Table of Contents

• List of Tables
• List of illustrations
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction

  The Meeting Place

• The Blackfoot
• The Coming of Montana Traders
• Hamilton and Healy's Trading Post
• Calgary's Changing Business System
• I.G. Baker and Co: American Enterprises in the Wagon-Row Era
• I.G. Baker and Co, and its Network of Stores
• Isaac Gilbert Baker and the Foundation of a Trading Company
• Expansion in Montana
• Trading in the Canadian Prairie Region
• Establishing a General Store in Calgary
• Survival and Expansion
• Responding to the Needs of the Mounted People
• Achieving Growth through Ties to Native People
• Changing Natural Environment
• Prosperity in the Mid- and Late 1980s
• I.G. Baker and Co's Relationship with its Main Competitor, Power and Bro.
• Ongoing Commitment to Banking
• Expanding Merchandise Sales
• New Management at the Calgary Store
• Sources of Beef
• I.G. Baker and Co and Capitalism
• Hudson's Bay Company: British Empire in the Wagon-Road Era
• Network of Trading Posts and Stores in Alberta
• John Bunn and the Establishment of a Store in Calgary
• Conflict between Richard Hardisty and Robert Hamilton
• James A. Grahme and Calgary Business
• Angus Fraser: New Manager
• Charles J. Brydges and New Business Opportunities
• An Uncertain Future
• Charles J. Brydges' Visit to Calgary
• Rails and Marketing
• Impact of the Canadian Pacific Railway
• Overcoming Barriers to Inland Transportation
• Richard Hardisty Responds to the Canadian Public
• I.G. Baker and Co and the Canadian Pacific
• Canadian Pacific and the Calgary Townsite
• Business in Calgary After the Arrival of the Canadian Pacific
• Coping with the Depression in the Mid-1880s
• Business Opportunities during the Saskatchewan Rebellion
• Peacetime Business
• The Emergence of the Town of Calgary
• Natural Advantages of Calgary
• The Grid
• George Murdoch: Harness and Saddle Maker
• Isaac S. Freeze: A General Merchant
• Specialization in Commerce
• Rankin and Allen: Dry Goods Merchants
• The Movement for Incorperation
• Calgary's Early Government
• Hamlets, Villages, and Settlers in the Bow Valley
• Creating Banking Services
• Informal Private Credit Networks
• Private Banks
• Lafferty and Smith
• LaJeune, Smith and Co
• Lafferty and Moore: Women in the Banking Business
• Chartered Banks
• Imperial Bank of Canada
• Bank of Montreal
• Responding to the Calgary Government's Financial Needs
• Financial Environment
• Building the Ranching Community
• Canadian Pacific Stockyards
• Land and the Rise of Big Ranch Companies in the Bow Valley
• American Roots
• Sever Winter of 1886-1887
• Livestock Raising and the Natural Environment
• Ranching in the Bow Valley: The Conrads, I.G. Baker, and the Harris Brothers
• Cochrane Ranche Company
• Small Ranchers
• Osborne E. Brown: Elbow River Rancher
• Arthur G. Wolly-Dod: Pine Creek Rancher
• John Quirk and his Meidum-Sized Ranch
• Improving the Canadian Pacific Stockyards
• Maintatining the Family Farm
• The Banister Family Farm at Davisburg
• Farm Protest Movement in the Bow Valley
• Emergence of the Calgary Market
• Shattered and Fulfilled Dreams
• Robert Findlay: Homesteader at High River
• The Andrews Family Farm at Davisburg
• James F. McKevitt: Midnapore Farmer
• Farming at Davisburg: The David Suitor Family
• Informal Economic Networks
• Agricultural Societies and Fairs
• Voluntary Associations in the Bow Valley
• Farmers and the Natural Environment
• Financial Problems
• Kenneth Cameron: Okotoks Farmer
• Politics and Progress
• From Town to City
• A Promising Place
• Calgary: Southern Alberta's Railway Hub
• Making Funds Available to Settlers
• The Great Fire
• Postfire Calgary's Business
• Canadian Pacific Station
• Business and Hotels
• Sandstone City
• Turning Business Ideas into Business Organizations
• George Alexander and the Alexander Block
• William Roper Hull: Meat Packer and Rancher
• Peter A. Prince and the Eau Claire and Bow River Lumber Co.
• Hutchings and Riley: Harness and Saddle Makers
• Environmental Problems
• Alexander Lucas and Alberta's First City
• Wesley F. Orr and a Young and Ambitious City
• Department Stores and Mass Distribution
• Recovering from the Great Fire
• Mass Distribution in Fort Benton
• Calgary's First Department Store: I.G. Baker and Co
• Credit and Cash Sales
• Wholesale Division
• Retail Division
• Competition
• Sale of I.G. Baker and Co's Stores
• A New Era in Department Store Business: Hudson's Bay Company
• Grand Opening
• New Sandstone Department Store
• Labour Relations
• Rewarding James Thompson
• Edmond Taylor: New Manager
• Expansion
• Women in Business
• Gender and Workforce
• Entrepreneurship
• Janet Dewar and Dressmaking
• Mary MacLeod: Dressmaker
• Margaret Leishman: Milliner
• Annie A Milder and the Millenary Trade
• Frances Marie Carr: Boardinghousekeeper
• Agnes Carroll and the Holy Cross Hospital
• Annie and Jean Mollison and Braemar Lodge
• Financing the Canadian Dream
• The Canadian Dream
• James A. Lougheed: Lawyer, Real Estate Entrepreneur, and Senator
• Christina Kinnisten: Calgary Confectioner
• Luey Dofoo and the Restaurant Business
• Samuel and Helen Shaw: Midnapore Entrepreneurs
• Sandy Watson: Pine Creek Farmer
• Meopham Garder: Ranching in the Bragg Creek Area
• James C. Linton and Books
• James S. Mackie: Gunsmith and Bookseller
• Service Businesses
• Conclusion: Themes of an Era 1870-1900
• New Technologies in Transportation and Communication
• New Goods for Consumers
• Business by Economic Sector
• Chronology
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index

About the Author

Henry C. Klassen taught history for many years at the University of Calgary. His academic pursuits centred around the study of Canadian business and financial history. His book, A Business History of Alberta, was shortlisted for the Scholarly Book of the Year at the 2000 Alberta Book Awards.

Reviews

Eye on the Future is a Who's Who of Calgary's (and the nearby rural hinterland's) pioneer business class . . . With his superb command of the region's history and archival sources, Klassen has produced a picture rich in intricate detail and nuance. No doubt, Eye on the Future will remain the classic reference on the first three decades of Calgary's business history A.A. Den Otter, The Canadian Historical Review

The great strengths of Klassen's approach are its inclusive view, the detailed face he is able to put on business, and his ability to see the opportunities and challenges of businesses from within the enterprise. Klassen is particularly effective in bringing previously overlooked businesspeople, like women, into his field of vision. H.V. Nelles, Business History Review

Klassen is a superb miniaturist. He deftly sketches the origins, the strengths and the foibles of scores of entrepreneurs who established the foundations of business activity in the Bow Valley during the last decades of the nineteenth century. Each cameo portrait glows with authenticity because it is based on meticulous archival research. Simon M. Evans, Western Historical Quarterly