Harry Strom

Strom continued as Social Credit leader, serving as leader of the opposition, until 1972, when he resigned and was replaced by Werner Schmidt. He continued in the legislature until the 1975 election, in which he did not seek re-election. After leaving politics, he returned to his farm and his involvement with his church. He died of cancer October 2, 1984, and was buried in Medicine Hat.

As Premier, Strom undertook a number of initiatives, especially in education and youth-related fields, but was politically ineffective. He lacked both charisma and an overriding sense of purpose, and his government gradually lost popularity. In the 1971 election, his government was handily defeated by Lougheed’s Progressive Conservatives. Strom served as opposition leader for two years, but soon relinquished the position and did not seek re-election in 1975. After leaving politics, Strom returned to farming. He died in 1984.

Strom also took a number of non-educational policy initiative, such as naming Jim Henderson as the province’s first Environment Minister. Other priorities were the reform of the Premier’s Office and the establishment of an Intergovernmental Affairs Secretariat, converted by Peter Lougheed’s government into a full ministry under Don Getty. In 1970, the government established the Alberta Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Commission.

Strom’s campaign theme was “the social development of Alberta”, and this general theme encompassed such diverse policy planks as a citizens’ committee on constitutional reform, a head start program for disadvantaged youth, commissions on the future of urban planning and education, an expansion of the role of backbenchers in policy development, and the opening of a branch of the Premier’s office in Calgary. Though he entered as the favourite, a poll in spring 1969 showed him running second of five candidates behind Minister of Transportation Gordon Taylor. However, he had the strongest organization of any candidate, thanks in large part to his young backers, and overcame this deficit by the fall.

In honour of his political services, Strom received honorary Doctor of Laws degrees from the University of Calgary (1969), the University of Lethbridge (1979), and the University of Alberta (1980). While several of his acts as premier had consequences extending well beyond his term, today he is largely forgotten, though he experienced a brief resurgence in name recognition in 2007. That year, critics of Ed Stelmach compared Stelmach to Strom, with the insinuation being that Stelmach was destined to lose the next election and be the last of the Progressive Conservative dynasty in the same way that Strom was the last of the Social Credit dynasty. In the end, it would not be until the 2015 provincial election under the leadership of Jim Prentice that the Progressive Conservatives would be defeated, with some pundits also comparing Prentice to Strom.

When Manning decided to retire in 1968, he called a key group of senior ministers to his office to advise them of his decision. This group included Strom, Treasurer Anders Aalborg, Industry Minister Russ Patrick, Education Minister Randy McKinnon. Aalborg was the natural choice to succeed Manning, but he had health problems and declined to run. Strom had no desire for the job and rejected any suggestion from the others that he be a candidate.

Harry Strom became Premier December 12, 1968 and served until the 1971 election, when his government was defeated by Peter Lougheed’s Progressive Conservatives. This tenure makes him the fourth shortest-serving former Premier in Alberta’s history, after Dave Hancock, Jim Prentice, and Richard G. Reid.

Though the legislature’s mandate from the 1967 election was not due to expire until May 1972, five years after it started, convention in Canadian politics is for legislatures to be dissolved every four years or less. Accordingly, Strom resolved to call an election in 1971, sometime between May and September. He briefly considered a spring campaign, in the hopes that the planting season would have farmers feeling optimistic and therefore inclined to support the incumbent government. However, after concluding that farmers would not react well to going to the polls in the middle of planting or harvest season, Strom finally settled on August 30. A campaign committee was assembled, and recommended a budget of $580,000.

In October 1962, Premier Ernest Manning appointed Strom Minister of Agriculture. In this capacity, he undertook a series of initiatives related to water use, including developing an agreement with Saskatchewan and Manitoba of the use of water emanating from the eastern slopes of Alberta’s Rocky Mountains. He also passed a series of legislation, including the Soil Conservation Act and Crop Insurance Act, and undertook a major departmental organization. The Alberta Agriculture Hall of Fame, which inducted Strom in 1985, credited him with expanding the use of irrigation in the province and for being a key figure leading up to the signing of a 1973 cost-sharing agreement on the subject with the federal government. He also served as Minister of Municipal Affairs for the last five months of the Manning government.

Alberta’s first native-born Premier, Strom was born in Burdett, Alberta. He worked most of his young adult life on the family farm, and was also actively involved in his church. After a stint in municipal politics, he ran for the Legislative Assembly of Alberta in the 1955 provincial election, and was elected. In 1962, Manning appointed him to his cabinet as Minister of Agriculture, a position he held until 1967 when he was appointed Minister of Municipal Affairs. When Manning decided to resign in 1968, Strom became a candidate to succeed him, and finished on top of a six candidate field.

In the 1955 provincial election, Strom ran as the Social Credit candidate in Cypress, where the incumbent, Social Crediter James Underdahl, was not seeking re-election. He easily defeated his only opponent, Liberal Joe Flaig, and was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta. He would be re-elected to this seat in each of the 1959, 1963, 1967, and 1971 elections, always winning more than 60% of the vote.

In 1943, Harry Strom was elected to the council of the County of Forty Mile No. 8 in southern Alberta. He served on local school boards at around the same time.

On October 27, 1938, Strom married Ruth Johnson, with whom he would have six children—Howard, Faith, Beverly, Brian, Ronald, and Arlene. The family attended the Evangelical Free Church of Canada in Bow Island until 1962. There, Strom served as Sunday school teacher, deacon, and board chair, in addition to his twenty years of involvement with the church’s Overseas Missions Board. Besides his activities with the church, Strom was involved in the Forty Mile Rural Electrification Association, the Burdett Home and School Association, and the Agricultural Improvement Association of Burdett.

Harry Edwin Strom (July 7, 1914 – October 2, 1984) was the ninth premier of Alberta, from 1968 to 1971. His two-and-a-half years as Premier were the last of the thirty-six-year Social Credit dynasty, as his defeat by Peter Lougheed saw its replacement by a new era Progressive Conservative government. He is remembered as an honest, decent man who lacked the political skills of his predecessor, Ernest Manning, or of Lougheed.

Strom was born in Burdett, Alberta, on July 7, 1914. His parents, Nils Hjalmar Strom (1877–1928) and Elna Maria Olivia Ekensteen (1883–1969), were second generation Swedish Canadians. He attended school in Burdett before moving to Calgary to attend high school at East Calgary High School and Calgary Technical High School, where he studied mechanics. In 1931, he received a certificate from the Provincial Institute of Technology and Art. His father died the same year, and Strom returned home to help his mother with the operation of the family farm.