In 1892 the Calgary Tribune published an editorial entitled
"Jewish Immigration." In the writer's view, "the
Jew, especially the Jew of Eastern Europe, is particularly noted
for his inability to adapt himself to any but an urban
occupation."1
More than a century later, the casual observer might at first
assume that the editorialist was correct. Today, Alberta's Jewish
communities are overwhelmingly urban, and there is little physical
evidence of any Jewish presence in the province's smaller centres
and rural areas. But historical records tell a different story.
The Jewish presence in Alberta predates the province's formation
by more than two decades and once included farmers, ranchers, and
traders as well as business and community leaders in villages,
towns, and cities across the province. At least two place names in
rural Alberta are named for Jews -Frank, in the Crowsnest Pass,
and Nordegg, in west central Alberta. Both are in honour of men
who operated coal mines in these communities, Henry L. Frank and
Martin Nordegg.
While the Jewish communities in Calgary and Edmonton have thrived,
those in smaller communities and rural areas have declined or
disappeared. Jewish farming, in particular, is a largely-forgotten
phenomenon in Alberta's history.
The first Jews known to have visited Alberta were traders and
merchants who came north from Montana Territory. One of the first
to be recorded was a gold prospector. The Fort Edmonton journal
for September 15, 1869 states, "Mr. Silverman (a Jew) and a
party
of 4 Americans & a Negro started for Fort Benton
today."2 The next known visitor was a man named Moses Solomon
who owned a saloon in Fort Benton, Montana. In 1873 he built a
trading post on the Belly River, south-east of the present Fort
Macleod, and traded that winter with the Indians.3 Four years
later, a Jew named Ursinger brought a herd of horses from Montana
to sell to the Indians signing the Blackfoot Treaty. The remainder
of the herd was sold to the Rev. John McDougall.4 A few weeks
later, on December 2, 1877, a Mounted Policeman at Fort Calgary
wrote in his diary that "Severn, a Jew, arrived with horses
to trade with the Indians."5
However, not until the 1880s and the arrival of the Canadian
Pacific Railway did Jews begin arriving in appreciable numbers. In
1882 some 150 Russian Jews joined the CPR construction crews that
built the railway as far west as Medicine Hat; at least one Jewish
labourer, possibly more, worked on the line through to Calgary in
1883.6 According to one source, they worked under a
Yiddish-speaking foreman, ate kosher food, kept the Sabbath, and
brought a Torah scroll for worship services.7 The Winnipeg-based
Repstein brothers, whose Cheap Cash Store followed the railhead as
it moved west, advertised in the first issue of the Calgary Herald
on August 31, 1883.
Most Jewish immigrants to prairie Canada came from the "Pale
of Settlement," a zone of the Russian Empire where Jewish
residents were confined to live. When revolutionaries
assassinated
Czar Alexander II in 1881, the Russian government blamed the Jews
for the nation's problems. They were expelled from certain major
cities and from the countryside, and they were forbidden to rent
or purchase land for agricultural use.8 Vicious pogroms,
anti-Jewish legislation, and military conscription drove many to
leave the country, even though they had difficulty in securing
permission to emigrate.
At this time, the Canadian government was anxious to colonize its
newly-acquired western territory. Canada's High Commissioner in
London, Sir Alexander Galt, saw Jewish refugees as prospective
Canadian farmers. He convinced the reluctant Prime Minister, Sir
John A. Macdonald, to admit Jews as agricultural settlers. Some of
the refugees were influenced by the Am Olam movement, a Jewish
"back to the land" ideal intended to
"normalize" Jews by turning them into producers rather
than artisans or traders. European Jewish philanthropists such as
Baron de Hirsch of France, financed Jewish bloc settlements in
various regions, including western Canada.