Description of Historic Place

The compact red brick Manitoba Power Commission Building sits on an open grassed area on the west bank of the Little Saskatchewan River that flows through Minnedosa. The one-storey structure, built in 1920 and situated south of the spillway from a dam on Minnedosa Lake, now forms part of the town's heritage village. The municipal designation applies to the building and its site.

Heritage Value

The Manitoba Power Commission Building, a utilitarian structure typical of industrial facilities designed in the 1920s, recalls one of rural Manitoba's earliest hydroelectric generating stations and the role that small independent companies played in the initial development of the province's electrical power supply. The building housed auxiliary diesel equipment used to supplement the output of the Minnedosa Power Co.'s modest, but locally important, hydroelectric plant established on this site in 1913. Located just south of Minnedosa Lake, the reservoir built to power the station's original turbine and generator, the building now functions as a museum.

Source: Town of Minnedosa By-law No. 2296, February 7, 1994

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the heritage character of the Manitoba Power Commission Building's site include:
- placement of the structure beside a flume on the west bank of the Little Saskatchewan River, at the south end of Minnedosa Lake and dam, with its front elevation facing south

Key elements that define the building's utilitarian character include:
- the structure's cube shape, low profile and formal composition, with a flat roofline, front and side parapets, a projecting frontispiece and recessed stepped-brick bays on two elevations
- the strong horizontal lines established by the large rectangular-shaped windows with wide sills, the large front entrance with a transom set in stone, a brick stringcourse, a stone band at the top of the frontispiece and continuous stone coping on the parapet
- the surviving 30-pane window on the south wall
- the modest materials and ornamentation, including the red brick surfaces, diamond-shaped decorative motifs at the front corners, the double wooden entrance doors, etc.

Key elements that recall the building's original functions include:
- the limestone trim inscribed with 'MANITOBA POWER COMMISSION' at the top of the frontispiece and with 'POWER HOUSE No 2' and the date '1920' above the door

Key internal elements that define the heritage character of the building include:
- the open floor plan with an office to the west and open space to the rear
- the basic materials and details, including a high concrete ceiling supported by steel I-beams, exposed brick walls, a concrete slab floor, yard-type light fixtures, etc.