Draft Horses Pulling Timber at Pioneer Acres, Irricana

 

 

At Pioneer Acres during Alberta’s Pioneer Steam Power Festival, the steam engines get most of the noise. The horses still do some of the oldest work on the grounds.

A team of black draft horses, harnessed with red-trimmed collars and traces, leaned into a heavy timber and walked it across the dry yard. One handler walked behind with the lines. No engine, no whistle—just weight, footing, and the sound of hooves on packed grass. This is the other half of the show: before traction engines broke sod and ran threshers, this is how timber, stone, and implements moved.

The log is the point. It is not a pretty wagon. It is a dead weight on a chain, the kind of pull that used to happen every day on a farm or in a woodlot. The horses stay in step. The driver stays quiet. The crowd watches because you can see the work in their shoulders.

Pioneer Acres puts steam and horsepower on the same weekend on purpose. One did not instantly replace the other. For a long time both were on the same farms. Watching a team walk a timber past a metal-clad shed and a horse trailer is a clean reminder of that overlap.

If you are there for the Case engines and the Parade of Power, stay for this. The horses do not need a boiler. They still move the load.

Antique Open Trucks at Pioneer Acres: A Glimpse of Prairie Pioneer Power

Pioneer Acres Trucks 

Hey KassDays Fam!

A couple of weeks back I headed out to Irricana for the annual Pioneer Acres Show (this year’s big Steam Power Festival edition, August 7–9). If you’ve never been, it’s pure Alberta heritage heaven—steam engines hissing, antique tractors pulling, horse teams working the fields, and a whole lot of early motor vehicles that look like they just rolled out of a 1910s farmyard.

One of the stands-outs for me was this beautifully restored early 20th-century open truck sitting in the display barn. Bright green body with red accents, tall vertical radiator, black bench seats, wooden cargo box piled with period sacks, and those classic red spoke wheels wearing diamond-tread tires. The overall brass-era proportions and the badge on the radiator scream Peerless (or a very close period commercial cousin).

Peerless, out of Cleveland, Ohio, is better remembered today for its luxury cars—one of the famous “Three Ps” alongside Packard and Pierce-Arrow. But from about 1911 to 1918 they also built solid commercial trucks in the 3- to 6-ton range. Survivors are scarce, especially on the Canadian prairies, so seeing one this well-restored and complete felt special. The chain-drive-era chassis, wooden bed, and open cab are exactly the kind of workhorse that would have been hauling grain, supplies, or harvest crews around Alberta a century ago.

Parked nearby were a couple of other period open trucks/commercials—one with a wooden cab in brown tones and another partial chassis with yellow wheels—making a nice little cluster of early motorized freight history. These machines sit right at the transition point between horse-drawn wagons and the modern truck, and Pioneer Acres does a fantastic job of showing them in context with the steam traction engines and threshing demos that were the weekend’s big feature.

If you’re into cars, trucks, steam, or just prairie history, mark your calendar for next year’s Pioneer Acres Annual Show. It’s an easy drive from Calgary, the grounds are packed with living history, and you never know what rare iron you’ll find sitting quietly in a corner.

Did you make it out to Irricana this year? Spot any other cool antique trucks or steamers? Drop your stories (or photos) in the comments—I’d love to hear them!

Safe travels and keep exploring Alberta’s hidden corners,
Kass
#PioneerAcres #Irricana #AntiqueTrucks #Peerless #SteamShow #AlbertaHeritage #KassDays