Prairie society is characterized by movement. After Canada annexed the land in 1870, the West was a world of the uprooted as immigrants came from around the globe to better their circumstances in a new land. Many of these novice homesteaders spent only a few years in farming, some because of climatic or soil problems, others because they simply did not like farm life or had never intended to do more than raise a stake for another career. Even for those who prospered on a family farm, the pull of the town, which by the 1920s might be only a brief automobile ride from the fields, often led to the establishment of a permanent house within the town limits. From the earliest days there was never enough room or promise on the farm for all the children of the pioneer generation and, as the demand for farm labour decreased, more young folk headed to the big cities of the "East" (Winnipeg and Toronto) or the "West" (Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver). The establishment of huge farming operations left abandoned farms in its wake, farms like the one in this photograph taken near Scotfield, Alberta in 1928. This is not to suggest that the land was uncultivated but rather that three or four farms of average size in 1900 would make a comfortable economic unit in 1960. A similar process affected the small towns. As the economy and social services were centralized, the towns' reasons for existing were taken away.
