In search of photos of the veg patch in their backyards!

by Delta Fay Cruickshank for the Biggar Museum and Gallery

How’s your garden growing this year?

Ours at the museum is doing great. Just harvested all the cucumbers and processed them into Hot Dog Relish that will be available during the Christmas Magic Auction on Facebook that will take place at the end of November and first of December. The self-seeded sunflowers are just awesome this year. We may need a chainsaw to take them down in November! In the meantime, it’s fun to watch the birds grabbing some seeds. We planted them last year to honour those suffering in Ukraine with that war, which unfortunately continues.

The sunflower is a symbol of Ukraine. My heart goes out to those people to have got through COVID and now having to live through a devastating war. I shake my head at the insanity of it all.

The gardens at home are producing. Lydia planted them this year and they look beautiful! The peas are delicious, and we will likely have more than enough zucchini! The purple pole beans are slow though. What did the homesteaders first grow to eat? Likely potatoes I would say. Do you have memories and pictures of your great granny’s garden? I would sure like a copy if you had some. If you bring them in, we can copy them and return them back to you.

Seems back in the day, ones’ humble veg patch out back did not warrant photography. I looked all through MemorySask and only found these two photos that actually showed an edible crop. Cabbages, lots of cabbages! Did these cabbages end up in Biggar, or did they go to Saskatoon? Did they all get made into sauerkraut? So many questions!

But surely to goodness cabbage was not the only crop for the table people grew. Was there a farmers’ market back in the

‘40’s? Did someone have market gardens back in the day? We had good grocery stores, did they sell local produce? Again, so many questions! If you know anything at all, please call me at the museum 306-948-3451.