Editing Saskatchewan (section)

== History ==
{{Main|History of Saskatchewan}}
[[File:Henry Kelsey sees the buffalo on the western plains.jpg|left|upright|thumb|[[Charles William Jefferys]]'s 20th century illustration of [[Henry Kelsey]] observing a herd of [[American bison|bison]] on the western plains. ]]
Saskatchewan has been populated by various [[indigenous peoples of North America]], including members of the [[Sarcee people|Sarcee]], [[Niitsitapi]], [[Gros Ventre people|Atsina]], [[Cree]], [[Saulteaux]], [[Assiniboine people|Assiniboine]] (Nakoda), and [[Sioux]].

The first known European to enter Saskatchewan was [[Henry Kelsey]] from England in 1690, who travelled up the Saskatchewan River in hopes of trading fur with the region's indigenous peoples. [[Fort La Jonquière]] and [[Fort de la Corne]] were first established in 1751 and 1753 by early French explorers and traders. The first permanent European settlement was a [[Hudson's Bay Company]] post at [[Cumberland House, Saskatchewan|Cumberland House]], founded in 1774 by [[Samuel Hearne]].<ref>{{Cite journal |pmc=2094753 |year=2000 |last1=Houston |first1=C. S. |title=The first smallpox epidemic on the Canadian Plains: In the fur-traders' words |journal=The Canadian Journal of Infectious Diseases |volume=11 |issue=2 |pages=112–115 |last2=Houston |first2=S. |pmid=18159275 |doi=10.1155/2000/782978 |doi-access=free }}</ref> The southern part of the province was part of [[Louisiana (New Spain)|Spanish Louisiana]] from 1762 until 1802.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/349302/Louisiana-Purchase |title=Louisiana Purchase |encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica |access-date=December 31, 2014 |archive-date=May 1, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150501010249/http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/349302/Louisiana-Purchase |url-status=live }}</ref>

=== 19th century ===
In 1803, the [[Louisiana Purchase]] transferred from France to the United States part of what is now [[Alberta]] and Saskatchewan. In 1818, the U.S. ceded the area to Britain. Most of what is now Saskatchewan was part of [[Rupert's Land]] and controlled by the Hudson's Bay Company, which claimed rights to all watersheds flowing into [[Hudson Bay]], including the [[Saskatchewan River]], [[Churchill River (Hudson Bay)|Churchill]], [[Assiniboine River|Assiniboine]], [[Souris River|Souris]], and [[Qu'Appelle River]] systems.

In the late 1850s and early 1860s, scientific expeditions led by [[John Palliser]] and [[Henry Youle Hind]] explored the prairie region of the province.

In 1870, Canada acquired the Hudson's Bay Company's territories and formed the [[North-West Territories]] to administer the vast territory between [[British Columbia]] and [[Manitoba]]. The Crown also entered into a series of [[Numbered Treaties|numbered treaties]] with the indigenous peoples of the area, which serve as the basis of the relationship between [[First Nations in Canada|First Nations]], as they are called today, and the Crown. Since the late twentieth century, land losses and inequities as a result of those treaties have been subject to negotiation for settlement between the [[First Nations in Saskatchewan]] and the federal government, in collaboration with provincial governments.

In 1876, following their defeat of United States Army forces at the [[Battle of the Little Bighorn]] in [[Montana Territory]] in the United States, the [[Lakota people|Lakota]] Chief [[Sitting Bull]] led several thousand of his people to [[Wood Mountain, Saskatchewan|Wood Mountain]]. Survivors and descendants founded Wood Mountain Reserve in 1914.

The North-West Mounted Police set up several posts and forts across Saskatchewan, including [[Fort Walsh]] in the Cypress Hills, and [[Wood Mountain Regional Park|Wood Mountain]] Post in south-central Saskatchewan near the United States border.
[[File:Battle of Batoche Print by Seargent Grundy.jpg|thumb|The 1885 [[Battle of Batoche]] was a battle during the [[North-West Rebellion]]. 1885 illustration by Sergeant Grundy]]
Many [[Métis (people)|Métis]] people, who had not been signatories to a treaty, had moved to the [[Southbranch Settlement]] and [[Prince Albert, Saskatchewan|Prince Albert]] district north of present-day Saskatoon following the [[Red River Rebellion]] in Manitoba in 1870. In the early 1880s, the Canadian government refused to hear the Métis' grievances, which stemmed from land-use issues. Finally, in 1885, the Métis, led by [[Louis Riel]], staged the [[North-West Rebellion]] and declared a provisional government. They were defeated by a Canadian militia brought to the [[Canadian prairies]] by the new Canadian Pacific Railway. Riel, who surrendered and was convicted of treason in a packed Regina courtroom, was hanged on November 16, 1885. Since then, the government has recognized the Métis as an aboriginal people with status rights and provided them with various benefits.

==== European settlements ====
The national policy set by the federal government, the [[Canadian Pacific Railway]], the [[Hudson's Bay Company]] and associated land companies encouraged immigration. The ''[[Dominion Lands Act]]'' of 1872 permitted settlers to acquire one-quarter of a square mile of land to homestead and offered an additional quarter upon establishing a homestead. In 1874, the North-West Mounted Police began providing police services. In 1876, the ''North-West Territories Act'' provided for appointment, by the Ottawa, of a Lieutenant Governor and a Council to assist him.<ref>{{cite book |author=Howard A. Leeson |title=Saskatchewan Politics: Into the Twenty-first Century |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qb4hnmKhTEoC&pg=PA116 |year=2001 |publisher=U of Regina Press |page=116 |isbn=978-0-88977-131-4 |access-date=March 27, 2018 |archive-date=September 23, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200923200915/https://books.google.com/books?id=qb4hnmKhTEoC&pg=PA116 |url-status=live }}</ref>
[[File:Ad to attract Immigrants to wheat belt in 1898.jpg|thumb|An ad to attract immigrants to [[Western Canada]], 1898]]
Highly optimistic advertising campaigns promoted the benefits of prairie living. Potential immigrants read leaflets that described Canada as a favourable place to live and downplayed the need for agricultural expertise. Ads in ''The Nor'-West Farmer'' by the Commissioner of Immigration implied that western land held water, wood, gold, silver, iron, copper, and cheap coal for fuel, all of which were readily at hand. The reality was far harsher, especially for the first arrivals who lived in [[sod house]]s. However eastern money poured in and by 1913, long term mortgage loans to Saskatchewan farmers had reached $65 million.<ref>Sandra Rollings-Magnusson, "Canada's Most Wanted: Pioneer Women on the Western Prairies." ''Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology'' 2000 37(2): 223–238; W. T. Easterbrook, ''Farm Credit in Canada'' 1938.</ref>

The dominant groups comprised British settlers from eastern Canada and Britain, who comprised about half of the population during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They played the leading role in establishing the basic institutions of plains society, economy and government.<ref>Peter Bush, ''Western Challenge: The Presbyterian Church in Canada's Mission on the Prairies and North, 1885–1925.'' (2000); Marjory Harper, "Probing the Pioneer Questionnaires: British Settlement in Saskatchewan, 1887–1914." ''Saskatchewan History'' 2000 52(2): 28–46. ISSN 0036-4908</ref>

=== 20th century ===
Gender roles were sharply defined. Men were primarily responsible for breaking the land; planting and harvesting; building the house; buying, operating and repairing machinery; and handling finances. At first, there were many single men on the prairie, or husbands whose wives were still back east, but they had a hard time. They realized the need for a wife. In 1901, there were 19,200 families, but this surged to 150,300 families only 15 years later. Wives played a central role in settlement of the prairie region. Their labour, skills, and ability to adapt to the harsh environment proved decisive in meeting the challenges. They prepared bannock, beans and bacon, mended clothes, raised children, cleaned, tended the garden, helped at harvest time and nursed everyone back to health. While prevailing patriarchal attitudes, legislation, and economic principles obscured women's contributions, the flexibility exhibited by farm women in performing productive and nonproductive labour was critical to the survival of family farms, and thus to the success of the wheat economy.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rollings-Magnusson |first1=Sandra |year=2000 |title=Canada's Most Wanted: Pioneer Women on the Western Prairies |journal=Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology |volume=37 |issue=2 |pages=223–238 |doi=10.1111/j.1755-618X.2000.tb01265.x }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rowles |first1=E. |year=1952 |title=Bannock, beans and bacon: An investigation of pioneer diet |journal=Saskatchewan History |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=1–16 }}</ref>
[[File:Banquet celebrating new province of Saskatchewan.jpg|thumb|A banquet being held to commemorate the creation of Saskatchewan, 1905]]
On September 1, 1905, Saskatchewan became a province, with inauguration day held on September 4. Its political leaders at the time proclaimed its destiny was to become Canada's most powerful province. Saskatchewan embarked on an ambitious province-building program based on its Anglo-Canadian culture and wheat production for the export market. Population quintupled from 91,000 in 1901 to 492,000 in 1911, thanks to heavy immigration of farmers from Ukraine, U.S., Germany and Scandinavia. Efforts were made to assimilate the newcomers to British Canadian culture and values.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Pitsula |first1=James M. |year=2005 |title=Disparate Duo |journal=Beaver |volume=85 |issue=4 |pages=14–24 }}</ref>

In the 1905 provincial elections, Liberals won 16 of 25 seats in Saskatchewan. The Saskatchewan government bought out Bell Telephone Company in 1909, with the government owning the long-distance lines and left local service to small companies organized at the municipal level.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Love |first1=Ronald S. |year=2005 |title='A Harebrained Plan': Saskatchewan and the Formation of a Provincial Telephone Policy, 1906–1912 |journal=Saskatchewan History |volume=57 |issue=1 |pages=15–33 }}</ref> Premier Walter Scott preferred government assistance to outright ownership because he thought enterprises worked better if citizens had a stake in running them; he set up the Saskatchewan Cooperative Elevator Company in 1911. Despite pressure from farm groups for direct government involvement in the grain handling business, the Scott government opted to loan money to a farmer-owned elevator company. Saskatchewan in 1909 provided bond guarantees to railway companies for the construction of branch lines, alleviating the concerns of farmers who had trouble getting their wheat to market by waggon.<ref>Kevin H. Burley, ''The Development of Canada's Staples 1867–1939: A Documentary Collection'' (1970) pp 139–43.</ref> The [[Saskatchewan Grain Growers Association]], was the dominant political force in the province until the 1920s; it had close ties with the governing Liberal party. In 1913, the Saskatchewan Stock Growers Association was established with three goals: to watch over legislation; to forward the interests of the stock growers in every honourable and legitimate way; and to suggest to parliament legislation to meet changing conditions and requirements.<ref>[http://www.saskatchewanstockgrowers.com/ "Saskatchewan Stock Growers Association"] {{Webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160410113335/http://www.saskatchewanstockgrowers.com/ |date=April 10, 2016 }}, Official Website</ref>
[[File:Maury Geography 073A Saskatchewan.jpg|thumb|left|Farmers at work in 1907. The introduction of [[Marquis wheat]] saw wheat output soar in the province.]]
Immigration peaked in 1910, and in spite of the initial difficulties of frontier life – distance from towns, sod homes, and backbreaking labour – new settlers established a European-Canadian style of prosperous [[agrarian society]]. The long-term prosperity of the province depended on the world price of grain, which headed steadily upward from the 1880s to 1920, then plunged down. Wheat output was increased by new strains, such as the "[[Marquis wheat]]" strain which matured 8 days sooner and yielded 7 more bushels per acre (0.72&nbsp;m<sup>3</sup>/ha) than the previous standard, "[[Red Fife]]". The national output of wheat soared from {{convert|8|e6impbu|lk=in}} in 1896, to {{cvt|26|e6impbu}} in 1901, reaching {{cvt|151|e6impbu}} by 1921.<ref>{{cite book |author=Arthur Henry Reginald Buller |title=Essays on Wheat: Including the Discovery and Introduction of Marquis Wheat, the Early History of Wheat-growing in Manitoba, Wheat in Western Canada, the Origin of Red Bobs and Kitchener, and the Wild Wheat of Palestine |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YqMUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA218 |year=1919 |pages=218–20 |access-date=March 27, 2018 |archive-date=September 22, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200922193714/https://books.google.com/books?id=YqMUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA218 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Urban reform movements in Regina were based on support from business and professional groups. City planning, reform of local government, and municipal ownership of utilities were more widely supported by these two groups, often through such organizations as the Board of Trade. Church-related and other altruistic organizations generally supported social welfare and housing reforms; these groups were generally less successful in getting their own reforms enacted.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hengen |first1=Girard |year=1988 |title=A Case Study in Urban Reform: Regina Before the First World War |journal=Saskatchewan History |volume=41 |issue=1 |pages=19–34 }}</ref>

The province responded to the First World War in 1914 with patriotic enthusiasm and enjoyed the resultant economic boom for farms and cities alike. Emotional and intellectual support for the war emerged from the politics of Canadian national identity, the rural myth, and social gospel progressivism The Church of England was especially supportive. However, there was strong hostility toward German-Canadian farmers.<ref>James M. Pitsula, ''For All We Have and Are: Regina and the Experience of the Great War'' (U of Manitoba Press, 2008), p 280. [http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=25802 online review] {{Webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210410151832/https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=25802 |date=April 10, 2021 }}</ref> Recent Ukrainian immigrants were enemy aliens because of their citizenship in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. A small fraction were [[Ukrainian Canadian internment|taken to internment camps.]] Most of the internees were unskilled unemployed labourers who were imprisoned "because they were destitute, not because they were disloyal".<ref>Pitsula, ''For All We Have and Are'' p 41.</ref><ref>Lubomyr Luciuk, ''In Fear of the Barbed Wire Fence: Canada's First National Internment Operations and the Ukrainian Canadians, 1914–1920'' (Kingston: Kashtan Press, 2001).</ref>
[[File:Hawker-Eaton-InternmentCamp.jpg|thumb|A memorial stone for [[Ukrainian Canadian internment|Ukrainian Canadians interned]] during the [[First World War]] at the [[Saskatchewan Railway Museum]]]]
The price of wheat tripled and acreage seeded doubled. The wartime spirit of sacrifice intensified social reform movements that had predated the war and now came to fruition. Saskatchewan gave women the right to vote in 1916 and at the end of 1916 passed a referendum to prohibit the sale of alcohol.

In the late 1920s, the [[Ku Klux Klan in Canada|Ku Klux Klan]], imported from the United States and Ontario, gained brief popularity in nativist circles in Saskatchewan and Alberta. The Klan, briefly allied with the provincial Conservative party because of their mutual dislike for Premier [[James G. Gardiner|James G. "Jimmy" Gardiner]] and his Liberals (who ferociously fought the Klan), enjoyed about two years of prominence. It declined and disappeared, subject to widespread political and media opposition, plus internal scandals involving the use of the organization's funds.

==== Post–Second World War ====
In 1970, the first annual [[Canadian Western Agribition]] was held in Regina. This farm-industry trade show, with its strong emphasis on livestock, is rated as one of the five top livestock shows in North America, along with those in [[Houston, Texas|Houston]], [[Denver, Colorado|Denver]], [[Louisville, Kentucky|Louisville]] and [[Toronto]].
[[File:Queen and burmese.jpg|thumb|An equestrian statue of [[Elizabeth II]] in [[Regina, Saskatchewan|Regina]]. The statue was unveiled by the Queen in 2005.]]
The province celebrated the 75th anniversary of its establishment in 1980, with [[Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon]], presiding over the official ceremonies.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Archer |first=John H. |title=Regina: A Royal City |journal=Monarchy Canada Magazine |volume=Spring 1996 |year=1996 |url=http://www.monarchist.ca/mc/regina.htm |access-date=June 30, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080209220023/http://www.monarchist.ca/mc/regina.htm |archive-date=February 9, 2008 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Government of Saskatchewan > About Government > News Releases > February 2002 > Province Honours Princess Margaret |url=http://www.gov.sk.ca/news?newsId=89f899ba-9ec6-46ac-8049-aeeb33a0aeca |date=February 11, 2002 |website=gov.sk |publisher=Queen's Printer for Saskatchewan |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110706203611/http://www.gov.sk.ca/news?newsId=89f899ba-9ec6-46ac-8049-aeeb33a0aeca |archive-date=July 6, 2011 |access-date=February 15, 2011 }}</ref> In 2005, 25 years later, her sister, Queen [[Elizabeth II]], attended the events held to mark Saskatchewan's centennial.<ref>{{cite news |date=May 18, 2005 |title=Royal couple touches down in Saskatchewan |work=CTV |url=http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1116361103300_111770303/?hub=TopStories |access-date=June 30, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051001053156/http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1116361103300_111770303/?hub=TopStories |archive-date=October 1, 2005 }}</ref>

Since the late 20th century, First Nations have become more politically active in seeking justice for past inequities, especially related to the taking of indigenous lands by various governments. The federal and provincial governments have negotiated on numerous land claims, and developed a program of "Treaty Land Entitlement", enabling First Nations to buy land to be taken into reserves with money from settlements of claims.
<blockquote>"In 1992, the federal and provincial governments signed an historic land claim agreement with Saskatchewan First Nations. Under the Agreement, the First Nations received money to buy land on the open market. As a result, about 761,000 acres have been turned into reserve land and many First Nations continue to invest their settlement dollars in urban areas", including Saskatoon. The money from such settlements has enabled First Nations to invest in businesses and other economic infrastructure.<ref name="aadnc-aandc1" /></blockquote>

=== 21st century ===
In June 2021, a graveyard containing the remains of 751 unidentified people was found at the former [[Marieval Indian Residential School]], part of the [[Canadian Indian residential school system]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Sask. First Nation announces hundreds of unmarked graves found at former residential school site |url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/cowessess-graves-unmarked-residential-school-marieval-1.6077797 |website=CBC News |date=June 23, 2021 |access-date=August 2, 2021 |archive-date=July 18, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210718182241/https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/cowessess-graves-unmarked-residential-school-marieval-1.6077797 |url-status=live }}</ref>