[13] Anthony Henday's spelling was Keiskatchewan, with the modern rendering, Saskatchewan, being officially adopted in 1882, when a portion of the present-day province was designated a provisional district of the North-West Territories.

The province has 14 major drainage basins made up of various rivers and watersheds draining into the Arctic Ocean, Hudson Bay and the Gulf of Mexico.

Warm southern winds blow from the plains and intermontane regions of the Western United States during much of July and August, very cool or hot but changeable air masses often occur during spring and in September.

There is evidence of reduction of biomass in Saskatchewan's boreal forests[21] (as with those of other Canadian prairie provinces) is linked by researchers to drought-related water stress, stemming from global warming, most likely caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

While studies as early as 1988 (Williams, et al., 1988) have shown climate change will affect agriculture,[22] the effects can be mitigated through adaptations of cultivars, or crops, is less clear.

Saskatchewan has been populated by various indigenous peoples of North America, including members of the Sarcee, Niitsitapi, Atsina, Cree, Saulteaux, Assiniboine (Nakoda), and Sioux.

In the late 1850s and early 1860s, scientific expeditions led by John Palliser and Henry Youle Hind explored the prairie region of the province.

Many Métis people, who had not been signatories to a treaty, had moved to the Southbranch Settlement and Prince Albert district north of present-day Saskatoon following the Red River Rebellion in Manitoba in 1870.

Ads in The Nor'-West Farmer by the Commissioner of Immigration implied that western land held water, wood, gold, silver, iron, copper, and cheap coal for fuel, all of which were readily at hand.

Men were primarily responsible for breaking the land; planting and harvesting; building the house; buying, operating and repairing machinery; and handling finances.

They prepared bannock, beans and bacon, mended clothes, raised children, cleaned, tended the garden, helped at harvest time and nursed everyone back to health.

[32] Premier Walter Scott preferred government assistance to outright ownership because he thought enterprises worked better if citizens had a stake in running them; he set up the Saskatchewan Cooperative Elevator Company in 1911.

Saskatchewan in 1909 provided bond guarantees to railway companies for the construction of branch lines, alleviating the concerns of farmers who had trouble getting their wheat to market by waggon.

[34] Immigration peaked in 1910, and in spite of the initial difficulties of frontier life – distance from towns, sod homes, and backbreaking labour – new settlers established a European-Canadian style of prosperous agrarian society.

City planning, reform of local government, and municipal ownership of utilities were more widely supported by these two groups, often through such organizations as the Board of Trade.

In the late 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan, imported from the United States and Ontario, gained brief popularity in nativist circles in Saskatchewan and Alberta.

[42] Since the late 20th century, First Nations have become more politically active in seeking justice for past inequities, especially related to the taking of indigenous lands by various governments.

As a result, about 761,000 acres have been turned into reserve land and many First Nations continue to invest their settlement dollars in urban areas", including Saskatoon.

[46] As of the 2021 Canadian census, the ten most spoken languages in the province included English (1,094,785 or 99.24%), French (52,065 or 4.72%), Tagalog (36,125 or 3.27%), Cree (24,850 or 2.25%), Hindi (15,745 or 1.43%), Punjabi (13,310 or 1.21%), German (11,815 or 1.07%), Mandarin (11,590 or 1.05%), Spanish (11,185 or 1.01%), and Ukrainian (10,795 or 0.98%).

Bombardier was awarded a long-term contract in the late 1990s for $2.8 billion from the federal government for the purchase of military aircraft and the running of the training facility.

[60] Following World War II, the transition from many one-room schoolhouses to fewer and larger consolidated modern technological town and city schools occurred as a means of ensuring technical education.

[61] In 1944, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF), a left-wing agrarian and labour party, won the provincial election in Saskatchewan and formed the first socialist government in North American history.

The strike, which had become very unpopular because of the outrageous rhetoric of some of its leaders (one of them had called for bloodshed), finally ended after a few weeks, and universal health coverage was adopted by the whole country five years later.

The Saskatoon Airport was initially established as part of the Royal Canadian Air Force training program during World War II.

More than 500 National Hockey League (NHL) players have been born in Saskatchewan, the highest per capita output of any Canadian province, U.S. state, or European country.

[86][87] Some other notable NHL figures born in Saskatchewan include Keith Allen, Bryan Trottier, Bernie Federko, Clark Gillies, Fernie Flaman, Fred Sasakamoose, Bert Olmstead, Harry Watson, Elmer Lach, Max Bentley, Sid Abel, Doug Bentley, Eddie Shore, Clint Smith, Bryan Hextall, Johnny Bower, Emile Francis, Glenn Hall, Chuck Rayner, Wendel Clark, Brad McCrimmon, Mike Babcock, Patrick Marleau, Theo Fleury, Terry Harper, Wade Redden, Brian Propp, Ryan Getzlaf, Chris Kunitz, and Jordan Eberle.

A number of prominent women's hockey players and figures have come from the province as well, including Hayley Wickenheiser, Colleen Sostorics, Gina Kingsbury, Shannon Miller, and Emily Clark.

The Saskatoon Valkyries and the Regina Riot are the only two teams to win championships in the Western Women's Canadian Football League since it began play in 2011.

Notable curlers from Saskatchewan include Ernie Richardson, Joyce McKee, Vera Pezer, Rick Folk, Sandra Schmirler, and Ben Hebert.

Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip visited Regina, Saskatoon, and Lumsden, and the Saskatchewan-reared Joni Mitchell issued an album in Saskatchewan's honour.