Strongfield (2016 population: ) is a village in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan within the Rural Municipality of Loreburn No. 254 and Census Division No. 11. It lies approximately 100 km south of the City of Saskatoon on Highway 19 between its sister communities of Hawarden and Loreburn. Strongfield was once a booming village with an elementary school, post office, car and farm equipment dealerships, two Saskatchewan Wheat Pool grain elevators, small restaurants and other shops. Today the school no longer exists and most of the businesses have long been closed down. The village features hockey and curling rinks, an Elks lodge, the Strongfield café and post office, and a small United Church of Canada. The town is near the South Saskatchewan River, and the man-made Lake Diefenbaker created by the Gardiner Dam, one of the world's largest earth-filled dams. In the centre of the village is a cenotaph to Strongfield's fallen soldiers of both World Wars. For Saskatchewan's centennial, a celebratory event was held on July 2, 2005 in Strongfield at the community rink where activities included a pancake breakfast, horseshoe tournament, parade, street, hockey, slow pitch, beer gardens, supper and a street dance. History Strongfield's beginnings lie from 1903 and the great wave of Western settlement and development of the Canadian prairies. Strongfield incorporated as a village on May 3, 1912. From that time on it progressed as the economic and social hub of the expanding population in the area. The area was first surveyed by government surveyor J.A. Maddock and crew from May to July 1883, shortly after the former Hudson's Bay Company lands became part of Canada to be organized as the Northwest Territories. The surveying system of the Canadian prairies was based on a similar system adopted in the United States. Townships were divided into 36 sections of each . The square was further divided into quarter sections of . Strongfield would eventually be situated on township 27, range 5, west of the third meridian. The Dominion government, seeking to reassure the railway companies that the West was good agricultural land, enlisted the aid of two Canadians, Col. Davidson (for whom the nearby town of Davidson, Saskatchewan is named) and A.D. McRae. They visited the prairies and went to the United States to seek capital. they formed the Saskatchewan Valley Land Company, bought 500,000 acres (2000 km2) of land between Saskatoon and Regina from the