A Sense Of Place

Canadians have long identified the grain elevator with the prairies. For those living in Alberta’s farming communities, the elevator continues to bestow a sense of purpose. Yet even for urban Albertans who may have weaker ties to the land our elevators still hold a special place in our sense of identity.

The changes that are occurring in the grain and transportation industries are altering our landscape. They will also alter our sense of place and our sense of ourselves. As the elevators disappear only our collective memory can enable us to "read" the land and thus, help us understand who we are.

Our Town

Who hasn’t driven down a prairie highway searching the horizon anxiously for that row of grain elevators that signifies home? For generations of Albertans the elevator row meant safety, services and comradeship. It was a source of local pride, for the elevator row was a physical declaration of a town’s economic viability as well as the region’s agricultural strength.

The erection of an elevator along a railway line was often the impetus for the establishment of a service centre. As shops, offices and businesses mushroomed close to the elevator, competing grain companies vied for building locations. It was not long before a row of elevators graced "Railway Avenue" or "Main Street", quickly becoming a part of the commercial landscape of the town. Vulcan’s famous "nine in a line" in the mid-1950s became the quintessential statement of the importance of agriculture to both the town’s economy and that of the province.

Everything Old Is New Again

R. Skytt bought this elevator and moved it in 1980. They jacked up the elevator, welded rail irons as skids, and with the help of neighbours' tractors, the journey began.

It began to lean on the first curve, so it was left overnight and machinery was brought in to straighten it on the road.

In 1993, aluminum siding was put on, and the elevator was finished and ready to be used to store grain. It is still in use today.

Bleak though the prognosis might be for the survival of the country grain elevator, not all elevators will disappear when the grain companies close their last wooden elevators. Some will continue their lives in similar roles while others will remain to remind us of a way of life that has disappeared.

With the closure of elevators comes the question of how they might be salvaged for re-use. Prior to the 1990s elevators were often twinned with newer cousins. A number were sold to producers for personal storage and others were re-adapted by the grain companies to store bulk fertilizers. Today, townspeople recognize that the demolition of the elevators symbolizes the passing of a way of life. This sense of loss has resulted in the preservation of elevators by heritage groups in Acadia Valley, Esther, Meeting Creek, Radway, Rowley, Scandia, Spruce Grove, St. Albert, and Strathcona in Edmonton. Alberta has preserved a larger number of grain elevators as heritage sites than any of the other prairie provinces.

In the last several years elevator closures have become closely tied to rail line abandonment. Survival of many small villages and hamlets is in doubt. At the same time there has been a rise in the importance and size of regional service centres such as Camrose, Three Hills and Stettler.

Torrington serves as one example. In 1996 the C.P.R. closed the Acme-Wimborne branch line. When the two elevators came down the town lost one-third of its tax base. Unable to absorb a 50% tax hike, residents voted to be absorbed into the M.D. of Kneehill. The restaurant’s business dropped by 30% and the school enrolment fell so low that when the school closed for the Christmas holidays it did not re-open in January 1998. On the other hand, Camrose has long been a service centre for the surrounding region and a major educational centre. Its broader tax base and the construction of high throughput terminals outside of town have helped Camrose graduate into a regional centre.

Ferintosh once had three grain elevators. This United Grain Growers elevator was demolished in 1976. There are now no grain elevators left in Ferintosh.