Picturing A Utopian Reality

Curator Heather Smith has organized this exhibition of work by Everett Baker, a Saskatchewan Wheat Pool employee who photographed the social, natural, and historical development of Saskatchewan.

Additional Information

Everett Baker George Baker Holding Newspaper Declaring "Victory", Regina, Saskatchewan, May 7, 1945 (detail). Collection of the Saskatchewan History and Folklore Society, 35 Kodachrome Transparency #5936

Everett Baker (1893 - 1981) settled on a farm in the Aneriod district, near Swift Current, in 1918, where he became the Secretary for the Saskatchewan Grain Growers Association and the Consistency Organizer for the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool. From 1935 until his retirement in 1957, Everett worked as a Field Man for the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool, and his photographs from this period provide insight into the Co-operative Movement in Saskatchewan, 1941 to 1964. Baker became interested in photography in the early 1940s-photographing the social, natural, and historic development of Saskatchewan. He worked as a researcher for the Glenbow Museum, in Calgary, following his retirement from the Wheat Pool, and was appointed to the Historic Sites Commission for both the Saskatchewan Golden and Diamond Jubilees. In 1957, Everett became the first President of the Saskatchewan History and Folklore Society. Shortly before his death, he donated 11,000 colour slides which now reside with the Regina-based Saskatchewan History and Folklore Society. This exhibition includes 60 colour images, that explore a time that is optimistic about the future but connected to the pioneer past.