Where the River Runs: Stories of the Saskatchewan and the People Drawn to Its Shores

Kimberly J. Frail is a Digital Librarian for the Government of Alberta.

Victor Karl Friesen’s teaching background and his passion for the past
culminate in this carefully crafted history of the Saskatchewan River
Valley and “the people drawn to its shores.” The book is divided
into two sections: “Furs and Adventurers” and “Surveys and
Settlements.”

Part 1 sets the stage for the stories that follow, charting the arrival
of Aboriginals in the valley and their first contacts with Europeans. It
also traces the geographical history of the land and waterways that were
to become an integral part of the settlers’ lives. Some chapters in
this section present an in-depth analysis of the geography of the area
that is reminiscent of a university textbook. The chapters devoted to
individual explorers, surveyors, traders, and trading posts are equally
impressive with regard to inclusiveness. Chapters 8 and 9 provide a good
overview and analysis of the increasing competition between the Hudson
Bay Company and its challengers in the fur-trading industry.

The conflicts that would help shape the sociopolitical landscape of
Saskatchewan and Manitoba are introduced in Part 2, which includes
individual chapters devoted to Louis Riel and the battles of Duck Creek,
Fish Lake, and Batoche. However, Friesen reveals that some of the most
important showdowns in Prairie history did not occur on the battlefield
but rather in the wheat fields of farmers like Seagar Wheeler.
Wheeler’s victory in the 1911 Canadian Pacific Railway competition for
the best spring wheat yielded not only a thousand dollars in gold coins
but also the promise of fertile land that the government in Ottawa could
use to encourage worldwide immigrants to settle the Canadian West.

This comprehensive and meticulously researched book is appropriate for
academic and public libraries with collections specializing in Canadian
or Prairie history. Friesen provides illustrative maps, endnotes for
each chapter, an index, and a comprehensive bibliography—all
invaluable tools in a work this rich in detail.