A nugget of local history

By Joan Janzen
joanjanzen@yahoo.com

Recently, a reader contacted Your Southwest Media Group, saying the brown house in a particular photo that Kate had taken was originally on a farm northeast of Sibbald, where an experimental farm was located.

The establishing of experimental farms received royal assent in 1886, but it wasn’t until the turn of the century that they were established in Alberta. Some of them existed for a relatively brief period, which was the case for the farm located near Sibbald.

Sometime after the Depression, the house was moved to its present location. That location is now the farm belonging to Alan and Ramona Chiliak, near Oyen, Alberta.

Alan Chiliak said the experimental farm was a sister research farm to the ones located in Indian Head, Rosthern, Swift Current and other locations. “It was called ‘Fogelvik’ (meaning bird sanctuary). It was started by a man named Andrew Anderson and his wife and brother-in-law,” Alan explained.

“The original house, along with the barn and a few other outbuildings, are still standing on the farm a mile south of Laporte on the Leader grid.”

The establishing of experimental farms was to test crops, livestock housing, nutrition and management of animals, and manure as a fertilizer and the planting of shelterbelts. Andrew Anderson sold his farm to a Hutterite colony in 1932, and the colony later abandoned the farm in 1937.

“All the remaining yard assets were purchased by Raymond Wagner from Eatonia,” Alan said.

Alan has much more information about the experimental farm’s history, which he has found in the Glenbow Museum in Calgary, the Legislature in Edmonton, the Parliament building in Ottawa, and surprisingly enough, Buckingham Palace in London. He also has had the opportunity to speak to the original owners’ granddaughter, who lives in California.

Due to time restraints, I could not obtain all this additional information from Alan, but sometime in the future, we will chat and find out “the rest of the story.”

PHOTO BY KATE WINQUIST
The house on the right has quite a storied history. It currently sits approximately a mile south of the hamlet of Laporte.