Precarious foundations: Irrigation, environment, and social change in the Canadian Pacific Railway's Eastern Section, 1900-1930

Journal of Historical Geography

Volumn 32, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 74-95

  Evenden, Matthew ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA   (Canada)

Author keywords

Alberta; Canada; Environmental history; Irrigation; Settlement

Indexed keywords

AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT; IRRIGATION; RAILWAY TRANSPORT; SOCIAL CHANGE; TWENTIETH CENTURY;

CANADA; NORTH AMERICA;

EID: 31144435791     PISSN: 03057488     EISSN: 10958614     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/j.jhg.2005.01.019     Document Type: Article

References (105)

1. W. Beinart, The Rise of Conservation in South Africa: Settlers, Livestock, and the Environment, 1770-1950, Oxford, 2003, 158-194;
2. D. Headrick, The Tentacles of Progress: Technology Transfer in the Age of Imperialism, 1850-1940, New York, 1988
3. J.R. McNeill, Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth Century World, New York, 2000, 118-191;
4. J. Powell, Enterprise and dependency: Water management in Australia, in: T. Griffiths and L. Robin (Eds), Ecology and Empire: Environmental History of Settler Societies, Seattle, 1997, 102-121;
5. I. Tyrrell, True Gardens of the Gods: Californian-Australian Environmental Reform, 1860-1930, Berkeley, 1999;
6. D. Worster, An Unsettled Country: Changing Landscapes of the American West, Albuquerque, 1994.
7. M. Fiege, Irrigation, Encyclopedia of World Environmental History, Vol. 2, New York, 2004, 705-710.
8. N. Hundley, Jr., The Great Thirst: Californians and Their Water, 1770s-1990s, Berkeley, 1992; D. Pisani, To Reclaim a Divided West: Water, Law and Public Policy, 1848-1902, Albuquerque, 1992; D. Pisani, Water and American Government: The Reclamation Bureau, National Water Policy, and the West, 1902-1935, Berkeley, 2002; D. Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Growth and the American West, New York, 1985.
9. Exceptions include: A.A. den Otter Rdapting the environment: ranching, irrigation and dry land farming in Southern Alberta, 1880-1914 Great Plains Quarterly 6 1986
10. D. Worster, Under Western Skies: Nature and History in the American West, New York, 1992.
11. M. Fiege, Irrigated Eden: The Making of an Agricultural Landscape in the American West, Seattle, 1999.
12. I. Tyrrell, True Gardens of the Gods: Californian-Australian Environmental Reform, 1860-1930, Berkeley, 1999; D. Worster, An Unsettled Country: Changing Landscapes of the American West, Albuquerque, 1994.
13. Some suggestive points are raised in D. Worster's, Two Faces West: The development myth in Canada and the United States, in: P. Hirt (Ed.), Terra Pacifica: People and Place in the Northwest States and Western Canada, Pullman, 1998, 71-91.
14. D. Pisani, To Reclaim a Divided West: Water, Law and Public Policy, 1848-1902, Albuquerque, 1992; D. Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Growth and the American West, New York, 1985.
15. D. Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Growth and the American West, New York, 1985.
16. D.H. Breen, The Canadian Prairie West and the Ranching Frontier, 1874-1924, Chapters 1-3, Toronto, 1983; P. Wood, Winding 'in ways most devious': The Calgary Irrigation Company and the Tsuu T'ina Nation, Native Studies Review, in press. I thank Patricia Wood for allowing me to read this interesting piece in advance of publication.
17. P. Wood, Winding 'in ways most devious': The Calgary Irrigation Company and the Tsuu T'ina Nation, Native Studies Review, in press. I thank Patricia Wood for allowing me to read this interesting piece in advance of publication.
18. For a description of the surveys, see J.S. Dennis, Canadian Irrigation Surveys, in the Department of the Interior Annual Report, 1895, in Canadian Sessional Papers (1896); National Archives of Canada (NAC), RG 89, Vol. 52, File 29(1), J.S. Dennis, Chief Inspector of Surveys Memorandum, 'The Bow River Irrigation Canal' to Surveyor General, Department of the Interior, March 27, 1896
19. J.A. Eagle, The Canadian Pacific Railway and the Development of the West, 1896-1914, Kingston and Montreal, 1989, 196
20. On the Northwest Irrigation Act (1894) and its connections to international precedents, see C.S. Burchill The origins of Canadian irrigation law Canadian Historical Review 29 1948 353-362
21. D.R. Percy, Water law in the Canadian west: Influences from the Western States, in: J. McLaren, H. Foster and C. Orloff (Eds), Law for the Elephant, Law for the Beaver: Essays in the Legal History of the North American West, Regina, 1992, 274-291.
22. A. Mitchner, The Bow River scheme: The CPR's irrigation block, in: H.A. Dempsey (Ed.), The CPR West: The Iron Road and the Making of the Nation, Vancouver, 1984, 259-262;
23. for a study of a neighbouring irrigation project started somewhat later than the CPR projects, see J. Gilpin, Prairie Promises: History of the Bow River Irrigation District, Vauxhall, 1996.
24. Biggest irrigation plant in America New York Times October 1, 1911
25. A. Mitchner, The Bow River scheme: The CPR's irrigation block, in: H.A. Dempsey (Ed.), The CPR West: The Iron Road and the Making of the Nation, Vancouver, 1984, 264.
26. Glenbow Archives (hereafter GA), M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 12.
27. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1921, 67.
28. On land promotion and sales, see the still valuable J.B. Hedges, Building the Canadian West: The Land and Colonization Policies of the Canadian Pacific Railway, New York, 1939, 294-319.
29. Glenbow Library, CPR Pamphlets, undated, but c. 1910. Public opinion concerning the Bow River valley of Southern Alberta; starting a farm in the Bow River valley, Southern Alberta Canada; animal husbandry in the Kingdom of Alfalfa Bow River Southern Alberta; back to the land the famous Bow River valley Southern Alberta Canada.
30. Glenbow Library, CPR Pamphlets, undated, but c. 1910. Facts concerning the Bow River Valley; The staff of life: A story of winter wheat production in Southern Alberta.
31. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1915, 4.
32. A. Mitchner, The Bow River scheme: The CPR's irrigation block, in: H.A. Dempsey (Ed.), The CPR West: The Iron Road and the Making of the Nation, Vancouver, 1984, 267.
33. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 4, CPR Eastern Section Annual Report, 1935, 15. see also Fig. 9.
34. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1919, 5.
35. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1919, 5.
36. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1919, 6.
37. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1928, 2; Annual Report, 1929, 3.
38. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1917, 34; and Annual Report, 1918, 56.
39. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1915, 15.
40. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1916, 1.
41. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1916, 1.
42. On the CPR's horticulture program, see: R. Rees, New and Naked Land: Making the Prairies Home, Saskatoon, 1988, 118-120.
43. University of Alberta Archives (hereafter UAA), William Pearce Papers, Accession 74-169, M 9721, File 2, Burgess to Pearce, 3 November 1894. In this letter Burgess raises concerns, re: Malaria and rheumatism.
44. UAA, William Pearce Papers, Accession 74-169, M 9721, File 2, Pearce to AM Burgess, Deputy Minister of the Interior, 19 April 1893 (copy). Pearce responds to claims from a Mr. Klotz to Burgess that alkali could prove to be a problem.
45. Pearce's role in early irrigation promotion is covered in detail by E.A. Mitchner, William Pearce and federal government activity in Western Canada, 1882-1904, PhD thesis, University of Alberta, 1971; E.A. Mitchner, The development of Western waters, unpublished MS, University of Alberta, 1973, 77-106 [available at the Glenbow Library, Calgary].
46. UAA, William Pearce Papers, Accession 74-169, M 9274, File 1, Draft of Paper read to the American Society of Irrigation Engineers, 1895-6 by John Titcomb on behalf of William Pearce, Irrigation in Alberta, Canada.
47. UAA, William Pearce Papers, Accession 74-169, M 9721, File 2, Pearce to AM Burgess, Deputy Minister of the Interior, 19 April 1893 (copy).
48. UAA, William Pearce Papers, Accession 74-169, M 9721, File 2, Pearce to Burgess, 17 November 1894.
49. UAA, William Pearce Papers, Accession 74-169, M 9721, File 2, Pearce to AM Burgess, Deputy Minister of the Interior, 19 April 1893 (copy).
50. GA, M2260, CPR Land Settlement and Development Papers, Box 10, File 18, P.L. Naismith to Mr. Walker, 18 January 1918.
51. Quoted in D. Finch, Much Brain and Sinew: The Brooks Aqueduct Story, Brooks, 1993, 29. No date for the Yeats interview is listed.
52. http://www.bowriver.org/index.html and http://www.tucanada.org/alberta/ fishrescue.htm. The source is admittedly partisan.
53. Prairie Lake provides living for 43 fishermen near Brooks Calgary Herald 15 February 1938
54. Fishermen to wind up years' operations Brooks Bulletin 23 March 1939
55. T.E. Randall Birds of the Eastern Irrigation District The Canadian Field Naturalist 1946 124-131 The current check list of birds on offer from the Eastern Irrigation District list 237 different species
56. On the loss of bird habitat in the prairies and the use of agricultural landscapes by birds, seM: R.M. Wilson, Seeking refuge: making space for migratory waterfowl and wetlands along the Pacific flyway, PhD thesis, Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, 2003.
57. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1919, 98.
58. Irrigation water taken up by weeds: Heavy losses thus incurred by farmers on ditch Calgary Herald 2 15 September 1934
59. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1919, 104.
60. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1917, 12.
61. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 1, Annual Report, 1917, 13.
62. These processes are described in a special section of a report devoted to scour and siltation problems: GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1920, 229-231.
63. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1919, 97.
64. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1920, 119.
65. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1922, 115.
66. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 2, Annual Report, 1921, 81.
67. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1926, 159-160.
68. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 153-154.
69. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 153-154.
70. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1925, 170.
71. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 24.
72. For a brisk analysis, see the still useful W.A. Mackintosh, Economic Problems of the Prairie Provinces, especially Chapters 2 and 3, Toronto, 1935.
73. GA, M6193, Ernest Corbett Papers, Corbett report on soil drifting, 24 August 1931.
74. For an analysis of adjustment difficulties in a comparable case, see: B.Q. Cannon 'Quite a wrestling match': The adaptation of dry land farmers to irrigation Agricultural History 66 1992 120-136
75. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 18.
76. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 18.
77. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 19.
78. D.C. Jones, Empire of Dust: Settling and Abandoning the Prairie Dry Belt, Edmonton, 1987.
79. In 1931 it was estimated that the ratio of debt to farm values in Census Division 3 of Alberta (containing the Eastern Section as well as some acres of dry land farming) was 68.52:100. This compared with a provincial average of 38.75:100. Census of Canada, 1931, Vol. 8, Table 23, Mortgage Indebtedness, 1931, and Farm Expenses, 1930, by Census Division, 678. In the mid-1930s, agricultural economist Charles Burchill wrote of the dire circumstances in the Eastern Section: "The 780 land contracts still in existence in 1934 had an average age of fourteen years and represented an original cost of $4,423,800. But the present debts on these same contracts now totalled $5,164,240. Fewer than one-fifth of the farmers owed less than they had originally agreed to pay. The average man had wasted fourteen years of labor"
80. Burchill Alberta's great experiment in community co-operation: History of the Eastern Irrigation District Western Farm Leader 3 June 1938 3-4
81. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1925, 19.
82. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 4, Annual Report, 1926, 158.
83. On the conflicts in the Western Section, see: A. Mitchner, The Bow River scheme: The CPR's irrigation block, in: H.A. Dempsey (Ed.), The CPR West: The Iron Road and the Making of the Nation, Vancouver, 1984, 264-265. The correspondence of federal officials who intervened in this case may be found in NAC, RG 89, Vol. 56, File 29A.
84. R. Gross and L. Kramer, Tapping the Bow, Brooks, 1985, 160.
85. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 4, Annual Report, 1928, 178.
86. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1924, 27.
87. GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 4, Annual Report, 1928, 2.
88. For a discussion of Trego's role as an agitator and organizer, see: D.C. Jones, Feasting on Misfortune: Journeys of the Human Spirit in Alberta's Past, Edmonton, 1998, 81-102.
89. GA, M6959, Carl Anderson Papers, Box 6, File 61 contain minutes of the UFA local #904, Scandia, 1920-1928.
90. The Bolivia threat was more than rhetoric. A settlement company provided advice to prospective settlers, and Trego promoted the venture. See Jones, Feasting on Misfortune, 95-101.
91. GA, M6959, Carl Anderson Papers, Box 6, File 61 contain minutes of the UFA local #904, Scandia, 1920-1928.
92. Irrigation officials noted a shift towards sheep production in the section as early as 1923: GA, M6388, Eastern Irrigation District Papers, Box 3, Annual Report, 1923, 67.
93. GA, M6959, Carl Anderson Papers, Box 5, File 54, Notes, nd.
94. GA, M6959, Carl Anderson Papers, Box 5, File 54, Notes, nd.
95. A. Mitchner, The Bow River scheme: The CPR's irrigation block, in: H.A. Dempsey (Ed.), The CPR West: The Iron Road and the Making of the Nation, Vancouver, 1984, 271.
96. The events and terms of the transfer may be traced in R. Gross and L. Kramer, Tapping the Bow, Brooks, 1985.
97. I. Tyrrell, True Gardens of the Gods: Californian-Australian Environmental Reform, 1860-1930, Berkeley, 1999, 141-153.
98. D. Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Growth and the American West, New York, 1985, 129-188.
99. The problem would not abate. J.R. McNeill suggests 'By 1980 salinization corroded agriculture on about a quarter of the irrigated land in India, Pakistan, the United States, and Egypt. In the 1990s, salinization seriously affected about 10 percent of the world's irrigated lands.' Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth Century World, New York, 2000, 181.
100. M. Fiege, Irrigated Eden: The Making of an Agricultural Landscape in the American West, Seattle, 1999.
101. Tyrrell, True Gardens of the Gods: Californian-Australian Environmental Reform, 1860-1930, Berkeley, 1999; M. Fiege, Irrigated Eden: The Making of an Agricultural Landscape in the American West, Seattle, 1999.
102. D. Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Growth and the American West, New York, 1985;
103. D. Worster, An Unsettled Country: Changing Landscapes of the American West, Albuquerque, 1994.
104. W.D. Swearingen, Moroccan Mirages: Agrarian Dreams and Deceptions, 1912-1986, Princeton, 1987, 59-77.
105. J. Powell, Enterprise and dependency: Water management in Australia, in: T. Griffiths and L. Robin (Eds), Ecology and Empire: Environmental History of Settler Societies, Seattle, 1997, 102-121.