This United Grain Growers elevator at Belmont occupied the site of a former elevator purchased by UGG from Canadian Consolidated Grain in 1959. Renovated in 1966, it was destroyed by fire on April 18, 1973. Rebuilt as a 109,000-bushel elevator and crib annex in 1974, it was closed permanently in January 1999, about 18 months after this photo was taken. It was demolished in October 2000.
Photo: George Penner
Two off-track elevators at Cypress River, seen in this photo from July 2018, are operated by Paterson Grain. The western (left) elevator was built in 1927 and expanded with balloon annexes in 1940, 1953, and 1963. The annexes were replaced by four steel tanks in the 1980s. The eastern (right) elevator was built in 1928 by Manitoba Pool. Its capacity was augmented with a balloon annex in 1954 and a crib annex in 1976. Closed by Agricore in 2001, it was sold to Paterson in 2004. Formerly serviced by the CPR Glenboro Subdivision, the line past the elevators was abandoned in September 2014 and the rails were removed in the summer of 2016.
Photo: Gordon Goldsborough
This photo of the elevators at Minto was taken in August 2014, shortly after a windstorm damaged the former Manitoba Pool elevator (40,000 bushels, built in 1928 and traded to Paterson Grain in mid-1988) at left. The former Paterson elevator (32,000 bushels, built in 1936 and closed in 2005) at right fared somewhat better but both of them, in deteriorating condition generally, were deemed too costly to repair by the local farmer-owner. He demolished them in February 2015 but salvaged two steel bins on each side of the Paterson. They remain in active use.
Photo: Jean McManus
A 50,000-bushel elevator at Arden was built in 1926 by Manitoba Pool Elevators. In 1952, the 30,000-bushel “Pool B” elevator (purchased from Western Canada Flour Mills in 1940) was moved beside it and converted to an annex. Renovated in 1970, a new 60,000-bushel crib annex was added in 1981. Closed by Agricore in the summer of 1999, it was sold in 2001 to the 80-member Canadian Organic Commodity Marketing Coop then reopened in January 2003, after a period of intensive cleaning, as the first certified organic-only elevator in Manitoba. Closed in 2006, the elevator was purchased by the Rolling Acres Hutterite Colony for its own grain storage needs.
Photo: Gordon Goldsborough
In the 1950s, there were over 700 grain elevators in Manitoba. Today, there are fewer than 200. You can help to preserve the legacy of these disappearing “Prairie sentinels.”
The Manitoba Historical Society (MHS) is gathering information about all elevators that ever stood in Manitoba, regardless of their present status. Collaborating with the Manitoba Co-operator it is supplying these images of a grain elevator each week in hopes readers will be able to tell the society more about it, or any other elevator they know of.
MHS Gordon Goldsborough webmaster and Journal editor has developed a website to post your replies to a series of questions about elevators. The MHS is interested in all grain elevators that have served the farm community.
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Your contributions will help gather historical information such as present status of elevators, names of companies, owners and agents, rail lines, year elevators were built — and dates when they were torn down (if applicable).
There is room on the website to post personal recollections and stories related to grain elevators. The MHS presently also has only a partial list of all elevators that have been demolished. You can help by updating that list if you know of one not included on that list.
Your contributions are greatly appreciated and will help the MHS develop a comprehensive, searchable database to preserve the farm community’s collective knowledge of what was once a vast network of grain elevators across Manitoba.
Please contribute to This Old Grain Elevator website here.
You will receive a response, by email or phone call, confirming that your submission was received.
Goldsborough is interested in hearing all sorts of experiences about the elevators — funny, sad, or anything in between. Readers willing to share their stories can leave messages at 204-474-7469.
