BIG CROPS AND FALLING PRICES IN 1921

Competition is considered to be one of the important motors of progress, whether it's about who can raise the biggest whatsis or who can go the fastest. The Strachans were up to it, but rather amazed themselves at the tall oats they could raise on newly cleared ground far to the north with long, long days.


Three Strachans are in the center of the photo, but one -- indicated by a light pencil note, shows as only "Seth's hat." The back of the photo says, "Seed oats on S.S.S. Farm 5 1/2 feet high."


The back of the photo says "Wheat raised on S.S.S. Farm." But the album caption says "oat bundles five feet long." It's also unclear whether this is in the Strachan yard, and whether that's "Papa" standing in the middle. But plainly they were all impressed and proud. I had understood that all the horses died of equine encephalitis when the family got to Swan River, but maybe these were later and maybe they were replacements or even borrowed.

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Here's where all those long bicycle trips paid off! Glenn is WAY out in front! The back says, "Glenn Strachan winning bicycle race at Swan River." The album caption is "Glenn wins bicycle race at Swan River (Dominion Day, July 1, 1921.)" Note the flag of the British Empire. Ironically, in later life he had terrible trouble with his lungs and allergies, finally moving to Santa Ana, California, to keep from constant bouts of pneumonia that in those days were life-threatening. We wondered whether his lungs had been frozen, but his son, who grew up in Santa Ana, also has trouble with breathing.

Of course, ironically and destructively, bumper crops mean overabundance and low prices. The railroads and elevators could buffer that a bit by shipping crops to where the weather and other factors were not so favorable.

THE DUCK MOUNTAINS

On the back: "West Favelle gorge in Duck Mountain looking south. The river is just to right of Seth's hand."


On the back: "West Favelle Gorge in Duck Mountain looking east.

"Geologically, the Duck Mountains are part of the Manitoba Escarpment, along with the Turtle Mountains, the Riding Mountains, and the Porcupine Hills. Their underlying rocks are Cretaceous shales and (below that) sandstone, which overlie deeper deposits of Devonian limestone, which in turn overlie Precambrian granite [1]. The vertical relief of the mountains is the result of erosion of the Cretaceous shale by the ancestral (pre Ice Age) Red River to the east, and by the ancestral Assiniboine River to the west, and so the Duck Mountain's apparent height is the result of a lowering of the surrounding prairie, rather than any orogen. Glacial scouring exaggerated the vertical relief of the mountains, and the glaciers deposited thick beds of glacial till that now overlay the bedrock. The post-ice age Duck Mountains then formed the western shore of Lake Agassiz. The flat bottom of Lake Agassiz now forms the Manitoba lowlands, and it is from these lowlands that the vertical relief of the Duck Mountains is most impressive (indeed, really the only place from which it is even readily noticeable), as the mountains provide an obvious contrast to the monotonous flat of Manitoba's prairie.

"The area represents the southern limit of the boreal forest in its transition zone to aspen parkland. The forest soils are stony and the landscape is rolling, with numerous ponds and creek channels. The forest trees include white spruce, black spruce, tamarack larch, balsam fir, jack pine, quaking aspen, balsam poplar, and paper birch."

In the early years the Strachans were here, moose meat was a major part of their diet. More than that, the mountains engaged their imaginary lives, a wild place full of potential and surprises in a nearly religious way. When the boys got to June, just before time to cut hay, they would have had a few slack days to pedal bicycles over to the alluring Duck Mountains. One of my father's favorite songs was "The Bear Went over the Mountain to See What He Could See."

HARVEST TIME

The album page is headed "end of 1920" but the vegetable harvest comes in October for root crops and in December for animal crops.


The back of this photo says "Bruce and Glenn harvesting their onion crop," which sort of implies that they planted and will profit from the onions. Looks as though they're about halfway through.


This photo says "John Henderson and Glenn Strachan with moose they shot in Duck Mountains. Henderson camera." Glenn is standing. Someone else will have to identify the guns, but a person needs a pretty powerful rifle for a moose. Not having a freezer, these folks were in the habit of canning their moose meat, which meant stews instead of roasts and steaks. Moose meat is excellent, at least every time I've eaten it, I've found it succulent and tasty.

MAY AND FRIENDS

Socializing in a rural place, especially a newly settled one, is a survival skill. No EMT, no welfare, no firemen and so on. Everyone took care of his or her own family and tried to help the other families.


July, 1920. Howard and Doris Innis and May Strachan enjoy a swing. I suspect that with trees that size, the swing is hanging from a board put across between two trees. Looks like someone spent money on a nice new rope.


This formal portrait was probably taken in a studio with a chair and a drape. I don't know where the mister was. They're a pretty family with plaid on the girl and a corduroy suit on the boy. The mum wears a lovely locket and we're glad her wedding ring shows.


May wrote on the back of this photo: "This was taken in 1920, too. The greyhound was not our dog but a stray. This is by the garden." Presumably the dog was just visiting and either went home or ran on. A greyhound is a practical dog for the prairie where it could run down rabbits and coyotes, though probably not kill a coyote. They are meant to spot their prey with eyesight rather than scent it with noses, so they are sometimes called "gazehounds."


This photo is dated August, 1920. "May Strachan with a bunch of high-bush cranberries picked on Roaring River." I know little or nothing about high bush cranberries, the prairie and especially along the streams there are always a variety of small bush fruits. They take longer to gather than the tree fruits, like apples or plums, but they are often particularly healthy.

TRIPS AND PICNICS

Even on the peneplain of the northern prairie, there are little knots and variations.

This is Thunder Hill! Seen from the south. I don't know whether it's a glacial moraine or a primordial reef in an ancient sea or simply a more durable and therefore less erodable stretch of land. Those clumps of vegetation, groves of trees planted to be windbreaks, are called "poplar bluffs."


Glenn has found a roadside berry patch. Looks like buffalo berries to me and that would fit the terrain. They are small, intensely red, very astringent berries that have good flavor when sweetened or, as the Indians did, mixed with dried pounded meat to make pemmican, a source of vitamins through winter. One doesn't eat many off the bush! They have formidable thorns and are usually gathered by spreading something under the bushes and then thrashing the bushes vigorously with a stick.

But now I see that my father's caption is "Picking 'Saskatoon berries' on Thunder Hill." Saskatoons, sarvisberries, service berries, are fairly tasty and also make good pemmican. They are blander than huckleberries, but an important ingredient in the sacred soup at ceremonies and easy to dry for preservation.



The back of the photo says "Henderson and Strachan families picnicking on the Swan River." The picture is blurry and it's hard to tell whether that "boat" is actually afloat or resting on the bottom of this shallow place, possibly the "rapids" though I don't see that slanting tree. The women in their white dresses are clustered while the boys, as usual, are all over the place. The dark man on the gravel bar to the right seems to be looking down or holding a camera in front of himself. This idyllic scene calls out for a Impressionist painter to capture the afternoon light, the reflections, the trees like a palisade.



This is dated September 5, 1920 and says, "Rose Henderson and Doverspike's tame coyote." Animal theorists would have a lot to say about the human habit of making pets out of the infant versions of predators we otherwise try to kill, but it DOES look like a dog! Might not stay tame very much longer. Puberty tends to make even humans a little feral.

HERE AND THERE ON THE FARM

Of course -- strictly speaking -- this bridge, which takes on major proportions in a flat land where most inclines go down instead of up, is on the road rather than the farm. But this is the title of the album page.


The bridge goes across the Roaring River. The pair of photos were taken on June, 1920. This one says "East side."


The second photo does seem a bit vertiginous. In mud season it would take a little nerve and skill to keep from skidding down sideways. This snap is marked "looking West."


These oats are the reason people wanted to move to the Swan River Valley! The photo was taken in August, 1920, and the crop is sixty days old. I'm not sure which of the boys is standing out there, but judging from the hat it's either Bruce or "Papa." Since Bruce was six feet tall, the oats must be nearly five feet tall. Of course, this is the natural result of a first crop on newly cleared land. There was no chemical fertilizer in those days but the field would have had centuries of deposits of soil plus whatever the plants generated. Everyone assumed that this richness would continue unchanged.


July, 1920. "Our first garden." Seth seems to think they're raising cats. The parents raised big gardens all their lives, even in Oregon when they were retired. In fact, my grandpa had a fatal heart attack after a day in the garden. I have vivid memories of them out there with hoes and pith helmets. My grandpa was a great admirer of Rodale. No one in the next generation was a farmer, but some of the grandchildren turned out to be enthusiastic backyard gardeners.

PORTRAITS -- FAMILY AND OTHERWISE

People on the prairies are proud of their affiliations. The SS Strachans don't appear to be church-goers, but they are very school conscious and to them a "family" is not just genetic. It's a sort of business in which everyone is shareholders, "Papa" is CEO. This one-room school group is marked " September 1,1920, West Favel School. Miss McDougal, teacher." See Martha Ostenso's "Wild Geese" or the movie version, "After the Harvest" for a version of this pattern than had gone toxic and for a depiction of a school teacher's life in that time and place. Miss McDougal would have lived with a family, but evidently not with the Strachans.


My father the photographer cherished his self-timer on the camera which caused some people to suspect that he had a secret partner who went around with him so he could be in the photos. But it buzzed for about three minutes before it took the photo, which was so long that those portrayed got tired of waiting. It was June, which can be pretty hot. And sometimes it just didn't "fire," so the photographer would go to investigate. Good thing it wasn't a firecracker.



This is one of my favorite photos, a kind of Ingmar Bergman "Wild Strawberries" image of a Sunday afternoon. Seth, the youngest, is firmly anchored in his Buddha pose by the two women. "Papa" is his usual patient self. Glenn is more stoic than Bruce, and where did Bruce's tie go?