Agriculture was practised in North America long before Europeans arrived on the prairie. In the western interior, for example, Ojibway and Mandan corn was a highly valued product in intertribal trade, serving as an item of exchange for clothing material and other goods produced by neighbouring bands. When the fur trade dominated the economy of the western interior (1670-1870), fur company labourers cultivated garden plots to supplement their limited diets, but this was small-scale agriculture, subsistence farming at best, and it offered little hope of progress or development.
The transportation and scientific changes of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries revolutionized prairie agriculture. With the beginning of regular railroad service, between 1878 and 1886, prairie wheat became competitive in continental and world markets. With the development of new strains of grain, like Red Fife and Marquis wheat, vast new areas of land were brought into production. With increased knowledge of how grains could be grown under dry conditions, more farmers could withstand the vagaries of climate. These developments made the western rural dream commonplace: plant a few bushels of seed in the spring, reap thousands of bushels in the autumn, and earn good prices in a far- flung market that spanned the world. It was a dream that fascinated generations of rural people.
The first great migration of grain growers into the prairie West started in the early 1870s and ended in the 1890s. Smaller than subsequent migrations, it was dominated by settlers from southern Ontario who built replicas of Ontario communities in the West. Churches and banks, barns and farm houses similar to those found in the East appeared in rural prairie villages and along prairie roads. Similarly, Ontario rural organizations, agricultural societies, secret lodges, women's groups and church auxiliaries became integral parts of prairie society.
In the 1890s the second great migration, much larger than the first, transformed the prairies. Settlement pushed into more remote areas, away from the rivers and the first railway lines. The process took two generations to complete. Branch lines from the railway had to be built, roads constructed, villages developed, amenities provided it was a long, difficult and expensive process. The success rate was not high. Hidden behind the general patterns of success and development lay thousands of individual stories of hard work, years of triumph, seasons of despair and rapid adjustment to changing conditions. In some districts as many as one-half of all settlers failed at homesteading. There were many lessons to be learned. The prairies have immense differences in climate and soils, requiring careful study, accumulated experience and technological adjustment. Measured in crops lost, work unrewarded and farms closed, the cost of learning was high.
Between 1920 and 1940 there was a steady trickle of settlers who gradually forced the contours of settlement westward and northward; however, this third wave of migration brought little increase in the total cultivated acreage. The newly opened land most of it on the western and northern fringes simply replaced uneconomic farms abandoned by their discouraged owners.
Since 1940, prairie rural areas have witnessed a steady emigration. Scientific agriculture based on improved technology has forced farm size upward towards the 400-hectare size. Machines have replaced men, draft horses have nearly disappeared and rural life has been transformed. The consequences are clear. Many rural homes built in the 1920s now stand unoccupied. Small villages, once bustling, are now nearly empty retirement centres largely bypassed by travellers and local people who prefer shopping in larger towns and cities. A way of life arduously developed over the preceding fifty years has been rapidly undermined by the transportation and technological changes wrought after 1940.
The Conditions of Grain Production
Although the grain growers came at different times, they all faced comparable conditions, many of which still prevail. The land itself is situated on three levels. Southern Manitoba lies about 200 metres above sea level, southern Saskatchewan about 360 metres, and southern Alberta about 500 metres. The western interior is marked by treeless terrain in the southern districts, mixed plane and poplar trees in the parkland belt and heavy forests in the north. In the present farming districts, the soils are roughly similar and, though rarely of first quality, they are sufficiently rich to produce good crops. Typically, the climate is characterized by at least 100 frost-free days, an average monthly summer temperature of 15 C and precipitation of twenty-five to fifty centimetres in the growing season. But an individual farmer cannot rely on averages. The rain clouds overhead in spring might miss his farm by a couple of kilometres and, though the year might still appear to be average in district weather records, he could be left with a dried-out, low-yield crop. Nature's variables soil, precipitation, temperature and insects are problems which prairie farmers have in common.
The man-made conditions under which farmers labour are also generally similar across the prairies. Prior to extensive settlement, the federal government decided to employ the sectional survey. With a very few exceptions, therefore, the entire region is marked into sections which are one mile square (260 hectares) and, within these sections, into four quarter-sections of 160 acres (65 hectares) each. These are the units of a western farm and during the first half-century of prairie settlement many novice farmers selected a free quarter-section homestead, earning full title by paying the necessary fees and by living on the land for three years. For the many who bought land from railways, land companies and private citizens, the grid system still determined the shape of their farms and the distance from their neighbours.
The railways were also crucial to farm life. The location of a branch line and station determined how far one had to travel to buy supplies, pick up the mail and sell grain important considerations when farm families relied on horses and oxen for transportation. The railway was also important because its freight rates helped determine the cost of goods in the prairie towns. Freight rates, while not so important to many other Canadians, became of foremost significance to prairie grain growers. Along with bank interest charges, equipment costs and the price of food, they affected farmers in a dramatic, demonstrable way and were a standard bone of contention in prairie politics.
Another man-made element in the prairie farmer's environment was the grain elevator, the place where crops were sold. The elevator, in fact, became a symbol for the region, its elongated shape appealing to artists and photographers. It was also a determinant of the grain grower's prosperity. At the elevator grain was weighed, graded, stored and ultimately loaded into railway cars. In the early years of the century, local elevators were not controlled by governments and many farmers believed they did not receive a fair return. They argued that weigh scales were inadequately policed and reductions for weed seed content were too large. As a result, many farmers mistrusted the existing grain marketing system and insisted on government regulation.
Finally, prairie farmers were concerned about the international wheat market. The price of wheat in Chicago, Buenos Aires, Liverpool and Winnipeg determined whether grain growers could afford to feed and clothe their families. To their dismay, this price was determined by the speculative futures market in a stock market type of atmosphere. Many farmers would have preferred that grain sales be controlled by a government agency because they feared that large grain firms were manipulating the futures market to their own advantage. Thus, the grain export business, like the elevator system, the railway and land regulations, affected the fortunes of all prairie farmers.
These farmers were gambling that they could build a better life for themselves. They shared a struggle to grow crops in similar soils, in a similar climate, under uniform laws, within a common marketing system and a single world export market. They were individuals who generally worked alone or in small-scale enterprises, but they shared a way of life across the prairies. Their goal was to find appropriate adaptations, in the economic system and in their society, in order that they might enjoy material security and a fruitful, satisfying way of life.
Victories of Science and Technology
Scientific research sponsored by government, universities and industry has done much to aid farmers. Plant science has made an important contribution to farm life, developing new plant strains which have reduced the growing time of grains, increased resistance to diseases and insects and enlarged production dramatically. Soil scientists have taught farmers how to cultivate particular soils, how to use fertilizers in order to increase productivity and how to match plant variety to soil type. Insecticides and herbicides have reduced the depredations of insects and weeds. Similarly, engineers, through the development of an astonishing array of machinery, have lightened the physical toil of farmers, increased their control over the growing process and given them power, speed and efficiency that were undreamed of a century ago. Elderly farmers who contemplate the modern production process say that farm life has changed beyond recognition. The ox and horse have given way to trucks and tractors; ancient plant varieties have been replaced by scientifically selected and carefully cleaned seed grains; guess and prayer have been supplemented by fertilizer charts and chemical sprays. If better production techniques can solve the problem of material welfare, modern farmers have had extraordinary assistance in their attempts to grow two blades of grass where one grew before.
The Campaigns for a "Just Return"
A larger farm income can result from greater yields, of course, but also from reductions in the cost of production. Though farmers received assistance from many quarters in their efforts to grow more grain, they recognized that they would have to help themselves if they were to control their other costs. The result was farm movements such as the Grange, the Patrons of Industry, grain growers' assemblies, cooperative companies and pooling arrangements, and even farmers' political parties. The goal was to improve the marketing and transportation systems through either government or cooperative action and, thus, to win a larger share of the selling price for the farmer.
In the local market, where they met the grain buyer at the elevator or the railway tracks, farmers had expected that competition would provide a just price. When this proved to be a vain hope, because elevator owners colluded to fix daily prices, farmers built their own elevators to regulate the trade. These developed into farmer owned elevator chains the Grain Growers' Grain Company, the Saskatchewan Cooperative Elevator Company and the Alberta Farmers Co-operative Elevator Company. All of these organizations were started according to the principles of the international cooperative movement, though the Grain Growers Grain Company had to eliminate some of its cooperative methods in order to gain admittance to the Winnipeg Grain Exchange.
Farmers soon discovered that cooperatives provided only a small advantage as long as they did not control a large proportion of the wheat sold abroad. The lesson was driven home between 1917 and 1920 when, in the unstable markets of the time, the federal government controlled all wheat exports and returned prices well above pre-war levels to the delight of prairie producers.
Abolition of the government-run board coincided with the collapse of wheat prices, however, so farmers launched another campaign to control the lion's share of Canadian exports and thus to influence the international price. Their chosen weapon, devised in the United States and Australia, was the wheat pool, which required members to sell their grain to a central export organization and to be paid an average yearly price according to the quality of the grain. The pools worked well in the late 1920s but collapsed during the Depression, at which time the federal government again intervened to assist the marketing process. In 1943, the federal marketing agency, the Canadian Wheat Board, became the compulsory agent for all prairie wheat sales, a position which it retains to this day. Later, it became the exclusive agent for other grain crops, including most oats and barley. The result has been that for over thirty-five years the federal government has been responsible for the sale of a large portion of prairie grain production. Farmers are still at the mercy of international grain prices but, because of the Wheat Board, they can usually obtain a good price for the Canadian product.
Freight rates, like the costs of marketing, take a slice of the farmer's income and thus are watched carefully by prairie leaders. As every western school child knows, the focus of this debate is the Crow's Nest Pass freight rate agreement (Holy Crow as its detractors call it), which has set a maximum levy or ceiling on rates for grain shipments almost continuously since 1897. A reasonable deal at the time, the rate was imposed upon the Canadian Pacific Railway in exchange for a large federal subsidy intended to underwrite the construction of a rail line into the coal and mineral fields of the Crow's Nest Pass region in southern Alberta and southeastern British Columbia. Though shipping costs have increased dramatically in the intervening eighty years, the rates permitted on the shipment of grain have not, much to the dismay of some railway officials. Farmers respond, however, that the freight rates are low in order to subsidize farm production costs just as the railways were subsidized by the taxpayer when they were built, and just as the manufacturer is subsidized by the consumer who is forced to buy tariff-protected goods. The debate is endless. But, as with their struggles over local and international grain prices, most farmers defend the freight rate ceiling in order to win what they describe as a just return for their labour.
In addition to using cooperative methods to lower the cost of grain handling, grain growers used them to provide a cheaper, locally controlled alternative to large businesses and banks. The cooperative elevator companies, for example, bought bulk orders of such farm supplies as binder twine and fertilizer and distributed them to members at cost. Cooperative buying clubs, which had similar goals, often developed into full-scale cooperative stores in competition with other supermarkets. The stores in turn developed wholesalers to buy and even manufacture commodities in quantity. In the 1930s grain growers began credit unions to meet their financial needs and these were ultimately organized into the larger credit union centrals of the 1970s. Similarly, the search for alternatives to outside corporations led to the establishment of cooperative insurance companies, oil refineries and a farm implement factory. By means of such innovations, farmers gained some control over many economic activities and ensured that the elusive "just return" for their labour would be possible.
Rural Protest
The cooperative movement was more than just an economic alternative. It is true that on the prairies, as in the international movement, cooperatives were intended to provide democratic control over economic institutions. But they were also bulwarks of rural society. By improving the educational level of their members, cooperatives hoped to enhance the cultural life of the West and to encourage popular participation in important political decisions. Thus, the grain growers cooperative movement encouraged adult education institutes, better local schools, temperance, women's suffrage and political reform. Some within the movement went further and, in their most idealistic moments, dreamed of establishing a cooperative commonwealth.
The farmers' most dramatic impact was in politics. When they started their campaign to win federal regulation of the grain trade, for example, they convinced their members of parliament to speak for them and were successful in achieving the Manitoba Grain Act of 1900 which regulated the sale of grain through local elevator points. But when they tried to lower the tariff or to build a railway to Hudson Bay, actions which would affect powerful business interests in central Canada, they ran into stiff opposition in parliament. Even in the prairie provinces, where politicians listened carefully to farm spokespersons, farmers concluded that they could improve the laws by forming their own government. As a result, farmers' parties were organized across the prairies and across the country between 1919 and 1922 and formed governments in Ontario, Manitoba and Alberta. The farm-based Progressive Party won a quarter of the seats in the House of Commons in 1921. Though these political movements eventually disappeared, farmers were instrumental in the formation of two new parties in the 1930s, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (forerunner of the New Democratic Party) and Social Credit, and have continued to express themselves strongly in political debates ever since. Farmers have long recognized and even exaggerated the importance of government decisions and have consistently tried to make their point of view prevail. When they were not fighting powerful vested interests they usually achieved their aims. However, when they were tackling stronger opponents, as in the case of the Wheat Board (where private grain sellers were opposed) or freight rate regulation (where the rail companies were critical), farmers have had less success.
The Changing Prairie Society
The grain growers interest in economic security was linked to their concern for a happy, productive community life. In the short space of forty years, citizens and government alike were preoccupied with the task of creating towns, businesses and cultural institutions for over a million recent immigrants. In an extraordinary stroke of fate, no sooner was a vast network of villages, schools, churches and other social amenities created than the painful process of dismantling it began. The story of prairie rural society, like that of the rural economy, is one of rapid, even bewildering change.
The most important factor in farm social life in the early years of settlement was the isolation of the family. People lived and worked alone; for days and sometimes weeks on end they saw no outsiders. A homestead, like an island in the sea, could be several miles from the nearest neighbour. The demands of the farm, the rigours of winter and the very rules of a homestead act, which at one time required six months consecutive daily residence on a quarter section in each of three years, enforced a severe regimen upon the settler and his family. But in time, the raw edges of the new life were worn smooth. A comfortable house replaced the shack; fences controlled cows, horses and pigs; the local schoolhouse provided not only education but friends, games and talk for farm children. These networks of rural life, often formed around a schoolhouse or church, developed across the prairies within a decade of first settlement in a district. They supplemented the other centre of agricultural life, the town or village, which was regularly frequented only by those who lived within five or six kilometres.
Town life began as a simple extension of farm life and many residents were simply farmers whose fields were just beyond the last streets. But towns gradually developed a life of their own that was quite different from the world of the family farm and much closer to that of prairie cities. The town existed to serve the farmer, however, so the relationship between the two societies was usually cordial.
Almost every rural town came into existence because it sat along a railway line at an appropriate distance, about ten to twenty kilometres, from the preceding settlement. The gap between them was apparently determined by the convenience and economy of horse-drawn wagon hauls from the surrounding district. The station and elevators situated along the tracks formed a focus for the business centre because Main Street (the chief business thoroughfare) either paralleled the railway or ran at a right angle to it. The business street was usually very wide, as much at twenty-five metres, allegedly to accommodate horse-drawn wagons in wet weather, and was marked by one-storey buildings, often of frame construction, with high square fronts which were intended to give the impression of stability and prosperity. However impermanent and utilitarian the town might appear, it gradually acquired a sense of autonomy and community. Townsfolk participated in clubs and sports with greater regularity, learned the news of the world more quickly and acquired conveniences like telephones and electric appliances sooner than their rural counterparts. Although both were founded upon the production and sale of grain, towns and farms belonged to different worlds.
This gap between town and farm narrowed after 1940 as a result of dramatic changes in farming and in the wider society. The conveniences of town life, electricity, running water and television, are available to many farm dwellers, and where horse travelled distances used to be great, the automobile has brought neighbours and distant towns within easy reach.
Perhaps the most striking change to overtake rural society has been the rapid decrease in the size of its population. Modern machinery has reduced the need for a large farm labour force, and now far fewer workers and farms (which are much larger in total acreage) occupy the plains. While the population of the prairie provinces continues to grow, the proportion living on farms and engaged in agricultural pursuits is in decline. Many prairie towns have experienced depopulation as well, though this does not mean that the country town is doomed. Instead, a few towns will grow and prosper as prairie society adjusts to dramatic changes.
The Grain Trade - A Staple
Prairie grain has occupied the role of a staple in Canadian development. It contributed to the peopling of a vast region and was at least partly responsible for the economic boom in the early twentieth century as well as the economic crisis of the 1930s. Within the region, even today, the fortunes of grain affect the fortunes of everyone. Not only farmers but railway companies, insurance dealers and implement salesmen are affected by the yields and prices of the principal grains and oilseeds. As with other staples, grain production is central not only to the economy but to social organization and political behaviour. The village network and farm protest movements, for example, are a direct result of the dictates of grain production. Not surprisingly, the overwhelming importance of grain has led to worries about too much specialization. Despite scientific advances and large irrigation projects, the region has too often faced hardships when crops were poor or prices low. Indeed, the recent history of the West, which has been dominated by debates over the development of oil, potash, uranium and hydroelectric power, can be seen as a struggle for economic diversification in order that the region might be released from the uncertainty of a one-crop staple economy.
