Happy birthday, Clyde.
On Jan. 28, the Village of Clyde celebrated its 100th birthday with cake in the village office.
“It’s a great day for the Village of Clyde,” said deputy mayor Nat Dvernichuk.
He added Clyde has become a beautiful village over the last few years, thanks in large part to it being home to a close-knit community of people who work together.
“I’m hoping the next 100 years will be just as promising,” he said.
Dvernichuk said he is “very honoured” to be serving the village as a councillor and deputy mayor at the same time it’s turning 100. “I’m very grateful for the opportunity to do so,” he said.
Those close-knit residents who work together to make Clyde the place it is include people like Jim Rau, who can often be found at the curling rink in the winter.
He gave credit to those people who came to the area and had a hand in making the community what it is today.
“I have a lot of respect for those people who came here from somewhere else,” he said. “They left wherever they were from to make a new life, and then send for their families a few years later.”
Rau also gave kudos to the volunteers who put in a lot of manual labour to build things like the community hall. They would volunteer long hours after they were done working for the day, he said.
“You don’t really see that now.”
Dvernichuk moved to Clyde, partly for work-related purposes, in 1975.
However, he said before he moved to the village from Bon Accord, he had friends who were from the community. His neighbours in Bon Accord were from Clyde, and they their actions told him it was a good place to move to.
“I could tell from them it was a friendly community,” he said.
While last week’s celebration was a low-key affair, with people simply dropping in for a slice of cake before heading out to the rest of their day, the real festivities will take place this summer.
The big celebration to mark the village’s centennial is scheduled for June 21, which will coincide with the Clyde Summer Solstice festivities.
Events planned to mark the occasion include a ribbon cutting after the Solstice parade, with Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock MLA Maureen Kubinec and Westlock—St. Paul MP Brian Storseth scheduled to attend.
