Jack Braidek, a longtime Saskatchewan Wheat Pool employee and later managing editor ofThe Western Producer, died Aug. 19 at age 84.
He was raised on a farm near Speers, Sask., but spent much of his life at different postings for Sask. Pool, including stints as an agricultural representative at Delisle and Moose Jaw.
For three years in the 1980s, Braidek was involved in a Sask. Pool sponsored agricultural project in Zambia.
As formerWestern Producereditor Keith Dryden recalled in an Aug. 22 interview, it was an attempt to introduce modern wheat farming techniques and equipment into the southern Africa country.
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“It really was a project where agrologists from Saskatchewan were brought in to give some advice on modern farming methods,” he said.
“Modern machinery was imported and it really was an attempt to bring Zambia’s agriculture into the 20th century. It was not particularly successful.”
When he returned from Africa, then Western Producerpublisher Bob Phillips hired Braidek as an editorial adviser on agronomic issues. The Producer was then owned by Sask. Pool.
He became managing editor before retiring.
Dryden remembers one of Braidek’s main influences as trying to keepProducerreporters and managers connected to agronomics and farmers.
“I remember on one occasion, he got all the department managers, advertising, circulation, editorial, together and took them down to the Pool research station at Watrous where he got them in touch with the base we were serving,” he said. “He saw his job as getting us closer to our customer base.”
Braidek was an active member and leader in the Saskatchewan Institute of Agrologists and in 1992, was inducted as a Fellow into the Agricultural Institute of Canada.
He graduated from the University of Saskatchewan College of Agriculture in 1951 and received a master’s degree in extension from the University of Wisconsin.
