Around forty people from Goyran were present in the municipal council room to listen to Michel Ruffié tell his anecdotes about the history of the village. Coming from a family established in Goyrans for many generations, he enchanted the audience with two stories; that of the miraculous fountain of Goyrans and that of the conflict between the school and the presbytery in the 19th century.
Saint-Jean Baptiste is the patron saint of Goyrans, and every June 24 the people of Goyran demonstrate their attachment to the one who protects them, perpetuated today during the village festival. On the way from Bugat, the Saint-Jean fountain has long been reputed to be miraculous. According to legend, its water cured St. John’s disease, people with abscesses, tumors, and varicose veins, but also young mothers awaiting deliverance!
We find in the archives several testimonies from residents declaring themselves cured after using its water.
In 1893, following testimonies, the fountain was identified on the 1807 land register. Excavations made it possible to find at a depth of 1 m the remains of a red brick fountain, with a depth of 4 m. In 1895, priest Viraben had the monument that we see today built and relaunched the pilgrimage on the Sunday preceding the feast of St John.
Discord around public schools
Michel Ruffié addressed a second theme, that of the disagreement over the construction of a public school between 1851 and 1885.
The priests of Goyrans were often tempted to establish a counter-power to the municipality, at the origin of the disputes at the end of the 19th century. In 1851, the municipality asked the architect Jean-Jacques Esquié to draw up a plan for a school house leaning against the north wall of the church. To do this, the mayor obtains a grant of 300 Frs from the Ministry of Public Education. (around €15,000 to €25,000 according to our estimates) This first school, as soon as it was built, was squatted in 1853 by the priest, who made it his presbytery. The high point of the dispute came from the priest who, in the middle of a sermon, reproached the mayor’s wife for having an inappropriate hairstyle for the place of worship. It was not until 1884 that the town decided to build a new one on the Place des Marronniers. In 1886, the first secular teacher arrived, paid by the State.
2024-02-04 05:51:55
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