© 2025, Christian Cassidy
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Place: Former Manitoba Gypsum Co. / Real Canadian Superstore
Address: 1385 - 1405 Sargent Avenue
Constructed: 1906 and 2004
The Manitoba Gypsum Company started operations in 1904 after it built a mine and small factory near Gypsumville, Manitoba. When the plant burned down in 1906, it was relocated to Sargent Street at St. James Avenue in Winnipeg and was expanded several times over the decades.
The company is credited with being the first in Canada to produce and sell wall plasterboard commercially. They also produced other items like plaster of Paris, wood fibre plaster, and stucco.
Winnipeg was a major player in the national plaster industry by the First World War and Manitoba Gypsum employed 150 men at its plant and several more at its mine. By 1927, it manufactured seven to eight million feet of plasterboard per year.
Nor-West Farmer, April 20, 1920
The company, and a subsidiary it owned in B.C., were bought out in March 1928 for $3 million by Canada Gypsum and Alabastine Ltd.. William Armstrong, the company's founder and president, got a seat on the national company's board.
In 1959, what was by then known as Gypsum, Lime, Alabastine Canada sold out to Domtar Construction Materials Ltd. which also had a tar-based building materials plant in St. Boniface.
Domtar sold all of its Canadian gypsum-related business interests to Georgia Pacific Canada Ltd. in 1996.
Georgia-Pacific announced the closure of the Winnipeg gypsum plant, along with two others in the U.S., in 2001.
The land at 1385 - 1405 Sargent Avenue was sold to Loblaw Companies and in March 2004 it was announced that the site would become home to a 150,000 square foot Real Canadian Superstore with a 38,000 square foot mezzanine level fitness centre.
It would be the largest grocery store in Winnipeg and the same size as Superstore's largest flagship store in Calgary.
The store opened on November 12, 2004.
Related:
The death of Peter Hutzel and others at Manitoba Gypsum Co. West End Dumplings
Gypsum in Canada Department of Mines, Ottawa, 1913 (start at page 77)
Gypsum in Manitoba Government of Manitoba, ca. 1983
"Empire" Gypsum Products Catalogue Manitoba Gypsum Company, 1910
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