Neighbours and Networks: The Blood Tribe in the Southern Alberta Economy, 1884–1939 (review)

The Kainai or the Blood people once shared the vast plains regions of southern and central Alberta with other nations of the Blackfoot Confederacy before signing Treaty 7 in 1877. Much was recorded about their roles as prominent buffalo hunters and traders in the voluminous Hudson's Bay Company's archives. Their colourful and charismatic leaders like Red Crow and Medicine Calf along with their involvement in treaty negotiations have entered the ken of popular historians of Canada. These historical sources, however, have captured the Kainai largely as a people of the nineteenth century. A keen and curious student of Native history then may wonder what happened to them in the twentieth century. W. Keith Regular's Neighbours and Networks provides some answers to this question. It is indeed a welcome addition both to the genre of much-neglected twentieth-century Native history, in particular that of Native labour, which Rolf Knight pioneered, and to the local economic history of southern Alberta.

Similar in approach to the accounts of labour historians, Neighbours and Networks is roughly divided into occupational categories, in which the Kainai workers were actively engaged from 1884 to 1939, including coal mining, grazing, haying, freighting, and sugar beet farming. All these jobs were connected to the interests and aspirations of neighbouring newcomers, including those at the nwmp station at Fort Macleod and at Mormon settlements. According to Regular, the year 1884 was significant not only because the Kainai Reserve was set aside but also because it signalled the end of the traditional Native economy, which was soon 'supplanted by developed capitalism' (11). The 'integration' of the Kainai into the local economy resulted in the creation of a new partnership between local businesses and Kainai workers, and the Kainai workers played prominent roles in the development of the local economy at least until the onset of the Second World War.

Situated in the heart of the ranching empire that thrived in the late nineteenth century, the Kainai Reserve attracted many ranching entrepreneurs who wanted to lease or illegally enter the reserve to deal with their overgrazing problems. The Kainai and their Indian agent constantly sought better-paid and more secure lease agreements with ranching companies. The Kainai also supplied a large amount of hay to those off-reserve ranchers and to the nwmp. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Kainai's significant contribution to the ranching industry was noted by the local newspaper that described them as the 'hay maker[s] of southern Alberta' (86). Their freighting services included not only hay deliveries but also deliveries of coal produced on the reserve.

Just outside the reserve, emerging Mormon settlements, especially Raymond, began extensive irrigation agriculture, chiefly growing sugar beets. Kainai labourers were indispensable to sustain this labour-intensive enterprise for the first twelve years or so. Although there were new skills to be acquired, the Kainai quickly learned them and became successful workers. Some early Kainai entrepreneurs such as Prairie Chicken earned an independent contract to produce beets in ten-acre off-reserve plots.

Apart from documenting these labour activities, Regular examines the Kainai as consumers. The income from agriculture and the Treaty 7 annuities were the main source of the Kainai's purchasing power. Local non-Native merchants gave the Kainai credit in the hope of getting paid back soon after annuity payment day. However, things did not unfold as the merchants expected, and debts often remained unpaid for years. In his conclusion, Regular imaginatively claims that the 'shopping spree' the Kainai engaged in after receiving treaty payments was akin to the buffalo hunt. Now the general store replaced the hunt, and beef from the store replaced buffalo meat. 'True, whites largely drove the economy,' Regular contends, but the Kainai successfully responded to changes in it (173).

Overall, Regular reveals some interesting strategies the Kainai developed for coping with economic change, but he does so largely...