Let’s celebrate our newest National Historic Site – Seven Oaks House!

John and Mary (Sinclair) Inkster, an influential Scottish-Métis family in the Red River Settlement, started building Seven Oaks House in 1851. The foundation was laid by John, a stonemason by trade, using cut stones that were held together by just their weight, no mortar required. Oak logs were floated down the river from Baie St. Paul, Quebec to construct the gracious two storey home in the Red River frame style. The house was designed with its facade facing east, towards the Red River and incorporated the northern end of the family’s original 1830s two-room log home as the kitchen.

Unfortunately, work on Seven Oaks House was interrupted in 1852 when the Red River flooded, resulting in well over a metre of water covering the property. While the children and animals were evacuated, John and Mary stayed through the flood, keeping dry by tenting on the second floor of the unfinished structure. Construction was completed in 1853 and the house was owned by the family until 1912, when John and Mary’s daughter, Mary “Marak” Inkster, gifted the property to the City of Winnipeg.

Seven Oaks House went on to serve its community in many different ways over the decades, including functioning as a local clubhouse and a military training site with a yellow de Havilland Tiger Moth biplane in the backyard. It was also still a home, with live-in caretakers, including the final Inkster family to live in it from 1942 to 1948. The house was eventually conserved and adaptively reused as a museum, which opened on July 2nd, 1958.

Having become the oldest home standing in Winnipeg, the historical significance of Seven Oaks House is now recognized by all three levels of government. On March 17th, 1997 it was added to the City of Winnipeg List of Historical Resources, on June 8th, 2017 it became a Provincial Heritage Site, and on October 22nd, 2025 it was announced as a National Historic Site. Operating as a museum it now educates the public while conserving the homestead site and related artifacts, opening the door to what life would have been like during the 19th century.

The national historic designation for the Seven Oaks House is significant as it brings attention to a distinctive surviving piece of Western Canada’s earliest Red River settlement history. The historic house and its grounds reveal stories that are rich in historical significance and illustrate a unique microcosm of the settlement and development of this region of Canada. Visiting the Seven Oaks House Museum provides a unique opportunity for visitors to experience its historic identity in the midst of a modern city, providing context for key themes of conflict, and reconciliation between settler and indigenous groups, and Scottish-Métis history.

From Sandra Klowak, the Chair of the Seven Oaks House Museum Board and nominator of the designation.

The Seven Oaks House Museum, located at 50 Mac Street, is open seasonally from the May Long Weekend to Labour Day. The museum is also a long time participant in Heritage Winnipeg’s Doors Open Winnipeg, and won the People’s Choice Award for best architecture in 2023.

Congratulations to Seven Oaks House on this well deserved national recognition!

Featured Image: Seven Oaks House, undated from Seven Oaks House Museum (via Doors Open Winnipeg 2019).