IRC

THE ANTIGONISH MOVEMENT

by Gabriel Kirkpatrick, CUNA Archivist

"Money alone will improve nothing," wrote Friedrich Raiffeisen. "Much more important is education in the purposeful use of funds made available by credit unions to bring about improved conditions."

The importance of education of members, staff and volunteers has always been one of the hallmarks of the credit union movement. But, probably nowhere was this collective effort more true than in eastern Nova Scotia during the depression of the 1930s. Never very prosperous, Nova Scotians suffered severely in the hard times that followed World War I.

A region of small farms, little fishing villages and mines that produced a marginal level of coal, eastern Nova Scotia was probably the most poverty-stricken area of Canada. Mortgaged to the local merchants and loan sharks, fishermen, farmers and miners needed a source of manageable credit and education in how to use it wisely. The staff of St. Francis Xavier University at Antigonish moved in to help fill the need.

Inspired by the efforts of Father James J. Tompkins, vice president of the University, the trustees of St. Francis agreed to consider his plan to bring education to the community rather than serving only the affluent who could afford to come to the university. "Education," said Father Tompkins, "must go to the people... Colleges must catch the spirit of service. . . must become light and power stations in their respective communities."

In 1921, the university offered the first six weeks' course of the "People's School". Unfortunately, the Antigonish diocese took a dim view of the plan. Father Tompkins was assigned to a parish in Canso, a fishing village, out at land's end on the easternmost end of the peninsula. There he continued his work to improve the conditions of the community. He studied cooperatives. He studied ways to diversify sources of income for the area. He contacted friends in the Department of Agriculture at St. Francis and asked them to send goats. Canso would become a breeding station.

Why, Tompkins asked the fishermen, could they not raise goats and harvest crops as a sideline to fishing? Why could they not pool their resources and erect a cannery for their own fish? Why did they need to be dependent on outside agents for their livelihood? Everywhere he went, he was asking provocative questions. His people began to listen. Eventually, Father Tompkins was organizing study clubs all over eastern Nova Scotia. The members were considering ways to solve their economic and social problems. The study clubs became the core of a cooperative movement in the area that quickly spread.

As the years passed, Father Tompkins' dreams were realized. St. Francis Xavier University organized an extension department whose mission was to bring education to the community. The department became the prime mover in the cooperative movement in eastern Canada. Led by Father Moses M. Coady, director of the extension department and a cousin of Father Tompkins, there were practical courses offered in organizing cooperatives, in agricultural pursuits and in problem solving.

In September 1931, Angus MacDonald, one of the early cooperators in Nova Scotia, invited Roy F. Bergengren to visit St. Francis to talk about credit unions. Bergengren accepted with delight. This was his first venture into the international arena, something he had dreamed of since becoming executive secretary of the Credit Union National Extension Bureau in 1921. Bergengren spoke before the Rural and Industrial Conference assembled at the university and met with cooperative leaders, including MacDonald and Coady. He encouraged them to seek credit union legislation in Nova Scotia.

The following summer, the Nova Scotia parliament passed a provincial credit union act. In 1932, Bergengren returned to Antigonish to help develop credit unions. On December 10, MacDonald and Bergengren drove to a schoolhouse in Broad Cove to organize their first credit union.

Of that experience, Bergengren wrote, "The car we were in had lost its windows. The snow drove in." When they reached the schoolhouse, it was "stone cold, but there was a big pot-bellied stove and plenty of wood, and we organized the first credit union in Nova Scotia and christened it the Filene Credit Union." Bergengren was wearing Father Coady's fur coat. On the same day, they went to Inverness in driving rain.

"We were a couple of hours late arriving, but the hall was packed when we made it some time after 9 p.m." The credit union was quickly organized and thirty-six people signed the papers. "Everyone there would have signed," Bergengren explained, "but the white space at the bottom of the blank gave out."

In essence, that was how the Antigonish movement worked. Through study and a clear understanding of their own problems, the people were able "to develop their own resources and control their own economics." That was the conclusion of Bergengren and the conclusion of numerous others, like Filene, Tompkins, and Coady, who believed in the ability of the people to study together, work together, and solve their own economic problems through credit unions.

Copyright © 2008 - Credit Union National Association, Inc.