Barns of Western Canada

W.J.C. Cherwinski is a professor of history at Memorial University of
Newfoundland and the co-author of Lectures in Canadian Labour and
Working-Class History.

Like farmers everywhere, those in Western Canada often devoted as much
or more care, attention, and money to their livestock enclosures as to
their own dwellings, because without horses and oxen the farming
enterprise was without a power source, and without livestock there were
no dairy products to generate cash.

Barns of Western Canada is a handsome tribute to the period preceding
the gasoline tractor, when livestock reigned supreme, and most farmers
practised diversified farming. Lavishly illustrated, the book provides
excellent examples of how immigrant farmers adapted to local
surroundings. Its dozens of photographs not only show the tremendous
variety of structures erected in the region before the Great Depression
but also reflect the architectural traditions from which each barn’s
owner sprang, the terrain and climate where it was built, and the
purpose for which the barn was used. Individuals, companies such as
Eaton’s and the Canadian Pacific Railway, governments, and
universities all flaunted their edifices as symbols of their position in
prairie society.