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Food security was a burning issue a century ago

On the evening of Nov. 1, 1937, hundreds of delegates and other residents from all along the west coast packed a hall in Port au Port to hear speeches during the region’s first ever co-operative conference.

Among those giving “stirring addresses,” writes a Western Star correspondent, was Rev. Oliver Jackson, superintendent of missions for the United Church, who happened to be in the district.

Jackson was one of the earliest boosters of the co-operative movement, and likely had a spring in his step as he left that Monday night meeting.

Less than 48 hours later, he was dead — drowned after falling overboard in rough seas moments after leaving the tiny south coast community of West Point.

A farewell party watched in horror from the shore as his protégé, student missionary Wallace Harris, also perished while trying to rescue him.

Their small open boat, the Mitzpah, was later found wrecked on nearby rocks.

Jackson had spent the better part of 25 years visiting isolated outports across Newfoundland, encouraging education and self-sufficiency among the poor population. He had an energetic and engaging personality, and was welcomed openly by most he met. But he didn’t hesitate to ruffle a few feathers, calling to task business and political leaders who he felt were resisting the need for change.

In his short book “Apostle of the Outports,” a tribute to his predecessor, Max Dawe describes how Jackson, who first arrived in Newfoundland from Wales as a young Methodist missionary in 1911, became increasingly passionate about the economic state of the population.

“The dreadful conditions under which so many of the Newfoundland people have been living for years because of economic impoverishment and isolation impressed themselves upon his sensitive soul more and more as the years went by, so that he who began his work as friend and counsellor of youth, now became an ardent champion of the rights of the common people,” Dawe wrote.

To quote from the reverend’s own log: “How has it come to pass in Newfoundland that the producers all around her coast, in schooners or on land, fishermen, sailors, small farmers or loggers, are now dumb slave of a truck system which deprives them of their economic freedom? They are afraid to speak out because to do so would mean suffering for their families, but a hot sense of injustice can be felt and a good deal of ominous grumbling heard among the men themselves.”

Jackson wrote several columns and articles about farming — a popular one was titled “Our Friend the Pig” — and inspired many young people to take up the torch along the way.

His ministry 100 years ago paints an interesting parallel to today’s explosion of interest in community gardens and food self-sufficiency.

Then, like now, it was external forces that threatened the livelihood of communities. Today’s challenges are more global and in some ways more ominous — climate change, the factory food system — but in both cases it took a grassroots movement to exact change.

As retired religious studies professor Hans Rollmann points out, Jackson wasn’t the first local clergyman to promote horticulture.

The Moravian missionaries, who settled in Inuit territory in the 1700s, managed to supplement their diet and that of the locals with fresh vegetables.

“Determined to succeed with horticulture, the Moravians developed gardening methods best suited for a climate such as Labrador,” Rollmann wrote in one of his regular Telegram columns several years ago. “Even in Hebron, there were eventually thriving gardens, and in Ramah, north of Hebron, they built a greenhouse.”

Rollmann also highlights the efforts of Bishop Ronald MacDonald — yes, his real name — of Harbour Grace, “a progressive Roman Catholic (and) an ardent proponent of gardening and agriculture.”

MacDonald was essentially the grandfather of home-grown agricultural research. He was appointed by the government in 1899 to lead a commission to look into the matter. His recommendations? The creation of a ministry of agriculture and industries, division of Newfoundland into agricultural districts, and establishment of agricultural colleges, farming schools, model farms and experimental stations.

MacDonald and his commissioners felt the government could provide more than just guidance.

Said Rollmann: “Support of agriculture by the government, they thought, was not confined to practical know-how but had a more far-reaching ethical intent, in that it was to awaken a spirit of initiative, independence and self-help throughout Newfoundland and Labrador.”

It was, perhaps, their deep faith that helped religious pioneers such as MacDonald and Jackson see great potential where countless other visitors to Newfoundland saw nothing but rocks and barrens.

As Jackson put it, "We have fine natural resources in our fisheries and our minerals, and I have found deep valleys, broad rivers, timber and grassland and good soil. Let us go out and defy the depression. Let us have faith in our country's resources, in ourselves, in God. Let us prove our mettle by digging deeper into the soil."

Peter Jackson, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Telegram