Marshman family 2 time century farm award recipient

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Looking back on old pictures and learning the history of our family farm has been a wonderful experience but I think to myself why in God’s name would four brothers from Pennsylvania choose to purchase in 1909 the land we farm today. Their closest terminal was Crossfield where they pulled the grain wagons with horses. There were only two or three farmers in the area. Our pictures show that the winter weather was close to what we experienced this past winter. This is a beautiful area but come on, it would have been pretty barren by the standards of even the smallest of towns in Pennsylvania. But today, I thank God for these men who chose to put their roots down here. As I see so many family farms being taken over by the urban sprawl, we are blessed that we are still able to live the life of a farmer.

There may have only been two or three farmers but as would have it Winfield cottoned onto a neighbor’s daughter, Carrie (Mildred) Leathart and married her in 1913. Winfield took over the farming from Mildred’s father who lived five miles from the Marshman home place. To this day, the Marshman’s have been farming both the paternal and maternal grandparents original land. Lloyd and I are fortunate to own the Leathart land. Don Leathart (who lived on the farm until the 30’s) died two years ago at the age of 96. We received some heirlooms including some of the original articles our ancestors had when they first arrived here.

It is with great credit to William (Clara), Winfield (Mildred) and then to Merle (Verna) that we have been able to stay on this land. To have kept our farm going through the 30’s, the war, the droughts, and the ups and downs of the market is quite an accomplishment. Merle had five children, the three sons took over the farming in the early 90’s. Gerald the youngest still lives at Merle’s home place. Dwayne, who we lost to cancer in 2012, lived at Merle’s father’s place, where his wife Mary and his daughter Kim Salt (Ben) still live. Lloyd the oldest, lives by the old Leathart home place. We all still farm. Merle’s sons are getting to retirement age and it is his grandchildren that are starting to pick up the reins. Kim and Steve are actively farming now. The arrival of nine great grandchildren may prove that these farms will prosper for another 100 years and more.

I do not call our ancestors homesteaders because the land was purchased from Calgary Colonization, they were not homesteading. A fact I learned when Lloyd and I spend many hours trying to get the information documented for the Leathart century plaque. We feel fortunate that Dwayne was with us when the family received the County plaque for 100 years of farming on the Marshman land but the documents for the Alberta plaque remained elusive. The Leatharts was proving difficult too. Finally this past winter we found what we needed. The Glenbow archives held the 1909 Certificate of Purchase for the Marshman land, and by finally thinking what would possibly have a Leathart name on it we thought of taxes. You own land, you pay tax! To our great relief and a good story thrown in we found they had only one tax book and only for 1915. It covered one township but it had our land, we thought we had hit the jackpot and felt 1915, oh well we would just have to wait a year. When the clerk brought us the book as we scanned the document we realized that the Leatharts had an outstanding tax of $2.60 since 1912!

We put the “Marshman/Leathart Family” on the plaque because we felt it is a family treasure that all of the Marshmans can be proud of. Grandpa Merle, 88 years old, Lloyd (Cheryl) and family, Dwayne (Mary) and family, Rachel (Wayne) and family, Arlene and Gerald can all say they have picked saskatoons, picked rocks and got stuck in the gumbo on this land and now after 102 years, this land has given each one of us our own story to tell.