100 Years - The CCUB

When the CCUB commune was started in British Columbia producing fruit, vegetables and lumber, these products were shipped to Saskatchewan and in return, British Columbia would receive grain, horses and other farm products. Since the distance between the two prowinces was too great, a commune was organized in Alberta.

The first settlement was started in 1915. In 1916 and 1917 more land was purchased by Cowley, Alberta, bringing the total acreage to 12,000. Three hundred people lived in 13 small villages; virgin land was ploughed by steam engines which pulled ten-bottom* ploughs. Ten teams of oxen arrived from Saskatchewan and four were hitched to a two-bottom plough. Horse drawn ploughs were also used. Two elevators, one in Cowley and one in Lundbreck were constructed. In 1926 a flour mill was built in Lundbreck which had a capacity to mill one hundred barrels of flour per day.

In 1924 CCUB assets in Alberta were assessed at $590,572.00. The commune had 320 horses, 9 registered mares and 7 registered Percheron stallions. One stallion cost $5,000. A hip-roofed barn in the village of God's Grace had 32 stalls and a lean-to which served as an enclosure for a stallion and part of it was a workshop.

In a letter written an March 5, 1925, from General Manager Shukin in BC to Paul Potapoff, General Manager, Alberta, Shukin thanks Alberta for providing British Columbia with their daily bread [bread in Russian also means grain]. In page 2, and page 3 he states that 'we have need of horses as there are lucrative logging operations available.' He asks that Alberta 'send two carloads of young horses which could be used in orchards, and the older ones would be used for logging. Send one carload to Grand Forks and one to Brilliant.'

It was not economical to ship horses from Saskatchewan. Hay, oats and water had to be taken in the box car and a person had to go along to tend to the animals. Carloads of horses could be loaded in Cowley in the evening and the shipment would arrive in Brilliant next morning. Train service was much better then.

Michael M. Verigin, Cowley, 1975

* A`bottom' referred to the ploughshare which would plough one furrow. The bigger the plough, the more 'bottoms'.

"... it was quite a job, you know, it was new settlement and new horses. The horses were young, and here we have to work all day, harrowing, then evening, atter six o'clock we have to go north; that's nine miles to the Terrill Ranch*, and the weather was perfectly right for that year, I believe it was 1919. The crop was very good for those who had seeded in the spring, but there was lots of rain, the ruts were awful, and the horses were poor, their feed was poor, so we travel pretty well half the night - then we have to be in Lundbreck for breakfast, that means six o'clock in the moming, and by that time, the hay that we hauled had to be unloaded into the box cars. So we spent all spring, two months, working all day and then travelling all night, loading hay into cars..." (First-hand informant)

*Called Baghatni Rodnik, Rich Springs, by the Doukhobors, near Lundbreck. Alberta.

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