Against the Grain: An Irreverent View of Alberta

David W. Leonard is the project historian (Northern Alberta) in the
Historic Sites and Archives Service, Alberta Community Development. He
is the author of Delayed Frontier: The Peace River Country to 1909 and
co-author of The Lure of the Peace River Coun

With a plethora of celebration books coming in the wake of Alberta’s
100th centennial in 2005, it should not be surprising that a few would
have taken an irreverent approach to the province and its history.
Written by a Calgary-based journalist, Against the Grain falls into this
category. In the book, Ford, a self-described “aging, liberal
feminist,” presents a litany of negative opinions about the
right-of-centre political and cultural climate of the province, while at
the same time claiming to be among the three million Albertans who are
“tired of being described as rednecks.”

Against the Grain is largely a series of sweeping generalizations, and
contradictions abound throughout. For example, the author professes
surprise that the neighbours of convicted environmental saboteur Wiebo
Ludwig showed anger toward him, but then contends that “the real
surprise was that nobody levelled a rifle [at him].” Ford is
especially weak on history. On page 3 she states that homesteading was
facilitated by the Canadian Pacific Railway and not apparently by the
Dominion government, while on page 4 she claims that cattle ranching in
the southern foothills occurred after the homesteaders arrived rather
than the other way around. For some unexplained reason, Treaty 7 with
the Blackfoot Confederacy was of far greater consequence than Treaties 6
or 8 with the First Nations of the northern and central part of the
province. And a quick check of any atlas will show that the Mackenzie
Highway was hardly in the valley of the Peace River.

Ford’s contention that Albertans are “perpetually misunderstood”
will not be altered by this book.