Date Published:
April 2007

L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

Land distribution as per the Dominion Lands Act

[1872+]

Claude Bélanger,

Department of History,

Marianopolis College

This township grid shows the situation as created by the Dominion Lands Act of 1872. However, it also incorporates the decisions made to set aside for the Hudson Bay Company 1/20th of the fertile land of the West and the effect of granting 25,000,000 acres to the Canadian Pacific Railway as per its contract of 1881.

Immigrant farmers into the Prairies could claim ¼ section of land for the cost of registration of the land and of surveying. If they began development of their land within three years, they could claim, under the same conditions, another ¼ section. Thus, the standard farm in the West rapidly became one of 320 acres. However, it is clear that much of the best land was not available free to the settlers but had to be puchased from the Hudson Bay Company or the Canadian Pacific Railway.