Originally Posted by Bitumen Bullet
And that is exactly what Canada want's you to remember. They do not want you to know that in what is Manitoba today there was another colony, a successful colony with many businesses, including wind, water and the latest in technology Steam powered mills producing cloth and flour for use across what is today Western Canada.
They do not want you to think of the Riel family as French settlers with their own farm and mill living in a well established colony with all the rights of British Subjects. Nor do they want people to think of the international trade occurring in today's Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, or the thousands living and working in and around Manitoba's ocean ports. Work that included manufacturing, as well as shipping and logistics.
They want people to believe that there was nothing to see here, no truth to the stories that Canada was using it's military for force people, British Subjects, some French and Catholic into capitulation.
At the time the reason was clear. Confederation was tenuous. The image of forcing French Catholics off land that was rightfully theirs would not play well in Quebec. Best for Canada's PR to play on the racism of the day and tell Canadians the only people being killed by the military were savages and worst yet mixed bloods.
But the PR story continues to be told. We are still taught that there was no one here but a few Indians and violent Metis. Canada does not want it's history in the West known or talked about and for similar reasons.
If it was taught in classrooms that people had already settled in the West, that there were active and growing industries, that trade with the world was occurring through busy ocean ports employing thousands the people living in those areas today might start to ask questions.
They might ask what happened to the ocean ports after hundreds of years of regular use. They might ask what happen to the many mills in Manitoba, and they might learn that Canada had little interest in such supporting them. That Canada didn't want goods being shipped internationally out of the West, and brought in laws to make that illegal for many products, that all valuable products were to be shipped east, not north or south.
People might learn that the homegrown wheat and flour industry of Manitoba, ideally placed to grow from increased trade would become completely dominated by A.W. Ogilvie & Co. of Montreal. That Canadian companies were given preference over local companies, resulting in profits flowing east rather than back into local communities.
If people started looking they might come to learn that not only had a growing local business suffer while Canadian businesses were given advantage they might learn that even those wanting to start a business, or even get a loan for a new farm would be at a disadvantage thanks to a Canadian banking system that had only 11 banks all headquartered in the East. While the U.S. to the south had one bank for every 3,600 Canada had one bank for every 63,000 Canadians, staving the West of much needed capital.
They might even ask why Canada was in such a rush to build a railway.
Ancient history isn't ancient if you are still living with it.
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