Henry Wise Wood


Henry Wise Wood was an American-born Canadian agrarian thinker and activist. He became director in 1914 and was elected president of the United Farmers of Alberta in 1916. Under his leadership the UFA became the most powerful political lobby group in the province. In 1919, Wood oversaw the transition of the UFA into a political party and in 1921 they formed the government of Alberta, winning 38 of 61 seats in the Legislative Assembly. Wood refused to enter electoral politics himself but led the UFA's extra-parliamentary organization throughout, and influenced the elected government from the sidelines.

Background and early career

Wood was born on a farm near Monroe City, Missouri to a prosperous farming family with land holding in Missouri and Texas. He became an accomplished stockman while still a teenager. At the age of 44 he visited Alberta and the following year purchased a wheat farm and moved his family to Carstairs, Alberta.

Leadership of United Farmers of Alberta

An earnest student of agrarian reform, he had observed the Alliance and Populist movements in Missouri during the 1890s and after relocating to Canada soon joined the Society for Equity, an early farm association. In 1909 the Society for Equity merged with the Alberta Farmers' Association to form the United Farmers of Alberta. In 1914 Wood became a director of the UFA; in 1915 he was elected vice-president and was president from 1916 to 1931.

Class conflict ideology

Wood became well known as the main theorist and head of the radical Albertan branch of the wave of agrarian discontent that was sweeping Canada at the time. He consistently refused to run for office, but backed the United Farmers when they ran for office in the province and also supported the Progressive Party of Canada federally. Wood's basic ideology was one of supporting farmers class interests against bankers and industrialists and the concept of "group government" in which government by political parties representing narrow class interests would be replaced by a government composed of all groups.

Later life

Wood continued to play an important role in the UFA until 1937 when he retired to his farm in Carstairs, Alberta.
He died in 1941. A school in Calgary, Henry Wise Wood Senior High, was named after him.