker. Eventually it became a municipal plant and was expanded and improved many times as the town and city grew.
The next improvement on the town council’s agenda was a suitable lockup for drunks and other disturbers of the peace.
“This is a matter that requires the attention of our authorities at once,” observed the Times, “for in case of an arrest, there is no place in town where prisoners can be put except in a box stall in a livery barn.”
