The Westman Oral History collection was a project of the Westman Oral History Association and ran from 1980-84. The Westman Oral History Association was created on August 12, 1980, by a steering committee of the Assiniboine Historical Society. The Oral History Association undertook a project called "Voices of Yesteryear." The project was created in order to record and preserve the lives and experiences of early settlers to the Westman area. Work began in 1981, and included interviews conducted with approximately seventy senior citizens from over twenty communities in western Manitoba. The Association held a training session for committee members on April 11, 1981, where 125 participants learned how to conduct an effective interview and how to operate the recorders used in the interviews. The chairman of the Westman Oral History Association was Effie McPhail, the coordinator was Sally Cunningham, and the secretary was Bob Coates. Some of the interviews recorded were used in the early months of 1982 on a local radio station, CKLQ, as part of a program called "Centennial Memories." The project resulted in the creation of the Westman Oral History Collection.
Custodial History
This collection was accessioned by the McKee Archives in 1998. The original tapes from the Westman Oral History project were deposited in the Brandon Public Library. Copies of these originals were made by Margaret Pollex of the Brandon University Language Lab at the request of Eileen McFadden, University Archivist in the early 1990s. These copies compose the collection held in the McKee Archives.
Scope and Content
The collection includes the audiotapes used to record the interviews, as well as corresponding files for each interview subject. The files contain facts about the interviewees, including date and place of birth, occupations, and marital status. The files also include a summary of the interview heard on each tape.
The interviews were done with men and women pioneers from the Westman area of Manitoba, and describe the daily lives of common people during the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. The topics covered in the interviews include the following: Agriculture, Associations and Clubs, Churches and Church Life, Cultural Events, Early Politics, Education, Health Services, Immigration, Local Businesses, Native-White Relations, Pioneer Settlements, Pioneer Way of Life, Social Life, Sports, Transportation, and War Brides. This collection includes interviews with residents from the following communities: Brandon, Boissevain, Brookdale, Carberry, Deloraine, Douglas, Elkhorn, Erickson, Forrest, Glenboro, Hamiota, Hartney, Justice, Kenton, Killarney, Melita, Minnedosa, Neepawa, Ninette, Oak Lake, Rapid City, Reston, Rivers, Shoal Lake, Sioux Valley Reserve, Souris, Strathclair, Virden, and Wawanesa. The interviews also disclose the unique experiences of pioneer women in rural areas. Many of the interviewees provide brief family histories during their interviews.
Notes
Some of the files include photocopied pictures of the interviewees. Description written by Robyn Mitchell (2001).
The Manitoba Wheat Pool and Manitoba Pool Elevators kept and preserved a chronological record of the meetings of the MPE Board of Directors and annual delegate meetings. The minutes were typed and bound, then placed in the MPE reference library so that employees and members could access them.
Scope and Content
This sub-series consists of minutes of organizational meetings and later meetings held by the Central Office of the Manitoba Wheat Co-operative Producers, Ltd (later known as the Manitoba Wheat Pool) from 1923 until it went under in 1934, and of meetings held by the central office of Manitoba Pool Elevators from 1925 until 1997.
See fonds level description of RG 4 for history/bio of MPE
Scope and Content
This artificially created sub-series contains a variety of legal and official documents related to the operation of the Manitoba Wheat Pool and MPE. Records include the following:
1. Agreements, General By-laws, and Contracts 1924-1972
2. General By-laws
3. Incorporations and Dissolutions
4. Operating Agreements, Agreements for Sale 1940-67
5. MPE Complete Legislation
6. Miscellaneous Documents
7. Elevator Policy, Agreements, Incorporation Certificates / Indebtedness
8. Quantitative Appraisal of Wheat Pool Building (left in original binding)
9. 9th Victory Loan Souvenir: A Portfolio of Reproductions of the Documents of Surrender
10a. Federal Agreement 1972 p.1-126
10b. Federal Agreement 1972
11a. Terminal Expansion 1961 – 1963
11b. Terminal Expansion 1961 – 1963
12. By-Laws and Constitutions
13. MPE & Connaught Laboratories Agreements 1964-66
14. MPE & Connaught Laboratories Agreements 1964-66
15. “Pool Pac” Trade Mark 1964, 1971, 1979
16. Patent #501894 Dust Control Apparatus 1954
17. MPE Agreement w/ Daniel Augustus Kane (General Superintendent appointment) 1928, 1933
18. Manitoba Co-operative Wheat Producers Ltd. Agreement w/ Richard M. Mahoney (Manager) 1924, 1925, 1928
19. MPE Acts
20. MPE Acts
21. Party & Supplementary Agreements 1931-1936
22a. Historical Documents of the Manitoba Wheat Pool 1924 - 1927
22b. Historical Documents of the Manitoba Wheat Pool 1927 - 1930
23a. Miscellaneous Documents 1925 -1996
23b. Miscellaneous Documents 1979 -1998
24. Association Documents 1940 - 1966
25. Deed of Trust and Mortage August 2 1928
26. Wheat and Coarse Grains Overpayments 1929-1930
Manitoba Pool Elevators was quick to realize the usefulness of the radio medium as a educational and promotional tool. It was also often used to defend the Pool and the co-operative movement in general on programs such as Farm Radio Forum. See fonds level description of RG 4 for complete history/bio of MPE.
Scope and Content
Sub-series MPE B.10 consists of textual radio broadcast transcriptions. The records include transcriptions from 1930 until 1971. Radio broadcasts are on a wide variety of topics, including argicultural science, the grain market and general economy of Canada and the world, government acts and legislation that affected the producer, co-operatives and the co-operative movement, rural life, young people, WWII, Manitoba, and the Manitoba Pool Elevators.
See fonds level description of RG 4 for history/bio of MPE
Scope and Content
This sub-series consists of historical topics created by MPE:
1. P.F. Bredt Invovement with MPE and death 1935-1940
2. MPE history 1941-1973
3a. Manitoba Wheat Pool and MPE history 1930-1939
3b. Manitoba Wheat Pool and MPE history 1925-1929
4. Manitoba Wheat Pool history 1924-1971
5a. On to Ottawa and Manitoba Delegation Committee 1958-1960
5b. MPE Miscellaneous history 1934-1959
6. Manitoba Wheat Pool history 1925-1929
7. Manitoba Wheat Pool 1925-1931
8. Pool Grain Marketing after 1929 Overpayment 1928-1936
9. Historical Review of Grain Trade and MPE
10. MPE Library 1948-1952
11. Coarse Grain Handling 1948-1953
12. Canadian Wheat Board 1935-1960
13. Saskatchewan Wheat Pool 1949
14. 1929 Overpayment and Williams/Stamp Commission Newspaper Clippings 1929-1931
15. Leonard Harman 1972
16. Historical Publications 1995-1996; no dates
17. Miscellaneous Historical
18. Western Agricultural Conference and Farm Bureau 1963-1965
19. Canadian Co-operatives 1961-1969
20. Miscellaneous Historical Topics 1930
21. Miscellaneous Historical Topics 1934-1936
22. International Wheat Agreement 1941-1948
23. World War Two 1939, 1944
24. Canadian National Railway System
25. Overpayment Aftermath 1932-1938
26. Miscellaneous Pool History 1925-1931
27. Miscellaneous History
28a. MPE History (Acquisitions, Philosophy) up to 1979 1931-1979
28b. MPE History (Acquisitions, Philosophy) up to 1979 1931-1979
This box contains minutes generated by local MPE associations, collected by the central office. Records include the following:
127. SD #405 (Alexander, Beresford, Souris) June 27 1996 - July 12 1999
128. SD #404 (Hartney, Elgin/Fairfax) April 19 1996 - July 2 1999
129. SD #403 (Waskada, Deloraine, Goodlands/Medora) Dec 14 1995 - August 17 1999
130. SD #402 (Melita, Pierson) Nov 23 1995 - Oct 12 1999
131. SD #401 (Erikson, Cromer, Sinclair)
132. SD #503 (Elkhorn, Virden, Kirkella, McAuley) Dec 1 1995 - June 28 1999
133. SD #504 (Oakner, Quadra) July 31 1997 - April 14 1999
134. SD #301 (Killarney, Ninga, Dunrea, Boissevain) August 14 1996 - August 9 1999
135. SD and Local Miscellaneous
The Pool livestock advisory boards and livestock markets were organized under the MPE when MPE merger with the Manitoba Co-operative Livestock Producers Ltd in 1948. The livestock pools operated in much the same way the grain pools did. The MPE Livestock Division was overseen by the Canadian Livestock Co-operative (Western) Limited (known as the C.L.C.). Local shipping associations shipped livestock to a central selling agency in St. Boniface, although this changed with the development of the rural highway system in Manitoba and the founding of Pool Packers.
See also fonds level description of RG 4 for history/bio of MPE
Scope and Content
This sub-series consists of Livestock Division records, Virden Auction Market records, Brandon Livestock Advisory Committee records, Elkhorn Co-operative Livestock records, and Swan River Livestock Association Ltd.
