During the Great Depression, the unemployment rate was at an all-time high. In October 1932, the Canadian government decided to step in and do something about it. Major General McNaughton suggested to Prime Minister Bennett that a program would be set up in which unemployed men would engage in physically demanding labour in exchange for shelter, food, medical care, work clothes and a minimum payment. The men were required to work 44 hours a week for a payment of 20 cents a day. The men’s work would consist of clearing bush, planting trees, and building roads. As time went one, the men grew unhappy with their payment and wanted the wages to increase. By April 1935 men from assorted camps in British Columbia went on strike. Leading to the
