The life of Seager Wheeler is one of the most significant--albeit nearly forgotten--Canadian success stories. He was North America's most celebrated wheat developer, whose varieties in the 1920s made up 40 percent of the world's wheat exports, and contributed wealth to most facets of the Canadian economy. His most publicized accomplishment was being crowned World Wheat King an unsurpassed five times, from 1911 to 1918.
Over the course of a century, the Canadian Prairies went from being the breadbasket of the world to but one of many grain-growing regions in a vast global agri-food system. Magnan traces the causes and consequences of this evolution, from the first transatlantic shipments of wheat to the controversial dismantling of the Canadian Wheat Board. When Wheat Was King reveals how farmers, governments, and consumers, over successive periods, responded to industrialization, international trade rules set by the US, the liberalization of global markets, and the consolidation of corporate power. The result is a fascinating look at how regional, national, and international politics have influenced agriculture and food industries in Canada, the UK, and around the world.
As the twenty-first century marches forward, the country grain elevator rapidly nears extinction. These classic wooden structures once used to store grain are being torn down by the hundreds along with thousands of miles of railway branchlines. A proud and honored way of life is coming to end. Wheat Kings is a lavishly illustrated and poignantly written look at the passing of the traditional northern prairie grain elevators and the communities and railcars that served them. The book includes photographs of grain elevators from numerous small prairie towns. Also included are images of the region's train stations, churches, farms and commercial buildings, many abandoned. The book is organized by six concise essays. These include: Wheat Kings: brief history of grain elevators Of Peddlers, Pullers and Tramps: the prairie railroad system Something Big on the Horizon: concrete high-capacity super elevators McMahon - Hard Times on the Prairies: a forgotten town The Last Harvest: an elevator comes down Buffalo Bones: the end of the railroad grain cars. Wheat Kings is a chronicle of the end of an era as witnessed by one of North America's best-known and most-respected railroad writers and photographers. This book is sure to fascinate railway enthusiasts, transportation historians, and anyone interested in the changing worlds of farming and railroading.
The time is ripe to revisit Canada's past and redress its historical wrongs. Yet in our urgency to imagine roads to reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, it is important to keep in sight the many other forms of diversity that Canadian federalism has historically been designed to accommodate or could also reflect more effectively. Canadian Federalism and Its Future brings together international experts to assess four fundamental institutions: bicameralism, the judiciary as arbiter of the federal deal, the electoral system and party politics, and intergovernmental relations. The contributors use comparative and critical lenses to appraise the repercussions of these four dimensions of Canadian federalism on key actors, including member states, constitutive units, internal nations, Indigenous peoples, and linguistic minorities. Pursuing the work of The Constitutions That Shaped Us (2015) and The Quebec Conference of 1864 (2018), this third volume is a testimony to Canada's successes and failures in constitutional design. Reflecting on the cultural pluralism inherent in this country, Canadian Federalism and Its Future offers thought-provoking lessons for a world in search of concrete institutional solutions, within and beyond the traditional nation-state.
