Oswald Alexander Steele lived in West Nissouri, Middlesex, Ontario, Canada from his birth until 1904 or thereabouts. On 21 February that year, he received a membership certificate prepared in Thorndale from the South Nissouri Presbyterian congregation indicatiing he was leaving them as a member in good standing. He would have been 22 at that time and I presume he had finished his normal schooling and had accepted a job to teach in Aetna, Alberta for the upcoming school year. This certificate is in possession of Mike St. Clair, who submitted the information on this page.

Oswald was hired as a teacher for the Aetna, Alberta, two room school that was initially taught in Niels and Eva Hansen's home. Here he met, and later fell in love and married one of their daughters. Mary Leota Hansen (1892/Aetna, AB - 1985/Redlands, CA) was in fact one of his pupils and the courtship wasn't welcomed by her mother (her father had died when she was but 10, presumably before the courtship began). Oswald was still at home with his widowed mother when the 1901 census was taken, residing in W. Nissouri twp, Middlesex county, Ontario. Mary Leota told me that she fell madly in love with her teacher just about the first time she saw him. They married and five children were born to them in Aetna prior to his death.

The children of Oswald and Mary Leota were:

1. George Alexander Steele (1909/Aetna, AB - 1997/Reno, NV)
2. Herbert Bernard Steele (1910/Aetna, AB - 1999/Boise, ID)
3. Walter Hansen Steele (1912/Aetna, AB - 2002/Boise, ID)
4. Jeaneva Steele (1914/Aetna, AB - 1990/Redlands, CA)
5. Rex Dunbar Steele (1917/Cardston, AB - 1966/Panoka, AB)

Oswald died 8 Jan 1919 during the world-wide influenza epidemic of that season that killed millions, mostly young men and women in the prime of their life. In 1921 his widow married Moroni Allen (1879/Laketown, UT - 1968/Boise, ID) and in about 1930 they relocated with her mother Mary Leota Hochstrasser Hansen and several brothers to Weiser, ID. Many of her siblings remained in the Cardston area and are there to this day.

The parallels between Oswald's families (as a child and as a parent) are interesting. His father died young and left 6 children for his mother Jane to raise. She did so and then lived to the age of 98! He died young and left 5 children for his wife Mary Leota to raise. She did so and then lived to the age of almost 94! Obviously, these were strong women, and able to handle that tremendous burden.

According to G. Homer Durham in "N. Eldon Tanner: His Life and Service" Oswald was teacher to this great man who became an apostle and member of the first presidency in the LDS Church. This would have been sometime during the years of 1904 to 1913 as President Tanner attended the 1st through 9th grade in Aetna's two room schoolhouse. The story goes that only through 8th grade was taught at the time and President Tanner badly wanted to go on. He asked the principal if he wouldn't teach the ninth, who agreed on the condition that at least 5 were going to attend. Five were indeed rounded up, although they had to wait until after Christmas to start because as in many farming communities of the time the young men were often needed for farm duties in the fall. I'm wondering if Oswald could have been the "principal" in this story.

I believe Aetna was probably Oswald's first and only teaching station after normal school. Assuming 11 grades, then another year of normal school (this matched N. E. Tanner's path to teaching) he could have started teaching in Aetna as early as the fall of 1899. It could have been as late as 1906 for him to still teach a year before marrying Mary Leota. I think it was on the early side of that as Mary Leota talked about him first both boarding and teaching in the Hansen home.

The 1918-1920 influenza pandemic, during which Oswald died, ranks as one of the two top infectious killers in all human history. Because the ability to identify and classify viruses was not developed until the 1930's, for many years we didn't know what kind of virus caused the disease during these particular years. Due to DNA research during the 1990's, it was partially identified and given a name: Influenza A/South Carolina/1/18 (H1N1). More details on this are available in the March 21, 1997 issue of Science magazine.

Some census records that contained Oswald Alexander Steele:

• CENSUS: 1891 Canada Ontario Middlesex W. Nissouri; FHL #1,465,777; district 90; subdistrict F1, p. 13; listed as child with mother and siblings; age 8; name given as Oswell.
• CENSUS: 1901 Canada Ontario Middlesex W. Nissouri; FHL #1,843,563; subdistrict F7; p. 5;dwelling 44; concession 5, lot 26; w/mother and siblings; age 19, born 8 Aug 1881;student

Jeaneva Steele, daughter of Oswald, was my mother. If you are related to any of the people included on this page, I'd love to hear from you.

Mike St. Clair

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