Fort La Bosse S.D. is located in south-western, rural Manitoba. It serves a large geographical area with family-oriented communities, strong oil and agricultural industries and many energetic businesses.The division office is located in Virden, 78 kilometers west of Brandon on the Trans Canada Highway, and 105 kilometers north of the Canada-United States border. Virden is situated close to the geographic center of North America, midway between Regina, SK and Winnipeg, MB. The division includes all or parts of eleven rural municipalities. The division is divided into five wards with ten trustees. The division has approximately 1400 students in 10 schools.
Origin of the Fort La Bosse Name
A fort once operated on a high bank of the Assiniboine River near Virden. The fort’s name was Montagne à la Bosse or Boss Hill Fort. The North West Company from Montreal erected the Montagne à la Bosse fort some three and a half miles east of the present site of Virden. They operated the fort between 1790 and 1805. It served as a meat depot to provide pemmican and fresh meat supplies to feed the voyageur boat crews who transported furs from the west to the North West Company’s district headquarters at Fort William.”This is a well-built fort and beautifully situated on a high bank of the Assiniboine River and the country all around a level plain, but as the fort stands on a much more elevated place than the country on the opposite side of the river, we can from the fort gate (as I am informed) at almost all season of the Year see buffalo grazing or deer and cabri bounding across the plains.” Unfortunately, the fort had been erected on a gravel ridge and the site was mined for its gravel. The gravel was used for construction and maintenance of the old No. 1 Highway and the new Trans-Canada Highway. Prior to that, the Canadian Pacific Railway had built a spur line into the same area.
Today you may wish to visit the cairn on Montagne à la Bosse Road. The cairn is itself an historic site. It was erected 400 feet up from the fort site on the roadside of the old No. 1 Highway sometime in the 1920s. In the history books and journals of the explorers, the fort has been given many names: Moose Head Fort, Rivière Fort de la Bosse, Mont à la Bosse, Rivière aux Bois Fort. However, the name commonly known for many years has been Fort La Bosse.