Born in Woodstock, Oxfordshire Freer was a newspaper reporter who emigrated to Manitoba, Canada in 1888 from Bristol and became a farmer, settling south of Winnipeg, in the Brandon Hills district.
Less than two years after the Lumière Brothers exhibited the first film in France, Freer became the first Canadian filmmaker.
He made films about the Canadian prairies, especially themes of farming and railways, which were shown as early as 1897.
The Canadian Pacific Railway Company noticed Freer's films and began to tour them throughout the United Kingdom in an effort to promote immigration to Canada.
The second trip was not as successful a recruiting device because people had heard that Freer had downplayed Manitoba's mosquito problem and cold winters.