Family Environmental History
December 24, 2024 By: Riley Greer
Personal Environmental History:
The environmental history of my family occurs primarily within the provinces of British Columbia and Ontario. Among my family’s trades and occupations you’ll find butchers, teachers, bakers, educational assistants and oil field workers. All of these roles have carried their own environmental impacts, based on the places and times my relatives lived.
My father’s mother was born in Dawson Creek, a small town in northeastern BC. Growing up on a small farm with a brother and sister, the family relied heavily on the land to sustain themselves. Dawson Creek is located in the Peace River region, known as the best in the province for agriculture due to its long daylight hours and relatively low temperatures. This makes it the perfect place to grow wheat and barley, which the family farmed. My father’s father grew up in Ajax, Ontario. Although it is now part of the sprawling Greater Toronto Area, at the time Ajax was a small town of less than 10,000 residents. He eventually moved to Toronto, spending a number of years there before heading west to BC, where he met my grandmother. There they had two children, my dad and aunt, and adopted a third. The family lived off my grandfather’s various jobs, from working on a dairy farm, to a butcher shop and working as an operator in the oil field. This variety of jobs meant that the environmental impacts of their livelihoods were also diverse. Agricultural work, such as dairy farming, requires great amounts of land, water and feed for the cattle. Methane emissions are a large problem stemming from the keeping of cattle as well. Butchering requires the raising of animals, which has similar environmental consequences.
On my mother’s side my grandfather spent his youth in Quesnel, BC, where he was one of many in a large family. My grandfather grew up helping on the family’s small cattle farm. Like many others in Quesnel, they relied heavily on the forestry industry. He eventually went to university in Edmonton, graduating with a degree in chemical engineering. His career in gas line work took him to Fort St John and gained employment with West Coast Energy, where he would remain until retiring. My grandmother grew up in Windsor, Ontario. When she was 20, she moved out west to Fort St John with my mother and two uncles in tow. She worked a variety of jobs including a school janitor and baker, a job she would hold for the better part of 15 years before retiring.
My mother and father both decided to stay in Fort St John to start a family. My father went to trades school twice, once to become an electrician and again to become an instrumentation mechanic, leading to a career in the oil and gas industry. My mother has had a number of job titles, always within schools and immigration services. The oil and gas industries are vital to the livelihoods of many in northern BC, but the environmental impacts can be devastating. My father’s work has likely had the most direct environmental impacts, and has also allowed us to live a very comfortable middle class life that many are not able to.
Growing up, the outdoors were central to my experiences with my family. We spent countless weekends camping, exploring old backroads and hiking. The north provides endless opportunities for outdoor recreation and exploration, and these experiences shaped the person I am today. It would be fair to say these early experiences in the outdoors led to my decision to study the environment at a university level. I personally have paid for much of my schooling from labour jobs that directly impacted the environment. From oil field rental services to lumber yard work, I have had an impact on the surrounding environment to make a profit.
It is clear my family’s environmental history shows the complex relationships between humans and the environment. Much of the work we have done has involved resource extraction, or agricultural land use. Despite the impacts we have made, an appreciation for the environment and natural world has been present throughout the generations, and is something incredibly important to me personally.