One of the major challenges that Canadian government officials felt they faced at the end of the nineteenth century was the development of the prairie West. By this time there were large urban centers in eastern Canada, but many Canadians worried that they had not truly ensured the future existence of their country. To do this the government engaged in a systematic program to encourage immigration of farmers and agricultural laborers from the United States and Britain. This involved many forms of promotion, including a magazine entitled "Canada West." This work shall demonstrate through a detailed analysis of the magazine's covers over several years the ways in which Canada depicted the ideal life farmers could hope to have on the prairies.