Financially, it was better than teaching school. He had made ten dollars the first summer he taught school and to earn it he had walked three miles and a half each morning after milking the cows at home, arriving at the school soaking wet with dew from wading in the long prairie grass. And even at that, the trustees had wanted a "cheaper" teacher! A woman, they thought, might do it cheaper. The young schoolmaster objected so earnestly, however, that the argument was dropped. He needed this money to assist in a plan for attending the Collegiate at Portage la Prairie. He taught the school so well that after studying Latin at Manitoba College in 1899, the trustees were glad to get him back the following year at a salary of $35 per month. But milking cows at home night and morning and teaching school in between was not an exciting life at best for a young fellow ambitious to go farming. So at last he acquired a quarter-section of Hudson Bay Company land near Russell and took to "baching it" in a little frame shack. In the fall some lumber was required for buildings and it so happened that along came an old chap with a proposition to put in a portable sawmill on a timber limit up in the Riding Mountains nearby. The old man meant business alright; he had the engine within ten miles of its destination before he was overtaken and the whole machine seized for debt. It looked as if the thousands of logs which the residents of the district had taken out for the expected mill had been piled up to no purpose. Crerar, however, succeeded in making a deal for the engine and, with a couple of partners, began sawing up logs. The little sawmill proved so useful that he ran it for four winters. When finally it was burned down no attempt was made to rebuild. Its owner was entering wider fields of activity. After meeting Partridge and Kennedy his interest in the affairs of the farmers' little trading concern was quickened. He was much impressed with the fact that here were men so devoted to an idea--so profound in their belief that it was the right idea--that its advancement was their first and only thought at all times. Alex. Crerar liked that. If a thing were worth attempting at all, it was worth every concentration of effort. What these men were trying to accomplish appealed to him as a big thing, a bigger thing than most of the farmers yet realized, and it deserved all the help he could give it. The little agency was in the thick of a fight against tremendous odds and that, too, had its appeal; for to a natural born fighter the odds meant merely a bigger fight, a bigger triumph.