|
It serves several purposes. First, it
provides a complete record of elevators in the province
during 1997, which can be compared to a photo
documentation of rural communities in the mid-1970s,
which has been donated by Unifarm to the PMA. Second, the inventory was used
as the basis from which to trace the date of construction and the
company that first owned a given elevator, through records of the
Canadian Grain Commission and the Alberta Wheat Pool. Third, the
inventory allows for a process of evaluation of historical and
architectural assessment. The elevators on the inventory were
evaluated and placed on an A, B and C list, according to their
significance, with research profiles for structures on the A and B
lists. The results were interesting, in that Alberta in 1997
probably had more extant early elevators than the other prairie
provinces, with several predating 1910.
The fourth reason to do such an inventory is that it is a major
resource for research. Analysis of the inventory, in conjunction
with scrutiny of hundreds of archival photographs and initial
archival research, has allowed for preliminary identification of
differences and varieties of architectural design of elevators, as
well as the tracing of the evolution of technological changes that
have improved the operation of the elevator since 1900.
The inventory itself is a valuable record, but what of the
hundreds of others that had been demolished in the past? Major
archival collections only document a fraction of them, and rarely
after 1950. In the fall of 1997, the Provincial Museum of Alberta
launched a one-year photo search and contest to augment the record.
Open to all Albertans, amateur and professional photographers alike,
the contest seeks photographs taken, 10, 20 or 50 years ago, as well
as new photographs, in the hope of filling the gaps in the archival
record. When the contest closed in November 1998, 50 winning
photographs formed the basis of a travelling exhibition that,
augmented by small artifacts, art works, and other media, opened in
June 1999.
The response to date, according to Jane Ross, curator at the PMA,
has been overwhelming, as thousands of photographs often with
letters have poured in from all over Alberta from Provost, to
Gleichen to Winfield. In some cases these have been sizeable
individual collections. All of these photographs, along with the
thousands of photographs and video footage taken in 1997, will form
a remarkable and comprehensive photo documentation of Alberta's
grain elevators.
In the meantime, I completed an illustrated 400-page summary
report for the PMA. It addresses a range of illustrated themes,
including architecture and elevator design from the 1890s-1997, the
construction of elevators, site development and the evolution of the
complex of buildings and their functions, an overview of the grain
companies that operated in Alberta, the elevator agent's job and
health and safety issues, the development and regulation of the
grain trade, and the transportation and marketing of grain. The
farmer and the elevator, the elevator as social centre, and the
elevator and cultural identity, and the impact of the loss of
elevators, were among the remaining topics.
The PMA is now armed with exhibit themes, resource lists, a
substantial artifact collection, including a number of elevator
blueprints donated by United Grain Growers and the Alberta Wheat
Pool, along with thousands of scanned photographs and extensive site
specific information to be compiled in a database. All the potential
is there to develop an exciting and significant exhibit on grain
elevators in the future, and it must be undertaken in response to
the collective public interest shown in this aspect of the province's
human history.
|
