Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Using Schools To Map The Frontier Of Settlement On The Canadian Prairies, John C. Lehr, Brian Mcgregor

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences

Most attempts to map the frontier of agricultural settlement in western Canada have used land alienation data or population density calculated from census returns. Both methods are fraught with difficulties. Population density data are only available at five-year intervals at the 36-square-mile township level. Land alienation does not always reflect settlement. In Manitoba, entire townships were alienated years before they were occupied. The organization and building of schools is a better indicator of actual settlement and the emergence of community-based institutions. To test this hypothesis, school formation and land alienation in 35 townships in southeastern Manitoba were plotted. This showed …