MY GRANDPA WAS A FARMER

The village schools being located in a rural community taught subjects with an agriculture significance. We studied the importance of weed control, types of insects that cause plant damage, when to spray apples and why black giant chickens were not considered good egg producers.

By the time you graduated from grade twelve you had a good basic understanding of farming and the problems associated with food production.

The Ministry of Agriculture in Ottawa during the early part of the century approved textbooks for use in Ontario elementary schools. This ministry made sure the readers, geography books, arithmetic texts for each grade and the books used to study a subject called agriculture utilized considerable material related to farming and the improvement of Canada's number one industry of the period.

Public school students could calculate the rods of fence required to enclose a ten acre field; the cost of a dozen eggs after you deduct the cost of feeding the chickens; the difference between sheep kept for wool production and the lamb chop varieties. Questions of this nature would be part of the high school entrance exams.

High school students determined the butter fat content of cream; the breeds of cattle suited for milk production, for butter, cheese or other milk products; the bovines best suited for good beef production and why a York hog was necessary for long sides of bacon.

Students studied stories in their readers about Red Fife and Marquis wheat; why Peter McArthur stayed on the farm; and the pioneers that made Canada an agricultural nation.

The Geography book had articles about soil erosion, rainfall required for certain crops and why some farming areas are indigenous for fruit, grain or general farming.

Practical lessons in agriculture were demonstrated by cultivation and planting in the school garden plot. The pasteurization of milk was also a lesson in health and how a balanced diet of food was essential for the child' s growth and development.

One year , the village school considered it of great interest for the students to understand "Bee culture" and the part bees played in the apple production of the area. A hive of bees, in a glass sided hive was installed in a window of the upper room. The bees could come and go at will and the students watched as they filled the comb with honey. Lessons were conducted in bee culture and the part each member of a bee society played in honey production, pollinating blossoms, doing the menial chores of the hive, and bees that spent their time looking after the queen bee.

One day in late June, a beekeeper was called to remove a swarm of bees from a schoolyard tree; enticed the queen and her bees to enter a new hive, especially prepared for the event, and because of the location of the hive that had to be left till dark, part of the school playground was out of bounds. The only lesson some of the students had of this venture, was how a paste of baking soda reduced the hurt of a bee sting, to some degree. Several students developed an awareness that a small insect could cause some part of the body to swell to oversized proportions. The school board was lucky; not one family sued them for injury to their son or daughter.

The village school produced few agronomists and beekeeping was not continued as a form of practical agriculture education.
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