WINNIPEG – Approximately 60 graves on the grounds of the Franco-Manitoban Cultural Centre in St. Boniface will be exhumed in fall.
A cemetery established in 1913 by the Oblate Fathers, a Catholic religious order, is to be moved from its site at Des Meurons Street and Provencher Boulevard.
“The Oblate Fathers just accepted to give their space to the province so we could have a French cultural centre here, so the cemetery was already there,” said Sylviane Lanthier of the Franco-Manitoban Cultural Centre.
“Now 40 years later, what they are saying is they feel it’s not in an appropriate space, so they need a more proper place to rest.”
The remains of 63 people associated with the Oblates are interred at the cemetery. They will be moved to a cemetery elsewhere in St. Boniface.
The Franco-Manitoban Cultural Centre plans to maintain the area as green space and to put up something to honour the Oblates’ former use of the property.
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