Cropped : First Nations Agriculture in Manitoba, 1871–1971, livre ebook

A history of First Nations agriculture in Manitoba

Informed by the oral histories, speeches, petitions, and writings of Indigenous Peoples in Manitoba, and by Department of Indian Affairs (DIA) records, author Sarah Carter details First Nations’ ancient history of agriculture and the impacts of federal and provincial policy on their agricultural practices during the century succeeding the signing of Treaty 1. Though shaped by the same broad contours of colonialism and resistance as other nations to the west, Indigenous agriculture evolved in ways unique to the First Nations of Manitoba.

Over the 100 years examined in this study, First Nations insisted they wanted to farm and persistently called on their treaty partner to live up to their promises of assistance, despite continued neglect and policy-inflicted barriers (including confinement to small reserves with little arable land). Cropped exposes the stranglehold the DIA had on First Nations’ land, resources, and livelihoods and shows the deep roots of First Nations agricultural knowledge.

Illustrations
Foreword
Introduction

Chapter 1. “A State of General Dissatisfaction”: Treaties to the 1880s
Treaties 1 and 2, 1871
Indigenous Peoples’ Understandings and Recordings of the Stone Fort Treaty and the So-Called “Outside” Promises
Treaty 4, 1874
Treaty 5, 1875 Treaty 6, 1876 and Treaty 10, 1906
Farm-Making Costs
Slow Surveys of Reserves and Early Contests with Settlers over Lands and Resources
The Roseau River/Pembina Peoples of Treaty 1
The Indian Act of 1876, Predecessors, and Voting Rights
The Dakota
The Maladministration of the Indian Branch and the J.A.N. Provencher Scandal Smallpox and the New Spatial and Colonial Order
Removing Property Rights, Indigenous Farms, and Settlements off Reserves
“Indians” and Homestead Lands
Agriculture in Manitoba in the 1870s
Farm Instructors and Model Farms . . . not for Manitoba
The Myth of No Agriculture before the Settlers
Chapter 2. Challenges, Obstacles, and a Few Advances with Continuing Contests over Land: 1880s–96
Claims to Land: Roseau Rapids, Kaquaygooniash versus Ben Brewster
Environmental Conditions Shared with Settlers and Those Unique to First Nations
Rations
Off-Reserve Labour
DIA Policy on “Peasant” Farming in Manitoba
First Nations Reserves and Agriculture
The Permit System
The Sioux Valley and the Permit System
Homesteading and First Nations, the Indian Act, and Enfranchisement
Agriculture in Manitoba to 1896
Chapter 3. Reserve Land Dispossession, Farming Challenges and Setbacks, and “Rudimentary” Agricultural Training at Residential Schools, 1896–1918
The Failure of the 1898 Plan to Remove and Consolidate Some First Nations in Manitoba
The Gambler First Nation (Silver Creek) Surrenders, 1892 and 1898
The Roseau River Surrender, 1903
The St. Peter’s Surrender, 1907
The Swan Lake First Nation Reserve Surrender, 1908
Other Land Surrender Schemes
Opaskwayak, Pinaymootang, and Brokenhead First Nations
Pressure on the Long Plain Band to Surrender
Pressure on the Dakota to Surrender Land
The Use of Capital and Interest Funds of Bands
The Roseau River Band Funds
Contradictory Messages about Reserve Agriculture
Roseau River and Roseau Rapids
Off-Reserve Wage Labour/Income and Resources
Instruction in Farming at Industrial and Residential Schools
Elkhorn/Washakada
Private Property on Reserves
The First World War
Soldier Settlement
First Nation Veterans of World War I
Flint Corn
The “Spanish” Influenza
Chapter 4. “A Very Bad State” to “a Desolate Waste” to the Community Farm Experiment, Restrictions of Wartime Regulations, and the Return to Subsistence Farming: 1920–45
Reserve Farming in the 1920s
Supposedly Flourishing Farmers of the DIA
On the Ground behind the Headlines
The League of Indians of Canada
Indian Act Amendments
Continued Pressures to Surrender Land and/or Amalgamate First Nations
Natural Resources Transfer Agreements, 1930
“A Spectacle of Desolate Waste”: The 1930s
DIA Reorganization
Thomas Robertson’s Reports on Conditions of First Nations, 1936
Indian Agents as Settler Debt Collectors and Inspectors
Peguis Families Return to St. Peter’s, 1932–33
Northern Communities in the 1930s
Community Farms
The Second World War, Wheat Reduction, and Closure of Community and Agency Farms
Muskrat Farming
Conference on the North American Indian Today, 1939
Abolition of Agency Farms
The Second World War, Labour, and Enlistment
Women and Land: The Case of Caroline Prince Sinclair, St. Peter’s
Debate on Voting Rights
Agriculture in Manitoba at the End of the Second World War
Reserve Eradication: A New Policy?
Chapter 5. “Finally I Decided to Give Up the Farming Business and Start Working for Other People”: 1945–60
Indian Agents’ Views Solicited, 1946
The Last Community Farms
The Veterans’ Land Act
Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons, 1946–48
A Woman’s Perspective: Grace Nanawin Franklin
Recommendations of the Joint Committee
The Permit System
Indian Act Amendments, 1951
Critics of the Indian Affairs Branch
Continued Settler Pressure to Sell or Lease Lands
Band Farms
Other Occupations
Sugar Beet Work
Manomin
The Jean H. Lagasse Report
Seneca Root
Indian Homemakers Clubs
Social Assistance
“Designed for Failure”: Elders’ Words
W.L. Morton and the Indian–Métis Committee

Chapter 6. Favouring a Few: From Cooperative to Corporate Farms and the “Consultant Binge”: 1960s
Dismal Prospects for Reserve Economies
Assisting and Expanding First Nations Agriculture
Media Attention and Criticism
Hopeful and Helpful Developments of the 1960s
Agricultural Conferences
Provincial Agricultural Representatives and Reserve Farming
The Community Development Program
Canada-Manitoba Agreements in the Interlake Region
Off-Reserve Farming and Leasing
The Farm Credit Corporation
Dairy and Beef Cattle and the Rotating Herd System
Veterinary Visits and the PFRA
Cooperative Farming
Corporate Farming
The Farm Potential of Two Saskatchewan First Nations Communities
The Corporate Farm Model and “Consultant Binge”
Gabe Mentuck and the Abandonment of His Showcase Farm
The Persistence of Seasonal Wage Labour
Manomin Cultivation and Paddies
Women and Work
Goodbye to the Indian Agent
The White Paper, 1969
Epilogue. 100 Years from Treaty 1
Notes
Bibliography
Index