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POINT OF INTEREST: Notre-Dame-de-Lorette Church

HISTORICAL NUGGETS: The Legendary Midwinter Tramp of a Famous Lorette Resident

Continue east on #207 through Lorette and you will see the Notre-Dame-de-Lorette Church (Our Lady of Lorette) on your right (south side) at 1282 Dawson Road.

Visiting hours and more information about the history of the Notre-Dame-de-Lorette Church can be found at https://notredamedelorette.info/vie-paroissiale-parish-life/historique-history/.   Photo by Myriam Dyck.

Notre-Dame-de-Lorette Church (Our Lady of Lorette)

    “Lorette was the site of the first church built in the municipality of Taché in 1879. Jean-Baptiste Lagimodière, also known as “La Prairie”, donated a bell to the first iteration of this small church served by the Oblate Missionary fathers back in 1883. The existing church was started 15 years later by August Gauthier, a Lorette architect and builder. This magnificent church is decorated with beautiful frescoes by Montreal artist Louis-Eustache Monty and Constantin Tauffenbach, a French immigrant, better known for his portrait of Pierre Falcon. Early 20th century masterpiece paintings adorn its ceilings, the sanctuary and walls, lending credit to its reputation as the “Sistine Chapel of the Prairies”.”

    "The church is surmounted by three bells which were poured in Haute-Savoie, France.

    "The statue of our Lady of Lorette, patron saint of the parish, came directly from the church of our Lady of Lorette in Italy. The statue arrived in 1933."

Rose R. Blom, Taché Rural Municipality 1880-1980

Sources:

Conseil de la coopération du Manitoba. (n.d.). La région Seine Region: Guide Touristique | Tourist Information Guide (P.10). Print only. Based on a book by Saint-Pierre, Annette. Au Coeur de l’Amérique. Éditions des Plaines.

Blom, R.R. (1980, April). Taché Rural Municipality 1880-1980 (P.51). Commissioned by The Council of the Rural Municipality of Taché. Derksen Printers, Steinbach: Manitoba. Retrieved from University of Manitoba digital collections June 3, 2020, http://hdl.handle.net/10719/3055598

“Seven enormous paintings fill the walls of the altar area with the first being a painting of St. Patrick. "There was a huge contingent of Irish families and they contributed greatly and so this was to honour their generosity and help," he [Grossman] says. “A painting of the Holy Family is one of only two paintings not done by Monty. Because foundation problems resulted in the destruction of his original work, a local artist, Noëlla Gauthier-Yoeman, was commissioned in 1948 to replace it. Photo: Cheryl Girard, Winnipeg Free Press. “The Holy Family, painted by local artist Noella Gauthier-Yoeman, in the altar area of Notre-Dame-de-Lorette church. Along the historic Dawson Road, not far from the winding Seine River.” Winnipeg Free Press, August 4, 2012. Retrieved June 4, 2020 from https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-and-life/life/faith/sistine-chapel-of-the-prairies-164985996.html

Along the Dawson route, not far from the Seine River sits the second church in Lorette that father Dufresne had built in 1894. Archives de la Société historique de Saint-Boniface, Collection générale de la Société historique de Saint-Boniface, SHSB 1876. Retrieved June 5, 2020 from L'église de Lorette

A beautiful sanctuary for local residents of Lorette that also welcomed travelers on the Dawson Trail. Quebec painter Louis-Eustache Monty decorated most of the interior of Notre Dame de Lorette in the early 1900s… The Crucifixion dominates the back of the altar and is a wooden sculpture mounted on a painted mural created in 1999 by Robert Freynet, a Manitoban artist.” Source: Cheryl Girard, Winnipeg Free Press. (2012, August 4). Retrieved June 5, 2020 from https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-and-life/life/faith/sistine-chapel-of-the-prairies-164985996.html

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