Category: Authors

Sesquicentennial Celebration?

Alberta's Historic Places

 

Did you know that a special Alberta community is celebrating its sesquicentennial this year?  For that matter, do you know what a sesquicentennial is?  It’s a 150 year anniversary and the City of St. Albert is marking that major milestone in 2011.  At the heart of the celebrations is the Father Lacombe Church situated on Mission Hill.  Erected in 1861, the church is the oldest extant building in Alberta and embodies the community’s early history as a Roman Catholic mission.  From those humble beginnings, St. Albert developed into one of the largest settlements between Red River and Vancouver.  Today, it’s a vibrant, prosperous city.  Learn more about this site and other historic places in St. Albert by visiting the Alberta Register of Historic Places and searching for “St. Albert” under the Municipality advanced search option.

Written by: Matthew Wangler, Manager of Alberta’s Historic Places Research and Designation Program

Skrine Creek

rkelland

The name Skrine Creek has been officially adopted for a previously unnamed creek in the Porcupine Hills. The name commemorates Walter and Agnes “Nesta” Skrine (pronounced “screen”), who were early operators of a medium-sized ranch in the region. The spring-fed creek rises in the Municipal District of Ranchland No. 66 and flows northerly into the Municipal District of Willow Creek, where it joins Mosquito Creek approximately 24 kilometres west of Nanton.  

Walter Skrine was born in Somerset England in 1860. After receiving his education at Oxford University, he managed a coffee plantation in Ceylon until the early 1880s. In either 1883 or 1884, he to migrated to the Canadian northwest, where he began ranching along the Highwood River in the “Pekisko Hills” (Little Rolling Hills) region. After losing most of his cattle during the disastrous winter of 1886/87, he moved further west and established a ranch on Mosquito Creek. He chose the site due to the protection offered by the surrounding hills and the plentiful water supplied by the area’s creeks and springs. He settled first as a squatter, but later filed on a 160-acre homestead and leased nearly 16,000 acres of surrounding land. Starting with 200 head of cattle, he grew the herd to 700 head by 1898. Walter was active socially and politically within the ranching community. He ran, unsuccessfully, for the Territorial Assembly and, in 1885, the North-West Stock Association, a protest movement against the policies of the existing territorial stock association, was formed during a meeting at Skrine’s house in 1885.   

In 1895, Walter travelled to Ireland where he married Agnes “Nesta” Shakespeare Higginson of County Antrim. Walter and Nesta travelled back to Canada, where she took an active role in the daily activities of the ranch. Nesta was a very well-educated young woman and a talented writer and poet. She was published throughout Europe, mainly in Blackwood’s Magazine, under the pseudonym Moira O’Neill. She also published a short novel, The Elf-Errant (1895) and two books of poetry, Songs of the Glens Antrim (1900) and More Songs of the Glens of Antrim (1920). Ranching life and the landscape of the Canadian West provided inspiration for much of her prose and poetry, notably a prose piece entitled “A Lady’s Life on a Ranche,” which has been republished in many anthologies about southern Alberta ranching history, and a number of poems in both of her published books.   

Unlike many of their fellow ranchers, the Skrine’s welcomed the arrival of farmers into the region and assisted many of them in establishing themselves. However, the transition of the local economy from ranching to farming put pressures on many ranchers. In 1902, Walter and Nesta sold the Bar S Ranch to a neighbour and returned to Ireland. They settled at Ballyrankin House in County Wexford. In 1921, the house was burned by Irish patriots, one of many such attacks on English gentry during “The Troubles.” Undaunted, the Skrines, purchased the Newlands House, about a mile away and re-christened it as Ballyrankin House. Walter Skrine died here in 1930 following a hunting accident. Nesta Skrine died on January 22, 1955. As of 2011, the Bar S Ranch continues to operate on the same land originally selected by Walter Skrine in the 1880s.   

The proposal to name this water feature Skrine Creek was received from Clay Chattaway, the current owner/operator of the Bar S Ranch in September 2009. The proposed name was supported by both Municipal Districts, the surrounding land-owners and descendants of the Skrine family living in Ireland. The proposed name received the approval of the Alberta Historical Resources Foundation in November 2010 and the Minister of Culture and Community Spirit in February 2011.   

Creek Location

Click here for a full view of Aerial Imagery of the Region Around Skrine Creek.

National Topographic System Map Sheet: 82 J/8 – Stinson Creek

Latitude/Longitude: 50° 16′ 56″ N & 114° 5′ 57″ W to 50° 19′ 37″ N and 114° 6′ 18″ W

Alberta Township System: Sec 20 Twp 15 Rge 1 W5 to Sec 5 Twp 16 Rge 1 W5

Description: Rises in the MD of Ranchland No. 66 and flows north into the MD Willow Creek No. 6. The creek flows northerly into Mosquito Creek, approximately 24 km WSW of Nanton.  

Additional Resources 

Additional information about Walter and Nesta Skrine and the history of the Bar S Ranch can be found in the following resources: 

Skrine, Agnes, “A Lady’s Life on a Ranche,” In A Flannel Shirt and Liberty: British Emigrant Gentlewomen in the Canadian West, 1880-1914, edited by Susan Jackel, 95-110. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1982. Originally published in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine vol. 163 no. 987 (January 1898). 

Higginson, T. B. “Moira O’Neill in Alberta,” Alberta Historical Review vol. 5 no. 2 (Spring 1957): 22-25. 

Klassen, Henry. “A Century of Ranching at the Rocking P and the Bar S.” In Cowboys, Ranchers and the Cattle Business: Cross-Border Perspectives on Ranching History, edited by Simon Evans, Sarah Carter and Bill Yeo, 101-122. Calgary: University of Calgary Press and Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2000.

Blog Post Written by: Ron Kelland, Historic Places Research Officer and Geographical Names Program Coordinator

Paradise Valley Grain Elevator

Alberta's Historic Places

 

The Alberta Wheat Pool Grain Elevator in Paradise Valley was designated a Provincial Historic Resource in 2008. In order for a site to be designated a Provincial Historic Resource, it must possess province-wide significance for either its history or architecture. To properly assess the historic importance of a resource, a historian crafts a context document that situates a resource within its time and place and compares it to similar resources in other parts of the province. This allows staff to determine the importance of a resource to a particular theme, time, and place. Below is some of the historical information used in the evaluation of the Alberta Wheat Pool Grain Elevator. 

When members of the Barr Colony settled in what would become the Lloydminster district at the turn of the 20th century, they were soon served by the Canadian Northern Railway, which arrived in 1904.  With this, the farming district quickly expanded.  One of the areas to be flooded with homesteaders was located just southwest of Lake Bricker, in a district to be named Paradise Valley by a promoter with the California Land Company named Frank Henton.  The first settlers began to take up land in 1906, and in 1910 a store and post office was opened by Kenneth Gunn on SE30 TP46 R2 W4.  Schools and churches soon followed in the district, although the main commercial centers remained Kitscoty and Lloydminster, some 20 km to the north and northeast.  Like much of rural Alberta, the Paradise Valley district prospered during the World War I years but suffered a recession at war’s end, with the overproduction of grain causing international prices to fall.  Then, with the Locarno Pacts opening up markets in Europe, the demand for western Canadian grain began to rise.  When coupled with high yields, this brought prosperity to the district during the late 1920s.

It was no doubt the high yields and growing demand for grain that encouraged the Canadian Pacific Railway to extend a branch line from Marsden, Saskatchewan through to Paradise Valley in 1929.  The track was built through to LSD 13 of NW6 TP47 R2 W4, where the CPR subdivided a townsite and erected a small station.  The post office was brought in and a community called Paradise Valley quickly evolved, although it was never large and would not be incorporated as a village until 1964.  The district was prosperous however, and the farmers were happy not to have to haul their farm produce all the way to Kitscoty, for, almost immediately after the railway arrived, several grain elevators dotted the skyline.  These were owned by the United Grain Growers, Searle, the western Grain Company, and the Alberta Wheat Pool.  In time, these elevators were joined by structures owned by the McCabe Brothers and the Federal Grain Company. Read more →

McNaught Homestead

Alberta's Historic Places

 

The McNaught Homestead near Beaverlodge was designated a Provincial Historic Resource in 2003. In order for a site to be designated a Provincial Historic Resource, it must possess province-wide significance for either its history or architecture. To properly assess the historic importance of a resource, a historian crafts a context document that situates a resource within its time and place and compares it to similar resources in other parts of the province. This allows staff to determine the importance of a resource to a particular theme, time, and place. Below is some of the historical information used in the evaluation of the McNaught Homestead.

In the spring of 1909, a group of excommunicated Methodists from Ontario known as the Christian Association (or Burnsites after their leader, Nelson Burns) made their way in convoy to the western edge of the Grande Prairie in northwestern Alberta and began to carve out homesteads.  The district along the lower Beaverlodge River was just being surveyed, and this group of 31 settlers came to constitute what would become the first successful attempt at group settlement in the Peace River Country.  They were soon joined by other settlers from Ontario, some of them Christian Association members, some not.  Among the latter was Charles McNaught who, with his wife Eliza, arrived in the district in June, 1911 to visit his brother, Sam, who had settled in the area two years earlier. 

Taken by the country, Charles and Eliza also decided to try establishing a farm there, taking two quarter-sections of land off the Beaverlodge River on NE15 and SE22 TP71 R10 W6 with half-breed scrip, and one on NE25 TP70 R11 off the Red Willow River by homesteading.  They decided to reside on NE15, and so they constructed a log dwelling, a barn, and other structures, and proceeded to work the land.  In 1914, they received title to both NE15 and SE22.

Being at some distance from the more heavily settled areas of the south Peace River Country, the settlers around the Beaverlodge constituted a tightly knit group, most of whom were members of the Christian Association.  Many non-members participated in Association activities.  Though the Association itself would eventually go into decline, due partly to the lack of any formal church structure, the community remained closely connected, with many families inter-marrying.  The children of Charles and Eliza McNaught would remain on the family homestead for years, becoming strong pillars of the community.  Indeed, three of them came to serve as local schoolteachers. Read more →

St. Ambrose Anglican Church

Alberta's Historic Places

 

The St. Ambrose Anglican Church in Redcliff was designated a Provincial Historic Resource in 2008. In order for a site to be designated a Provincial Historic Resource, it must possess province-wide significance for either its history or architecture. To properly assess the historic importance of a resource, a historian crafts a context document that situates a resource within its time and place and compares it to similar resources in other parts of the province. This allows staff to determine the importance of a resource to a particular theme, time, and place. Below is some of the historical information used in the evaluation of the St. Ambrose Anglican Church.

When the Canadian Pacific Railway was extending its survey grade across the southern prairies during 1881-82, a point was made to identify places suitable for the erection of stations and the subdivision of townsites.  One such spot was where the railway was earmarked to cross the South Saskatchewan River at present dayMedicine Hat.  Among the established industries in the area was that of clay products.  Common clay and shale were readily available along the river flats, while ball clay, fire clay, and stonewear clay were to be found in the outlying areas.

       

In 1906, with the population ofMedicine Hatgrowing, the Stoner Land Company, which owned land along the South Saskatchewan River northwest of town, incorporated the Redcliff Brick Company and began to make bricks for the many buildings going up inMedicine Hatand elsewhere along the CPR line.  In 1907, a townsite was subdivided and a water & sewer system was installed near the plant.  With people arriving to engage in the brick industry, and its related service industries, Redcliff was soon incorporated as a village.  With the demand for brick growing, and the red clay off theSouth Saskatchewanproviding an excellent product, Redcliff also continued to grow.  The plentiful supply of natural gas was another inducement for industry as well as people, and Redcliff was referred to as a “Smokeless Pittsburgh.”  In 1912, with its population listed at 3,000, Redcliff was incorporated as a town.  By this time, three major brick plants were in business, along with an iron works, a truck-manufacturing plant, and the Dominion Glass Company.  Read more →

Bill Griffiths Creek

rkelland

A previously unnamed creek in the Bow Valley near Canmore has recently been named Bill Griffiths Creek. The name commemorates William “Bill” Griffiths. The spring-fed creek rises just east of the TransCanada Highwayand just south of the town of Canmore. It flows south-easterly, generally parallel to the Canadian pacific Railway tracks, for approximately four kilometres before joining the BowRiver about three kilometres upstream from the hamlet of Deadman’s Flats.

Bill Griffiths was a fisheries biologist with Alberta Fish and Wildlife. He received a Bachelor’s degree from the Universityof Alberta and a Masters degree from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. He worked for Alberta Fish and Wildlife briefly in 1976 and again from 1979 to 1983, this time as the Regional Fisheries Biologist based in Calgary. In this position he initiated new fisheries management strategies and regulations aimed at enhancing the Bow River’s trout fishery. He also did freelance consulting work in Burundi, Africa from 1983 to 1984, after which he returned to Alberta as an Environmental Assessment Biologist with Alberta Environment.

In 1985, he returned to Fish and Wildlife where he coordinated volunteer efforts to establish fisheries habitat enhancement programs. In 1987, he completed two major enhancement projects; one at Gap Lake in conjunction with the Sarcee Fish and Game Club and the other on a small creek near Canmore with the cooperation of the Upper Bow Valley Fish and Game Club. This second creek, which is the one that now bears his name, is now considered to be one of the most important spawning areas for brown trout in the BowRiver watershed. Due largely to his efforts, the Bow River has become recognized as a world-class trout fishery by scientists, writers and anglers.

Bill Griffiths died in 1988 and this creek has been locally known as “Bill Griffiths Creek” since that time. This name, now made official, commemorates his commitment to developing the brown trout fishery in the Bow River and his connection to this creek, which has become the subject of many studies and reports.

The naming proposal was made by former colleagues and students of Bill Griffiths. Local support was indicated by a petition. The Municipal District of Big Horn, the Town of Canmore and the management of the Kananaskis Country Provincial Parks all supported the proposed name. The Alberta Historical Resources Foundation approved the name during its November 27, 2010 meeting and the Minister of Culture and Community Spirit concurred with the decision on February 23, 2011. Notice of the decision was published in Alberta Gazette on April 15, 2011.

Aerial view of Bill Griffiths Creek

Creek Location

National Topographic System Map Sheet: 82 0/3 – Canmore

Latitude/Longitude: 51° 4′ 20″ N & 115° 20′ 0″ W to 51° 3′ 30″ N and 115° 17′ 30″ W

Alberta Township System: SW¼ Sec 27 Twp 24 Rge 10 W5 to SE¼ Sec 23 Twp 24 Rge 10 W5

Description: Flows south-easterly into the Bow River, approximately 3 km south east of Canmore and 75 km west ofCalgary.

Written by: Ron Kelland, Historic Places Research Officer and Geographical Names Program Coordinator

The ABC’s of Heritage Conservation (Part 3 of 3)

Alberta's Historic Places
 

 The final segment of this series ends with the middle – the letter ‘M’. 

‘M’ is the most important letter in the heritage conservationist’s alphabet. Maintenance is the best (and cheapest) way to maintain a historic place, and minimal intervention is always the desire when completing an intervention. 

  • Maintenance:  Routine, cyclical, nondestructive actions necessary to slow the deterioration of an historic place. It entails periodic inspection; routine, cyclical, non-destructive cleaning; minor repair and refinishing operations; replacement of damaged or deteriorated materials that are impractical to save. 
  • Minimal intervention:  The approach that allows functional goals to be met with the least physical intervention. 
L to R: Larry G. Potter and Don Totten

In the above photo Larry G. Potter and Don Totten conduct routine maintenance on the Canadian National Railways Steam Locomotive 6060 Provincial Historic Resource. Click here to read the Locamotive’s Statement of Significance on the Alberta Register of Historic Places.

To learn more about the above terms or to read about additional conservation terms, please review the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada. The Glossary section of the Municipal Heritage Partnership Program website is also a great resource. 

Did we miss something? Would you like us to discuss a term not mentioned in this series? Do you want more information on one of the terms we have defined? Submit a comment to this blog post and we will prepare a response. 

Written by: Brenda Manweiler, Municipal Heritage Services Officer (with definitions from the Standards and Guidelines).

The ABC’s of Heritage Conservation (Part 2 of 3)

Alberta's Historic Places
 

If Part 1 left you confused but less bemused hopefully the terms below will continue to explain the difference between some of our key terms. 

The Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada provides direction on how to conserve historic places. But what exactly is conservation and how does it differ from all the other “–tion” words related to historic places?  

  • Intervention:  Any action, other than demolition or destruction, that results in a physical change to an element of a historic place. 
  • Conservation:  All actions or processes that are aimed at safeguarding the character-defining elements of a historic place so as to retain its heritage value and extend its physical life. This may involve “Preservation,” “Rehabilitation,” “Restoration,” or a combination of these actions or processes. 
  • Preservation:  The action or process of protecting, maintaining, and/or stabilizing the existing materials, form, and integrity of a historic place or of an individual component, while protecting its heritage value. 
  • Rehabilitation:  The action or process of making possible a continuing or compatible contemporary use of a historic place or an individual component, while protecting its heritage value. 
  • Restoration:  The action or process of accurately revealing, recovering or representing the state of a historic place or of an individual component, as it appeared at a particular period in its history, while protecting its heritage value. 

To learn more about the above terms or to read about additional conservation terms, please review the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada. The Glossary section of the Municipal Heritage Partnership Program website is also a great resource. 

Written by: Brenda Manweiler, Municipal Heritage Services Officer (with definitions from the Standards and Guidelines).

MHPP comes to Drumheller

Michael
  
The Town of Drumheller spans the banks of the Red Deer River north-east of Calgary in the Canadian Badlands. You probably know Drumheller as the home of the Royal Tyrrell Museum, but it should be famous for more than fossils. Like all of Alberta’s communities, places throughout Drumheller reflect its unique history. In Drumheller these places show us Drumheller’s evolution from a ranching town to a regional service centre and as the site of over 130 coal mines. 

The Municipal Heritage Partnership Program (MHPP) recently trained the Drumheller Heritage Steering Committee appointed by Town Council. This is the first step MHPP takes when helping a municipality evaluate local historic places.    

Over the next several months, the committee will develop a context paper defining the people, groups and events that Drumheller feels contributed to its development. The next step will be to identify sites in Drumheller that reflect these influences. Hopefully, many of these sites will have “heritage integrity”—that is, the sites must have enough historic material to reflect the reasons why they are important to Drumheller. If they do, a Statement of Significance will be written for each site.

The Statement of Significance explains why the site is valued and what about it must be conserved for it to remain historic. The statements will help Drumheller decide how best to preserve locally significant historic places.   
The Navy League building may be one of the sites evaluated in the Town of Drumheller's Municipal Heritage Inventory project.

If you would like to learn more about conducting a Municipal Heritage Inventory, please read the Evaluating Historic Places manual found on the MHPP website. If you would like to discuss options please contact MHPP staff.

  
Written by: Michael Thome, Municipal Heritage Services Officer  

 

The ABC’s of Heritage Conservation (Part 1 of 3)

Alberta's Historic Places

 

The words of our trade can confuse and bemuse – below is a brief glossary of key terms designed to clarify and inform. 

Statements of Significance are used to understand how historic places should be conserved after a designating authority (i.e., a municipality – City, Town, Village or Municipal District, or the Government of Alberta) designates a place as a Municipal Historic Resource or a Provincial Historic Resource. 

  • Historic place:  A structure, building, group of buildings, district, landscape, archaeological site or other place that has been formally recognized for its heritage value. 
  • Statement of Significance (SoS):  A statement that briefly describes the historic place, identifies the heritage value or values associated with the place and lists the corresponding character-defining elements that must be conserved. 
  • Heritage value:  The aesthetic, historic, scientific, cultural, social or spiritual importance or significance for past, present or future generations. The heritage value of an historic place is embodied in its character-defining elements. 
  • Character-defining elements:  The materials, forms, location, spatial configurations and cultural associations or meanings that contribute to the heritage value of an historic place, which must be retained in order to preserve its heritage value. 

Village Treasures, in the Village of Mannville, is an example of a historic place. In January 2010 the Village designated it a Municipal Historic Resource. To read the Statement of Significance click here.

To learn more about the above terms or to read about additional conservation terms, please review the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada. The Glossary section of the Municipal Heritage Partnership Program website is also a great resource. 

Written by: Brenda Manweiler, Municipal Heritage Services Officer (with definitions from the Standards and Guidelines).