1
00:00:02,535 --> 00:00:04,471
(man) It's hard to believe

2
00:00:04,471 --> 00:00:07,007
that when the Selkirk Settlers

3
00:00:07,007 --> 00:00:10,643
arrived in Manitoba 
200 years ago,

4
00:00:10,643 --> 00:00:15,148
and they were told you can't 
farm in Western Canada.

5
00:00:15,148 --> 00:00:19,219
This is a land of ice and snow, 
it's fur country,

6
00:00:19,219 --> 00:00:21,955
and you can't farm here, 
it's not possible.

7
00:00:21,955 --> 00:00:24,457
[drums & melodica play]

8
00:00:24,457 --> 00:00:33,266
♪ 
♪

9
00:00:33,266 --> 00:01:09,936
[drums, guitar, & melodica 
play in bright rhythm]

10
00:01:09,936 --> 00:01:30,890
[woman voices the credits]

11
00:01:30,890 --> 00:01:38,264
And the members of...

12
00:01:38,264 --> 00:01:41,034
(male narrator) 
Manitoba is a spacious land,

13
00:01:41,034 --> 00:01:43,736
the easternmost 
of the prairie provinces

14
00:01:43,736 --> 00:01:46,673
located in the heart of Canada

15
00:01:46,673 --> 00:01:49,242
and the giant Hudson Bay 
Watershed.

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00:01:49,242 --> 00:01:52,679
Once known as Rupert's Land, 
it was called

17
00:01:52,679 --> 00:01:56,015
the Postage Stamp Province, 
believed to be

18
00:01:56,015 --> 00:02:00,086
unsuitable for agriculture and 
only valuable for the fur trade.

19
00:02:00,086 --> 00:02:05,024
Who could imagine what 
this province would become?

20
00:02:05,024 --> 00:02:10,296
[soft lapping of the waves 
against the shore]

21
00:02:10,296 --> 00:02:13,700
(James Hunter; Scottish accent) 
The Highlands of Scotland

22
00:02:13,700 --> 00:02:16,536
well into the 18th century 
were a tribal society.

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00:02:16,536 --> 00:02:19,806
We had clans as everyone knows, 
and clans of chiefs

24
00:02:19,806 --> 00:02:22,575
and the whole setup wasn't 
dissimilar

25
00:02:22,575 --> 00:02:27,447
to that of Native American 
society in North America.

26
00:02:27,447 --> 00:02:29,816
As the Industrial Revolution 
in Britain got underway

27
00:02:29,816 --> 00:02:32,352
and there was 
a huge demand for wool,

28
00:02:32,352 --> 00:02:34,487
their big product became sheep.

29
00:02:34,487 --> 00:02:37,090
To introduce sheep farming on a 
large scale into the Highlands

30
00:02:37,090 --> 00:02:39,025
necessitated getting rid of

31
00:02:39,025 --> 00:02:41,427
a lot of the people 
who were already there.

32
00:02:41,427 --> 00:02:43,263
Hence the Highland Clearances.

33
00:02:43,263 --> 00:02:45,632
So there were mass evictions 
right across

34
00:02:45,632 --> 00:02:48,334
the entire northern part 
of Scotland.

35
00:02:48,334 --> 00:02:51,604
(Jacquie Aitken; 
Scottish accent) Within 
the space of about 8 years,

36
00:02:51,604 --> 00:02:55,175
nearly every strath in the 
County of Sutherland

37
00:02:55,175 --> 00:03:00,780
had lost 95% of its 
indigenous population.

38
00:03:00,780 --> 00:03:03,917
They'd either moved to the coast

39
00:03:03,917 --> 00:03:07,587
to take up 
the small lots of land,

40
00:03:07,587 --> 00:03:10,990
they may have entered 
some of the industries,

41
00:03:10,990 --> 00:03:13,726
like the fishing industries 
at Helmsdale,

42
00:03:13,726 --> 00:03:18,731
they also might have decided 
to go to the factories

43
00:03:18,731 --> 00:03:23,436
in places like Glasgow to work 
in the cotton industry.

44
00:03:23,436 --> 00:03:26,139
These people, some of them 
were relocated

45
00:03:26,139 --> 00:03:28,641
onto the coast of Sutherland 
itself,

46
00:03:28,641 --> 00:03:30,643
others moved to other parts 
of Britain, but

47
00:03:30,643 --> 00:03:32,445
increasingly were these people

48
00:03:32,445 --> 00:03:34,180
and Highlanders more generally

49
00:03:34,180 --> 00:03:36,282
were emigrating 
to North America.

50
00:03:36,282 --> 00:03:38,585
(Jacquie Aitken) They would have 
heard these stories

51
00:03:38,585 --> 00:03:41,354
about the new lands in North 
America,

52
00:03:41,354 --> 00:03:44,724
land that you could have, 
and it could be yours

53
00:03:44,724 --> 00:03:48,027
and yours alone, and it was 
free, and it was free to use--

54
00:03:48,027 --> 00:03:50,964
if you worked hard, nobody 
would take it away from you.

55
00:03:50,964 --> 00:03:55,368
And this was something that 
must have been very enticing.

56
00:03:55,368 --> 00:03:57,737
I don't think Lord Selkirk 
probably knew

57
00:03:57,737 --> 00:04:00,139
who would take up his offer.

58
00:04:00,139 --> 00:04:03,176
It didn't take long 
and Lord Selkirk heard

59
00:04:03,176 --> 00:04:08,448
that nearly 500 people 
in Kildonan had signed up.

60
00:04:08,448 --> 00:04:12,919
(male narrator) 
Thomas Douglas was born 
on St. Mary's Isle

61
00:04:12,919 --> 00:04:16,422
in Kircudbright, Scotland, 
the youngest boy of 13 children.

62
00:04:16,422 --> 00:04:18,591
Thomas, 5th Earl of Selkirk,

63
00:04:18,591 --> 00:04:20,927
was an idealist and a 
philanthropist,

64
00:04:20,927 --> 00:04:24,130
and he inherited vast sums 
of money

65
00:04:24,130 --> 00:04:27,000
because all of his brothers 
died young

66
00:04:27,000 --> 00:04:30,503
and as a result, 
he had a very large fortune.

67
00:04:30,503 --> 00:04:33,406
And he used 
that fortune to charter ships

68
00:04:33,406 --> 00:04:35,408
to take struggling Highlanders 
from Sutherland

69
00:04:35,408 --> 00:04:37,410
and other parts 
of the Highlands lands

70
00:04:37,410 --> 00:04:39,479
to Red River Settlement,

71
00:04:39,479 --> 00:04:42,682
which turned out to be 
the beginning of Winnipeg.

72
00:04:42,682 --> 00:04:45,385
(Dr. Gordon Goldsborough) 
I don't think you can live 
in Manitoba your whole life

73
00:04:45,385 --> 00:04:47,153
without knowing a little bit 
about Selkirk.

74
00:04:47,153 --> 00:04:50,823
I think the thing I admired 
most is that

75
00:04:50,823 --> 00:04:54,294
he had very strong principles 
about correcting wrongs,

76
00:04:54,294 --> 00:04:58,331
and I think he looked at the 
Scottish Highland Clearances

77
00:04:58,331 --> 00:05:02,702
as a fundamental wrong.

78
00:05:02,702 --> 00:05:05,872
He realized that he could do 
things now,

79
00:05:05,872 --> 00:05:08,708
he had money in his hands,

80
00:05:08,708 --> 00:05:12,145
and he had the knowledge and the 
imagination to do something.

81
00:05:12,145 --> 00:05:14,247
Almost at once he became 
interested

82
00:05:14,247 --> 00:05:16,582
in some kind of immigration 
scheme

83
00:05:16,582 --> 00:05:19,118
that would take Highlanders 
to North America.

84
00:05:19,118 --> 00:05:23,489
Well, he was a wealthy man; 
he had a very big stake

85
00:05:23,489 --> 00:05:27,527
in the Hudson's Bay Company 
and he was able to obtain

86
00:05:27,527 --> 00:05:31,964
an extremely large area of land 
that was going to be used

87
00:05:31,964 --> 00:05:34,801
for settlement and farming, 
and, of course,

88
00:05:34,801 --> 00:05:38,571
the future expansion of farming 
would arise from it.

89
00:05:38,571 --> 00:05:42,208
[fiddle plays 
in folk-dance rhythm]

90
00:05:42,208 --> 00:05:45,411
(Jacquie Aitken) He was looking 
for some hardy,

91
00:05:45,411 --> 00:05:48,681
sturdy men to go and set up

92
00:05:48,681 --> 00:05:52,552
this new farming settlement 
in the middle of the prairies

93
00:05:52,552 --> 00:05:56,689
in Manitoba at a place called 
Red River, and this was

94
00:05:56,689 --> 00:05:59,225
the first agricultural 
settlement that was

95
00:05:59,225 --> 00:06:03,129
associated with the Hudson's Bay 
Fur Trading Company,

96
00:06:03,129 --> 00:06:06,332
and it was quite an important 
part of the story,

97
00:06:06,332 --> 00:06:09,168
and this was really the 
initiative of Lord Selkirk.

98
00:06:09,168 --> 00:06:12,238
(Dr. Jack Bumsted) 
A number of fur traders 
had told him

99
00:06:12,238 --> 00:06:14,974
about the promise of this area, 
and of course,

100
00:06:14,974 --> 00:06:17,910
one of the things that impressed 
them all was the dirt.

101
00:06:17,910 --> 00:06:21,881
The dirt is black, everybody 
realized,

102
00:06:21,881 --> 00:06:24,350
this ain't like Scotland. Right?

103
00:06:24,350 --> 00:06:28,221
where the dirt is gray 
and sandy-colored.

104
00:06:28,221 --> 00:06:31,691
This is good agricultural stuff.

105
00:06:31,691 --> 00:06:35,928
(Dr. Harry Duckworth) 
It's clear that the company was 
onboard, because they sold him,

106
00:06:35,928 --> 00:06:39,599
for 10 shillings, 116,000 
square miles of land.

107
00:06:39,599 --> 00:06:43,169
Much of it, as we know, 
was magnificent land.

108
00:06:43,169 --> 00:06:45,438
It included Southern Manitoba,

109
00:06:45,438 --> 00:06:48,975
reached into parts of 
North Dakota and South Dakota,

110
00:06:48,975 --> 00:06:51,277
reached into Northwest Ontario, 
also into Saskatchewan.

111
00:06:51,277 --> 00:06:53,880
But the center of it was 
the place

112
00:06:53,880 --> 00:06:56,215
where the Red and the 
Assiniboine River come together,

113
00:06:56,215 --> 00:06:58,751
what we refer to as The Forks 
in Winnipeg.

114
00:06:58,751 --> 00:07:00,620
(narrator) 
Glacial Lake Agassiz retreated,

115
00:07:00,620 --> 00:07:03,523
leaving fertile soils 
in the Red River Valley.

116
00:07:03,523 --> 00:07:05,091
(Allan Ashworth) Lake Agassiz 
formed then

117
00:07:05,091 --> 00:07:07,160
when glaciers which had occupied

118
00:07:07,160 --> 00:07:10,096
all of Canada and the northern 
tier of the United States,

119
00:07:10,096 --> 00:07:13,399
as they start to melt at the end 
of the last Ice Age,

120
00:07:13,399 --> 00:07:15,902
and huge amounts of meltwater 
are being formed

121
00:07:15,902 --> 00:07:18,571
as the glaciers melt back into 
Canada, that meltwater

122
00:07:18,571 --> 00:07:21,107
then becomes trapped by higher 
land to the south

123
00:07:21,107 --> 00:07:23,242
and it starts 
to form Lake Agassiz.

124
00:07:23,242 --> 00:07:26,212
And then as that ice 
continues to melt,

125
00:07:26,212 --> 00:07:28,681
the lake just continues 
to grow northward.

126
00:07:28,681 --> 00:07:32,452
Lake Agassiz then existed 
from about 13,000 years ago

127
00:07:32,452 --> 00:07:35,221
to about 8-1/2-thousand 
years ago.

128
00:07:35,221 --> 00:07:37,590
The reason the lake is 
important then,

129
00:07:37,590 --> 00:07:40,626
these flat surfaces 
that we have in this area,

130
00:07:40,626 --> 00:07:43,896
as the melting at the northern 
end, they were supplying

131
00:07:43,896 --> 00:07:47,166
huge amounts of sediment 
from the glaciers into the lake.

132
00:07:47,166 --> 00:07:50,203
They convert then to clays 
and so you get

133
00:07:50,203 --> 00:07:53,706
a very high preponderance 
of clays and silts in the soils.

134
00:07:53,706 --> 00:07:56,742
So that with the freshly-ground 
mineral matter that's in there,

135
00:07:56,742 --> 00:07:59,812
the potassium and all the other 
elements that are represented

136
00:07:59,812 --> 00:08:02,615
in those crushed-up soils, that 
leads to generally good soils

137
00:08:02,615 --> 00:08:05,985
and soil development 
for good agriculture.

138
00:08:05,985 --> 00:08:08,688
(narrator) 
Native people are 
thought to have

139
00:08:08,688 --> 00:08:12,258
entered the area of Manitoba 
about 6,000 years ago,

140
00:08:12,258 --> 00:08:14,760
moving north 
from the southern plains.

141
00:08:14,760 --> 00:08:18,164
As nomadic people, they traveled 
to their food supply,

142
00:08:18,164 --> 00:08:20,466
primarily the bison herds.

143
00:08:20,466 --> 00:08:24,237
Over time, they found convenient 
places to settle for a while.

144
00:08:24,237 --> 00:08:27,306
One of those places 
was at The Forks

145
00:08:27,306 --> 00:08:29,675
of the Red 
and the Assiniboine Rivers,

146
00:08:29,675 --> 00:08:32,011
which became a well-known 
gathering place.

147
00:08:32,011 --> 00:08:35,114
A little north of The Forks, 
indigenous people

148
00:08:35,114 --> 00:08:38,184
began to plant crops 
like corn and potatoes.

149
00:08:38,184 --> 00:08:41,254
Here the soil 
was rich and well-drained.

150
00:08:41,254 --> 00:08:45,057
(Clarence Nepinak) They would be 
eating a lot of vegetables,

151
00:08:45,057 --> 00:08:48,361
like plant foods, depending on 
the season, you know,

152
00:08:48,361 --> 00:08:51,330
and as each season changed 
sort of thing,

153
00:08:51,330 --> 00:08:54,267
there were different animals 
that they were able to harvest

154
00:08:54,267 --> 00:08:56,836
because they weren't always 
living in the same location.

155
00:08:56,836 --> 00:09:00,506
Well, the type of food that was 
eaten at that time

156
00:09:00,506 --> 00:09:02,808
was food that was plentiful.

157
00:09:02,808 --> 00:09:05,578
They'd go and do community hunts 
and then they would

158
00:09:05,578 --> 00:09:07,980
share all the meat 
that they brought back.

159
00:09:07,980 --> 00:09:10,616
But there was also berries 
that we also picked.

160
00:09:10,616 --> 00:09:12,552
With more Europeans coming,

161
00:09:12,552 --> 00:09:15,221
they had different foods 
and then, of course,

162
00:09:15,221 --> 00:09:17,957
the indigenous people 
had their foods as well.

163
00:09:17,957 --> 00:09:21,894
So there was this whole aspect 
of trading and sharing.

164
00:09:21,894 --> 00:09:25,831
(narrator) 
In 1812, the first party 
of settlers arrived

165
00:09:25,831 --> 00:09:30,269
and met unlivable conditions; 
no food, no shelter.

166
00:09:30,269 --> 00:09:32,772
(Lord Selkirk) 
It was many hundreds,

167
00:09:32,772 --> 00:09:35,775
and they came over by ship 
to Hudson's Bay

168
00:09:35,775 --> 00:09:38,210
and many of them 
landed at Churchill,

169
00:09:38,210 --> 00:09:40,746
then made their way 
down to the south

170
00:09:40,746 --> 00:09:42,949
and eventually arrived 
at Red River.

171
00:09:42,949 --> 00:09:45,184
And what they hadn't 
bargained for

172
00:09:45,184 --> 00:09:48,387
was the 5 months of ice 
and snow.

173
00:09:48,387 --> 00:09:52,058
And the friendship he formed 
with Chief Peguis

174
00:09:52,058 --> 00:09:55,461
of the First Nation Saulteaux 
meant that Chief Peguis

175
00:09:55,461 --> 00:09:58,564
would in fact protect them 
and the settlement.

176
00:09:58,564 --> 00:10:01,033
Peguis took them under his wing, 
so to speak.

177
00:10:01,033 --> 00:10:04,203
I think he did a lot 
to help them survive

178
00:10:04,203 --> 00:10:07,406
the first few months and years, 
at a time when they weren't

179
00:10:07,406 --> 00:10:09,742
really adapted to this and 
weren't fully prepared

180
00:10:09,742 --> 00:10:12,445
for the kind of weather they 
encountered, the kind of

181
00:10:12,445 --> 00:10:15,314
activities that they could 
engage in, the fact that we had

182
00:10:15,314 --> 00:10:17,850
a much longer winter than they 
would have had in Scotland.

183
00:10:17,850 --> 00:10:19,919
He basically helped them 
get established.

184
00:10:19,919 --> 00:10:25,758
Peguis was a hereditary chief, 
and he,

185
00:10:25,758 --> 00:10:28,094
he was very influential 
with the Europeans

186
00:10:28,094 --> 00:10:31,163
that were around The Forks 
here in the area of Winnipeg.

187
00:10:31,163 --> 00:10:32,932
(Dr. Gordon Goldsborough) 
People often think

188
00:10:32,932 --> 00:10:35,534
he had been here his whole life, 
but he wasn't.

189
00:10:35,534 --> 00:10:38,170
He had come here from the area 
of Southern Ontario

190
00:10:38,170 --> 00:10:41,007
that we now say is around 
Sault Ste. Marie, so in fact,

191
00:10:41,007 --> 00:10:43,342
I think maybe he had 
some affectional affinity

192
00:10:43,342 --> 00:10:45,645
for these people because, 
like him, they were newcomers,

193
00:10:45,645 --> 00:10:48,314
and now that he had become 
adapted to this area,

194
00:10:48,314 --> 00:10:51,050
he maybe felt some kind of 
kinship with them

195
00:10:51,050 --> 00:10:59,191
and that he had an obligation to 
help them get settled in too.

196
00:10:59,191 --> 00:11:02,795
(Blair Rutter) 
That's what I find so incredible 
about the Selkirk Settler story

197
00:11:02,795 --> 00:11:06,065
is that they persevered, 
and I think a lot of it

198
00:11:06,065 --> 00:11:09,035
had to do with owning 
a piece of land.

199
00:11:09,035 --> 00:11:12,738
Because they were driven off 
the land in Scotland--

200
00:11:12,738 --> 00:11:15,408
they were always tenants there.

201
00:11:15,408 --> 00:11:18,511
When they came to Canada, they 
were granted a piece of land,

202
00:11:18,511 --> 00:11:20,946
they knew that if they could 
stick with it,

203
00:11:20,946 --> 00:11:23,749
that this was going 
to be theirs,

204
00:11:23,749 --> 00:11:27,219
and no lord or no one else 
could evict you.

205
00:11:27,219 --> 00:11:30,289
The ownership of land and the 
respect for property,

206
00:11:30,289 --> 00:11:32,258
that was something that was

207
00:11:32,258 --> 00:11:34,393
really important 
to the Selkirk Settlers

208
00:11:34,393 --> 00:11:37,063
and why they were so determined 
to persevere

209
00:11:37,063 --> 00:11:40,900
in the face 
of all these hardships.

210
00:11:40,900 --> 00:11:43,436
(Phyllis Fraser) My ancestors 
arrived

211
00:11:43,436 --> 00:11:47,073
with the Lord Selkirk Settlers. 
The first one to arrive here

212
00:11:47,073 --> 00:11:49,275
was my great, great, great 
grandmother,

213
00:11:49,275 --> 00:11:53,079
and she arrived in late October 
in 1812,

214
00:11:53,079 --> 00:11:55,381
and her name was Catherine 
McGilvera,

215
00:11:55,381 --> 00:11:58,050
and she'd recently been married 
to Hector MacLean.

216
00:11:58,050 --> 00:12:00,920
They arrived, it was 
a very, very rough time;

217
00:12:00,920 --> 00:12:04,256
that first winter the settlers 
had to go down to Fort Daer,

218
00:12:04,256 --> 00:12:06,292
which is now Pembina, 
North Dakota,to winter

219
00:12:06,292 --> 00:12:08,260
because there was no food,

220
00:12:08,260 --> 00:12:10,763
there were no provisions 
made for them here.

221
00:12:10,763 --> 00:12:13,866
And they survived the winter, 
but Hector died the next spring.

222
00:12:13,866 --> 00:12:17,937
So here was Catherine, 20 years 
old, a widow with a baby, and

223
00:12:17,937 --> 00:12:20,773
she remained in the settlement 
and several years later

224
00:12:20,773 --> 00:12:24,176
she met a fur trader by the name 
of John Pritchard.

225
00:12:24,176 --> 00:12:26,579
And John Pritchard had been 
a fur trader

226
00:12:26,579 --> 00:12:28,848
with the North West Company, 
and he wanted

227
00:12:28,848 --> 00:12:31,317
to become a settler, 
he wanted to be

228
00:12:31,317 --> 00:12:33,119
affiliated with 
the Hudson's Bay Company.

229
00:12:33,119 --> 00:12:37,590
After a 24-hour courtship, 
they were married!

230
00:12:37,590 --> 00:12:41,527
They settled in Red River 
and had 10 children,

231
00:12:41,527 --> 00:12:45,064
and their daughter married 
a settler

232
00:12:45,064 --> 00:12:49,969
who came with the 1815 group, 
and that was John Matheson.

233
00:12:49,969 --> 00:12:57,877
So he and Catherine are my 
great, great grandparents.

234
00:12:57,877 --> 00:13:00,746
(narrator) 
Miles Macdonell 
had been sent to Red River

235
00:13:00,746 --> 00:13:03,682
as the advance man 
to establish housing

236
00:13:03,682 --> 00:13:07,820
and to source food 
for the expected settlers.

237
00:13:07,820 --> 00:13:09,789
I've never quite understood

238
00:13:09,789 --> 00:13:12,358
why Miles Macdonell has the 
reputation he has.

239
00:13:12,358 --> 00:13:15,261
When he brought the settlers 
here, they didn't really

240
00:13:15,261 --> 00:13:18,230
respect him at all, and he made 
somewhat dubious decisions,

241
00:13:18,230 --> 00:13:21,133
he was the one that issued 
the Pemmican Proclamation

242
00:13:21,133 --> 00:13:24,036
that said you couldn't take 
pemmican out of the settlement.

243
00:13:24,036 --> 00:13:27,139
The main part of the North West 
Company's trade

244
00:13:27,139 --> 00:13:30,376
was much further north than west 
and their concern

245
00:13:30,376 --> 00:13:34,280
was to feed canoe brigades, 
which had to go a very long way

246
00:13:34,280 --> 00:13:36,849
into the Northwest and come out 
again with the furs.

247
00:13:36,849 --> 00:13:39,819
And to do that they used 
pemmican.

248
00:13:39,819 --> 00:13:42,421
It was basically a very 
high-calorie, high-protein food,

249
00:13:42,421 --> 00:13:44,890
which was ideal 
for fur brigades.

250
00:13:44,890 --> 00:13:48,761
I call it the fuel on which 
the fur brigades ran.

251
00:13:48,761 --> 00:13:53,432
Pemmican Proclamation was 
designed to prevent provisions

252
00:13:53,432 --> 00:13:56,569
from leaving the settlement.

253
00:13:56,569 --> 00:13:58,604
And goodness knows, 
the settlement needed

254
00:13:58,604 --> 00:14:01,273
all the provisions it could get.

255
00:14:01,273 --> 00:14:05,177
But the trouble was that it 
probably exceeded his authority,

256
00:14:05,177 --> 00:14:09,682
moreover, 
it brought the wrath of the 
North West Company on his head.

257
00:14:09,682 --> 00:14:13,219
What he was basically telling 
the North West Company was

258
00:14:13,219 --> 00:14:16,222
you will have to shut down 
your pemmican operations.

259
00:14:16,222 --> 00:14:19,425
Well, they weren't 
going to do that,

260
00:14:19,425 --> 00:14:22,528
and so they began harassing 
the colony.

261
00:14:22,528 --> 00:14:24,163
(Phyllis Fraser) 
The hardships were huge;

262
00:14:24,163 --> 00:14:26,265
they had huge challenges.

263
00:14:26,265 --> 00:14:30,135
They were caught in the middle 
of a fur trade rivalry

264
00:14:30,135 --> 00:14:33,038
between the Hudson's Bay Company 
and the North West Company

265
00:14:33,038 --> 00:14:35,641
and the North West Company 
wanted them gone,

266
00:14:35,641 --> 00:14:38,177
and they encouraged them 
in various ways to leave.

267
00:14:38,177 --> 00:14:40,779
Also, there was no food 
for them,

268
00:14:40,779 --> 00:14:43,349
and without the support 
of Chief Peguis

269
00:14:43,349 --> 00:14:45,851
and his people and 
the Métis buffalo hunters,

270
00:14:45,851 --> 00:14:49,488
they would have starved.

271
00:14:49,488 --> 00:14:51,924
(narrator) 
There was considerable tension 
between the North West Company

272
00:14:51,924 --> 00:14:54,460
and the settlers 
brought to the area

273
00:14:54,460 --> 00:14:56,662
by the Hudson's Bay Company.

274
00:14:56,662 --> 00:15:00,799
The main economic activity in 
the area had been the fur trade.

275
00:15:00,799 --> 00:15:04,603
As the Hudson's Bay Company 
and the North West Company

276
00:15:04,603 --> 00:15:08,207
competed for furs, rivalry was 
the normal state of affairs

277
00:15:08,207 --> 00:15:11,610
and became even worse with 
the arrival of the settlers.

278
00:15:11,610 --> 00:15:16,115
Everything boiled over 
in June of 1816.

279
00:15:16,115 --> 00:15:19,318
Cuthbert Grant and his group of 
North West Company followers

280
00:15:19,318 --> 00:15:22,521
were coming across the prairie 
at Seven Oaks

281
00:15:22,521 --> 00:15:24,924
and Governor Semple 
and his group of settlers

282
00:15:24,924 --> 00:15:27,593
came out to meet them.

283
00:15:27,593 --> 00:15:30,429
There's a lot of controversy 
about what actually happened;

284
00:15:30,429 --> 00:15:32,865
a gun went off. 
[loud CRACK!]

285
00:15:32,865 --> 00:15:37,236
And a fierce battle took place

286
00:15:37,236 --> 00:15:41,807
and 22 of the settlers 
were killed that day.

287
00:15:41,807 --> 00:15:45,911
Selkirk and his people always 
thought of it as a massacre.

288
00:15:45,911 --> 00:15:49,548
It probably wasn't, it was an 
inadvertent collision

289
00:15:49,548 --> 00:15:51,984
between settlers 
and mixed-blood,

290
00:15:51,984 --> 00:15:55,587
but it was a very unequal 
encounter

291
00:15:55,587 --> 00:15:59,058
because the settlers were not 
militarily inclined.

292
00:15:59,058 --> 00:16:03,295
The mixed-bloods were well-armed 
and experienced shooters.

293
00:16:03,295 --> 00:16:05,764
Not surprisingly the result was

294
00:16:05,764 --> 00:16:09,101
heavy loss of life 
on the settler part,

295
00:16:09,101 --> 00:16:12,638
virtually no loss of life 
on the mixed-blood part.

296
00:16:12,638 --> 00:16:16,175
(narrator) 
After the Battle 
of Seven Oaks in 1816,

297
00:16:16,175 --> 00:16:19,511
peace came to Red River, 
but the challenges

298
00:16:19,511 --> 00:16:22,281
of droughts, pests, 
crop failures, and floods,

299
00:16:22,281 --> 00:16:26,652
like the devastating 1826 flood, 
persisted.

300
00:16:26,652 --> 00:16:32,024
In 1826 we have the first 
of the great floods

301
00:16:32,024 --> 00:16:35,427
in recorded history 
in the Red River area.

302
00:16:35,427 --> 00:16:38,564
The Red River rises by 20 feet;

303
00:16:38,564 --> 00:16:41,834
almost everybody lives 
on the banks of the rivers,

304
00:16:41,834 --> 00:16:44,636
and of course, the settlement 
is virtually wiped out.

305
00:16:44,636 --> 00:16:47,306
Large numbers of settlers leave,

306
00:16:47,306 --> 00:16:51,043
but this is not necessarily 
a bad thing.

307
00:16:51,043 --> 00:16:54,580
The colony did grow after 1817, 
not so much because there were

308
00:16:54,580 --> 00:16:56,849
new settlers coming in 
from Scotland,

309
00:16:56,849 --> 00:16:59,852
because there weren't very many, 
but the fur traders

310
00:16:59,852 --> 00:17:03,222
tended to retire here because 
this was a community,

311
00:17:03,222 --> 00:17:06,225
and it had some characteristics 
of European life.

312
00:17:06,225 --> 00:17:11,330
(Dr. Jack Bumsted) 
As a result of the merger 
of the two trading companies

313
00:17:11,330 --> 00:17:15,367
in the 1820s, there are 
a lot of surplus employees.

314
00:17:15,367 --> 00:17:22,608
The opportunity comes in 1826 to 
use the settlement as a place

315
00:17:22,608 --> 00:17:28,313
where retired members of the fur 
trade and their families can go.

316
00:17:28,313 --> 00:17:32,518
It was a good place for the fur 
traders, who in general,

317
00:17:32,518 --> 00:17:35,687
were married to women who were 
either natives or Métis

318
00:17:35,687 --> 00:17:37,823
and who would probably have had

319
00:17:37,823 --> 00:17:39,858
a very difficult time 
retiring to Europe

320
00:17:39,858 --> 00:17:41,894
where the society 
was so very different.

321
00:17:41,894 --> 00:17:44,696
So it was a good place 
to raise a family

322
00:17:44,696 --> 00:17:50,202
if you were a retired 
fur trader.

323
00:17:50,202 --> 00:17:53,806
[acoustic guitar; 
softly finger-picking]

324
00:17:53,806 --> 00:17:58,043
It's hard to believe that when 
the Selkirk Settlers

325
00:17:58,043 --> 00:18:01,346
arrived in Manitoba 
200 years ago,

326
00:18:01,346 --> 00:18:04,917
and they were told you can't 
farm in Western Canada,

327
00:18:04,917 --> 00:18:08,153
this is a land of ice and snow,

328
00:18:08,153 --> 00:18:11,223
it's fur country, 
and you can't farm here,

329
00:18:11,223 --> 00:18:14,093
it's not possible-- 
they were told that.

330
00:18:14,093 --> 00:18:17,396
The big accomplishment of the 
settlement was to show

331
00:18:17,396 --> 00:18:20,632
that you could establish a 
farming economy on the prairies.

332
00:18:20,632 --> 00:18:22,968
The big thing about a farming 
settlement

333
00:18:22,968 --> 00:18:24,870
is the density of population.

334
00:18:24,870 --> 00:18:28,006
As soon as you start laying out 
the prairies

335
00:18:28,006 --> 00:18:31,376
in quarter-section farms, you 
can have quite a big population.

336
00:18:31,376 --> 00:18:34,980
(Dr. Jack Bumsted) So one of the 
reasons that Selkirk moves

337
00:18:34,980 --> 00:18:38,450
into this territory is 
an imperial motive;

338
00:18:38,450 --> 00:18:42,187
he's trying to preserve 
most of Western Canada

339
00:18:42,187 --> 00:18:46,225
and part of the Western 
United States

340
00:18:46,225 --> 00:18:48,727
from the rapacious Americans...

341
00:18:48,727 --> 00:18:56,201
who will otherwise take it over 
entirely.

342
00:18:56,201 --> 00:18:59,404
(Dr. Harry Duckworth) 
So the settlement grew 
and eventually, of course,

343
00:18:59,404 --> 00:19:01,740
it became Winnipeg, 
Canada took over

344
00:19:01,740 --> 00:19:04,343
the rest of the country in 1870.

345
00:19:04,343 --> 00:19:06,111
There was a policy 
of European immigration

346
00:19:06,111 --> 00:19:07,813
over the next 40 years,

347
00:19:07,813 --> 00:19:09,848
and all kinds of Europeans

348
00:19:09,848 --> 00:19:12,451
came out here who would never 
have been brought

349
00:19:12,451 --> 00:19:15,320
if it hadn't been known 
that it was possible

350
00:19:15,320 --> 00:19:18,056
to have this dense population 
as a farming settlement.

351
00:19:18,056 --> 00:19:21,693
They started the waves of 
immigration that followed

352
00:19:21,693 --> 00:19:24,596
and because the Selkirk Settlers 
came here,

353
00:19:24,596 --> 00:19:27,966
others started to follow, 
and the Icelanders

354
00:19:27,966 --> 00:19:31,203
and Ukrainians, 
and just every other group.

355
00:19:31,203 --> 00:19:33,438
Now there's 
a Philippine community,

356
00:19:33,438 --> 00:19:35,974
there's so many others 
who've come

357
00:19:35,974 --> 00:19:38,443
and make Manitoba home-- 
we're very multicultural--

358
00:19:38,443 --> 00:19:41,280
perhaps because 
of the Selkirk Settlers.

359
00:19:41,280 --> 00:19:44,383
(narrator) 
Settling the West for 
agriculture was a bold move.

360
00:19:44,383 --> 00:19:47,519
Early surveys had disagreed

361
00:19:47,519 --> 00:19:50,923
over the West's suitability 
for agriculture.

362
00:19:50,923 --> 00:19:54,459
Manitoba's new survey, 
beginning in 1871,

363
00:19:54,459 --> 00:19:58,297
created townships 
of 36-square-mile sections,

364
00:19:58,297 --> 00:20:01,900
each section was 640 acres.

365
00:20:01,900 --> 00:20:05,204
This new method replaced 
the original Red River survey

366
00:20:05,204 --> 00:20:09,007
based on the early Quebec system 
of long, narrow river lots.

367
00:20:09,007 --> 00:20:12,077
(Dr. Paul Earl) What, of course, 
sparked the settlement

368
00:20:12,077 --> 00:20:15,547
in any kind of numbers 
and any kind of volume

369
00:20:15,547 --> 00:20:18,817
was the building of the CPR, 
which was completed in 1887.

370
00:20:18,817 --> 00:20:20,752
Sir John A. Macdonald's 
intention was

371
00:20:20,752 --> 00:20:22,621
to tie the country together

372
00:20:22,621 --> 00:20:25,157
and to tie Vancouver 
and British Columbia

373
00:20:25,157 --> 00:20:27,626
in with the eastern provinces, 
but, of course,

374
00:20:27,626 --> 00:20:30,596
they had to cross 
the Great Plains to get there.

375
00:20:30,596 --> 00:20:32,631
(Jamie Wilson) 
Sir John A. Macdonald,

376
00:20:32,631 --> 00:20:35,334
the good and the bad about him 
as our first Prime Minister,

377
00:20:35,334 --> 00:20:37,536
some of the good things 
he did was,

378
00:20:37,536 --> 00:20:39,338
he forced treaties to be signed.

379
00:20:39,338 --> 00:20:41,506
He also brought in 
a piece of legislation

380
00:20:41,506 --> 00:20:43,642
allowing First Nations to vote 
in eastern Canada.

381
00:20:43,642 --> 00:20:46,345
On the other hand, there was 
very aggressive practices

382
00:20:46,345 --> 00:20:49,348
on the government's side to 
displace people from the land

383
00:20:49,348 --> 00:20:52,684
and move them north away from 
where the railroad was 
going to be.

384
00:20:52,684 --> 00:20:54,453
They basically used forced 
starvation

385
00:20:54,453 --> 00:20:56,788
to help relocate 
First Nation communities.

386
00:20:56,788 --> 00:21:00,759
They would've had claims where 
the rail line was going to be.

387
00:21:00,759 --> 00:21:03,161
(narrator) 
Rail service made 
the settlement of the West

388
00:21:03,161 --> 00:21:05,364
a reality during the 1880s.

389
00:21:05,364 --> 00:21:09,067
Sir John's national policy

390
00:21:09,067 --> 00:21:13,038
included the concept of settling 
the plains area

391
00:21:13,038 --> 00:21:15,874
and creating 
a rural farming economy there.

392
00:21:15,874 --> 00:21:18,910
(narrator) 
As an incentive to build a 
transcontinental rail line,

393
00:21:18,910 --> 00:21:21,613
the CPR had been granted 
a monopoly

394
00:21:21,613 --> 00:21:24,016
on rail line development.

395
00:21:24,016 --> 00:21:26,752
(Dr. Ed Tyrchniewicz) 
Clifford Sifton was 
the Minister of Immigration.

396
00:21:26,752 --> 00:21:28,754
He in many ways determined

397
00:21:28,754 --> 00:21:31,790
which ethnic group was 
going to go where,

398
00:21:31,790 --> 00:21:35,027
so we ended up with the German, 
the Mennonite groups,

399
00:21:35,027 --> 00:21:38,363
going into Southern Manitoba, 
in Morden,

400
00:21:38,363 --> 00:21:41,833
Winkler, Altona area 
and the Steinbach area.

401
00:21:41,833 --> 00:21:43,869
They were essentially 
settling into areas

402
00:21:43,869 --> 00:21:46,004
that had good agricultural land

403
00:21:46,004 --> 00:21:49,908
and they were able 
to be quite successful at it.

404
00:21:49,908 --> 00:21:53,979
Some of the Eastern European 
groups tended to get dumped off

405
00:21:53,979 --> 00:21:56,848
into Southeast Manitoba 
in the poorer quality land,

406
00:21:56,848 --> 00:21:59,651
and yet they felt 
they still had good soil

407
00:21:59,651 --> 00:22:02,387
because it was better than 
what they had come from.

408
00:22:02,387 --> 00:22:06,291
(narrator) 
Between 1879 and 1881,

409
00:22:06,291 --> 00:22:09,995
58,000 immigrants 
came to Manitoba.

410
00:22:09,995 --> 00:22:14,232
Settlement continued and 
the late 1890s and early 1900s

411
00:22:14,232 --> 00:22:17,369
saw more than 30,000 immigrants 
from the Ukraine.

412
00:22:17,369 --> 00:22:21,073
In 1896, Clifford Sifton 
spared no expense

413
00:22:21,073 --> 00:22:24,543
and increased 
advertising abroad.

414
00:22:24,543 --> 00:22:27,746
These advertising claims in 
today's terms would be 
considered a scam

415
00:22:27,746 --> 00:22:29,614
because 
they essentially presented

416
00:22:29,614 --> 00:22:32,217
this area as a cornucopia.

417
00:22:32,217 --> 00:22:34,519
And we know 
that this environment

418
00:22:34,519 --> 00:22:38,123
that we work with in here is, 
it's very harsh,

419
00:22:38,123 --> 00:22:41,660
but it's also very fragile, 
and so people came here

420
00:22:41,660 --> 00:22:44,363
with very high expectations 
of wealth and prosperity.

421
00:22:44,363 --> 00:22:46,898
And many of them had 
their hopes completely dashed

422
00:22:46,898 --> 00:22:49,568
within a very 
short period of time.

423
00:22:49,568 --> 00:22:52,104
(Rob Tisdale) 
Homesteading in Canada was 
quite an organized affair.

424
00:22:52,104 --> 00:22:54,172
The railways financed 
construction

425
00:22:54,172 --> 00:22:57,843
through the capital assets 
of the land itself.

426
00:22:57,843 --> 00:23:00,045
The government granted 
the railways land,

427
00:23:00,045 --> 00:23:02,114
the railway surveys 
these lands

428
00:23:02,114 --> 00:23:04,383
on both sides of the rail line,

429
00:23:04,383 --> 00:23:06,418
they would sell these lands

430
00:23:06,418 --> 00:23:08,587
or bring people to these lands

431
00:23:08,587 --> 00:23:11,156
to homestead a 3/4-section, 
if you will.

432
00:23:11,156 --> 00:23:14,760
That would bring the population 
that the railways needed

433
00:23:14,760 --> 00:23:17,996
to create commerce, and it was 
a thriving business--

434
00:23:17,996 --> 00:23:20,565
the real boom of the 1880s

435
00:23:20,565 --> 00:23:23,568
through to, really 
up to the 1920s.

436
00:23:23,568 --> 00:23:26,238
(Laura Rance) The Canadian 
government wanted to get

437
00:23:26,238 --> 00:23:28,507
this vast prairie region settled 
mainly because

438
00:23:28,507 --> 00:23:31,576
they didn't want the Americans 
to stake claim to it.

439
00:23:31,576 --> 00:23:34,346
And so they came up with this 
scheme with the railways

440
00:23:34,346 --> 00:23:36,782
in order to draw people 
to the area.

441
00:23:36,782 --> 00:23:40,152
What it did was offer people 
essentially free land.

442
00:23:40,152 --> 00:23:43,822
They had to pay a $10 
registration fee,

443
00:23:43,822 --> 00:23:47,626
but they had a free 
quarter-section, 160 acres.

444
00:23:47,626 --> 00:23:52,564
What they had to do in order to 
get this land was to proof up or

445
00:23:52,564 --> 00:23:55,667
get 40 acres of their quarter- 
section into production, and

446
00:23:55,667 --> 00:23:58,737
they had to build a permanent 
structure within 3 years.

447
00:23:58,737 --> 00:24:01,740
That was easier said than done 
in a part of the world

448
00:24:01,740 --> 00:24:04,242
where there weren't 
a lot of trees at the time.

449
00:24:04,242 --> 00:24:07,579
A lot of these people 
lived in sod huts

450
00:24:07,579 --> 00:24:10,749
for a significant number 
of years. [steam whistle blows]

451
00:24:10,749 --> 00:24:13,785
(narrator) 
As a result 
of the government's programs,

452
00:24:13,785 --> 00:24:19,825
more than 3 million people came 
to Canada between 1896 and 1914.

453
00:24:19,825 --> 00:24:25,263
Selkirk passed away in 1820 
and never got to see

454
00:24:25,263 --> 00:24:28,733
the success 
of his agricultural experiment.

455
00:24:28,733 --> 00:24:32,170
He developed tuberculosis and 
died at a very early age,

456
00:24:32,170 --> 00:24:34,739
but the agreement he signed

457
00:24:34,739 --> 00:24:37,843
with Chief Peguis of the 
First Nation Saulteaux

458
00:24:37,843 --> 00:24:40,812
had this sentence in it, 
"The agreement would last

459
00:24:40,812 --> 00:24:43,882
for as long as the sun shines,

460
00:24:43,882 --> 00:25:04,769
the grass grows, 
and the rivers flow."

461
00:25:04,769 --> 00:25:10,842
(Phyllis Fraser) 
Manitoba was built on 
agriculture and the family farm.

462
00:25:10,842 --> 00:25:14,813
At the turn of the century, 
agriculture was the reason

463
00:25:14,813 --> 00:25:17,349
that the Manitoba Legislative 
Building is

464
00:25:17,349 --> 00:25:20,619
this huge, beautiful building, 
because it was booming,

465
00:25:20,619 --> 00:25:24,523
we were going to be 
the Chicago of the North.

466
00:25:24,523 --> 00:26:12,604
[drums & melodica 
play in bright rhythm]

467
00:26:12,604 --> 00:26:34,159
[woman voices 
the following credits]

468
00:26:34,159 --> 00:26:37,495
And the members of...

469
00:26:37,495 --> 00:26:41,666
To order a copy of the 4-part 
series "Built on Agriculture,"

470
00:26:41,666 --> 00:26:45,666
call or visit 
our on-line store...