Historical Vignette
Members of the Winnipeg Grain and Produce Exchange (the precursor to Winnipeg Grain Exchange) in 1904, the year that wheat, oats and flax futures were introduced.
Winnipeg Grain Exchange By Joan Cohen
bestowed an unexpected blessing. We haven’t been in a hurry, these people will tell you, to throw out the old and welcome the new - be it furniture or a decorative piece or older buildings - on the grounds that a spiffy new ches- terfield or a redevelopment project is neither needed yet nor affordable. And so it is that we have hung onto
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Winnipeg’s downtown Exchange Dis- trict with its 20 densely packed city blocks of well-preserved, often upscale and architect-designed buildings of turn-of-the-century (20th) vintage. In 1997, Ottawa designated it a national historic site. A statement signed by federal, pro- vincial and civic officials, explains why the district is a “unique, tangible lega- cy” of its times, and leaves no question as to why this core district carries the name of a single historic enterprise, the Winnipeg Grain Exchange, which operated there for 120 years. Te years between 1878 and 1913
produced a remarkably expansionist era, which saw Winnipeg transformed from a modest pioneer settlement to
36 • Winter 2014
ou hear sometimes from market experts how Winni- peg’s slow-growth economy of this past century has
By 1902, the city had become a more important handler of grain than Chicago. Its influence extended worldwide.
western Canada’s largest metropolitan centre. At the start of the period, on the rich land south and west of the city, spring wheat was showing inter- esting potential, and immigration soon soared. By law after 1899, all prairie wheat
would come to Winnipeg to be tested; once there most of it would be traded through the Winnipeg exchange. By 1902, the city had become a more im- portant handler of grain than Chicago. Its influence extended worldwide. Te city grew, supplying merchan- dise, lumber, agricultural equipment
and financing services to the settlers pouring onto the prairies. It was now at the core of an ever-stronger regional economy based on commercial agri- culture and the wheat trade. Winnipeg’s population in 1870
stood at around 100 people. By 1875, it had grown to 5,000, adding law- yers, real estate operators, bankers to the fur traders operating there. In the 1911 census, the population numbered 136,035. Winnipeg had become the country’s third largest city. Te first wheat exports went out
from Winnipeg in 1876, some 857 bushels, destination Ontario. Winni- peg businessmen quickly took out ads offering cash for Canadian wheat, for selling overseas. It would be another 11 years though
before the business leaders – most of them now leading grain merchants in the city – would gather in Winni- peg City Hall to create the Winnipeg Grain Exchange as the centre for han- dling and marketing prairie wheat. Its role was to provide marketing facilities, set rules of trade and publish market information. In its early years, all sales were for cash. In 1904, the exchange launched its long anticipated wheat futures market
The Hub
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