Poverty

"Walker Brothers Cowboy" takes place in Canada in the 1930s, a decade when that country— like so many others around the world—was feeling the drastic effects of the Great Depression. It is clear that the narrator's family's monetary circumstances have been adversely affected by the world events. The narrator makes reference to a time when her father owned his own business, a silver fox farm. Though they were poor then, "that was a different sort of poverty." Now the girl's father is a "pedlar," indicating that the family has come down in the world.

The mother's actions in the story most clearly show the poverty of the family, but details do as well: the mother has to alter her old clothes to fit her daughter; the family now lives in a poor neighborhood; and, when visiting Lake Huron, they are now on the side where...