6h P. Smith Family Left to Right Back Row : Mary, William, Ada

Front Row Left to Right: John P., Elizabeth, Edith (Roberts) (Courtesy of Sandra Gallant)

War, there was world—wide prosperity and exceptionally rapid development within Canada?’23 For at least part of this decade P.E.I. farmers were getting $1.75 per bushel for potatoes; and a carriage horse cost $200.00. Some peo- ple, like Father Alfred E. Burke, in 1904, declared there were no really poor people in P.E.I., unless they were “willfully and perversely poor’.’24

One of the most successful farmers in the communities was the pastor, Father John J. MacDonald. He practised agriculture scientifically, and eagerly tried new kinds of grains; he planted a large apple orchard on the parish farm, and became respected throughout the Maritime Provinces for his pure-bred Jersey cattle. The photograph on page 63 shows some of his cattle being exhibited in front of the parochial house. The following article from an Atlantic farm journal recounts his successes.

62

The clergy of Prince Edward Island are all more or less actively interested in the agricultural development of the country. There is one however who seems to take more than ordinary interest. This is the Rev. J.J. McDonald (sic) of Kinkora. He has a wide reputation as a stock breeder, having for a number of years past exhibited quite largely at their fairs. He is a breeder of the pure Jersey and at present has some excellent specimens. His two year old bull “General Hutton,” imported from Ontario, is an excellent specimen. He has at present several registered animals. Father McDonald is the proud possessor of twelve 1 st. Prize tickets from animals exhibited. 25

If P.E.I. farmers were to enjoy continued prosperity they needed a reliable system for transporting their farm pro— ducts to the mainland. The small boats then in use were not icebreakers, requiring exports to be shipped before winter. This made Island farmers hostages to off—shore buyers who could offer the lowest prices and get the lion’s share of the harvest. Farmers in the five communities were organized into a Farmers’ Institute in Township 27; and, during the decade they met and petitioned both provin- cial and federal politicians for help.26 Numerous letters of complaints were printed in the RBI. newspapers. Their frustration may be seen in the following lines by an anonymous writer from Kinkora, as an entry in a limerick contest. It did not win but the editor printed it, with a critical remark that it “did not scan properly,’ and was “worded somewhat strongly?

We all want the Tunnel. Don’t wait Till the new steamer fails on the Strait, For the dullest must know

That our hay at Pictou

Will congest at a hell of a rate.”