A Lime Kiln on the Slave River

A Lime Kiln on the Slave River

Jared

Written by: Patrick Carroll, Cultural Resource Management Advisor, Southwest NWT Field Unit, Parks Canada

About 50 km upriver on the Slave River from Fitzgerald, Alberta, among a small cluster of islands named Stony Islands, you will find the remains of a stone lime kiln. Archaeologist Marc Stevenson documented the kiln (IjOu-5) and a nearby quarry (IjOu-6) during a survey of the Slave River in 1980. He described the kiln as a, “large semicircular limestone feature 4m in height.” The quarry is an exposed face of limestone just upriver from the kiln. All that we know about the history of the kiln is based on notes from a conversation Stevenson had with a Brother Seaurault. According to Stevenson, “The feature, according to an elderly informant, is the limestone furnace used by residents of Fort Chipewyan in the 1910’s and 1920’s to make whitewash for their log homes in the latter settlement.” It appears, therefore, to have been here for at least a century and is now showing the degradations of time, seasonal flooding and ice scouring.

The kiln is built into a natural alcove in the limestone exposure, set on a rocky shelf at a height to protect it from the impacts of seasonal high water and ice scouring on the Slave River. It consists of a semi-circular convex stone wall extending from the bedrock which, together, create the chimney. The height of the wall extends to the height of the top of the bedrock. A stoke hole on the bottom of the wall faces toward the river. An interesting feature of this kiln is that one side of the wall of the kiln does not abut directly against the limestone outcrop. The collapsing wall on the down-river side appears to have been built mostly flush to the bedrock face. The wall on the up-river side, though, remains in its original condition showing it was built with a 30-60 cm gap between the edge of the stone wall and the bedrock face. It is not known what purpose this gap might have provided for the operation of the kiln, although, it is easily wide enough to allow for a person to enter the cavity of the chimney.

Source: Stoney Middleton Heritage Centre Community Group.
Source: National Stone Centre.
Source: Rhoda Allanic.
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Not Forgotten: Cousins in Arms

Not Forgotten: Cousins in Arms

Jared

Written by: Ronald Kelland, Historic Places Research and Designation Program

Remembrance Day, November 11, is the day Canadians honour our military personnel and memorialize those who gave their lives while in military service. While honouring all Canadian service personnel this Remembrance Day, RETROactive is drawing particular attention to a geographical feature named to commemorate two cousins who were casualties of the First World War.

Near the Alberta/British Columbia boundary, 55 kilometres ENE of Grande Cache is a mountain known as Mount May; its two peaks are named George Peak and Francis Peak. The mountain and its peaks are named for two cousins, George and Francis May of Ottawa, both of whom were casualties of the First World War.

Francis May

Francis Loren May (frequently misspelled Francis Lorne May) was born on August 14, 1894, at Ottawa to William Chaney May and Susan Margaret May (née Story). William May was a partner in the family firm George May and Sons, a leather goods and saddlery store on Rideau Street. In 1915, Francis was living with his parents at 155 Gilmour Street in Ottawa. Described as being nearly six feet in height and with hazel eyes, a ruddy complexion and light brown hair, he was a member of the Ottawa Ski Club and the Ottawa Canoe Club and, during his school years, he spent two years with the Ottawa Collegiate Institute Cadets. He tried to enlist for service with the Canadian Expeditionary Force in 1914 but was not accepted due to an attack of appendicitis. He did enlist for service at Ottawa on February 22, 1915. His attestation papers list his employment as clerk, and he may have been employed in the family firm or with the Dominion Government. Francis had worked with the Dominion Land Survey, notably in northeastern Alberta in 1912 as an axeman in the surveying party of George McMillan, DLS. It is possible that the May River, which was partially surveyed and named by McMillan in that year, may have been named for Francis.

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Halloween in Smoky Lake

Jared

Written by: Sara King, Government Records Archivist, Provincial Archives of Alberta

With Halloween once again upon us it’s time for some spooky fun from the Provincial Archives of Alberta. Nicholas Gavinchuk operated a photography studio in Smoky Lake from the early 1920s into the 1960s documenting all manner of aspects of community life there, including Halloween. One of the more interesting aspects of doing archival research is seeing a brief description of a file or photograph and finding out it’s not quite what you expected. This is often the case in archives as archivists try and use the titles given to photographs and files by the creator of the records as opposed to assigning their own.  

For example, the image below was labelled as “Halloween Hags”. But as you can see, they’re clearly Halloween hogs! In the Archives’ defense, an “a” and an “o” are awfully similar in cursive.

G1810 “Halloween Hags” (Smoky Lake), 1953. Source: Provincial Archives of Alberta.
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Who and where was John Ware?

Who and where was John Ware?

Jared

Written by: Sam Judson and Lindsay Amundsen-Meyer, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary.

Alberta’s cowboy culture is embraced by many and celebrated through events and conventions like the Calgary Stampede, K-Days or Calgary’s ‘White Hat’ tradition. This culture is largely represented in the history books by white, European settlers, although Alberta’s past is much more multiethnic and multicultural than many realize.

John Ware was one of Alberta’s early Black setters. Ware’s name is recognizable today to many Albertans, who refer to him as Alberta’s first Black cowboy, and the longevity of his legend is fascinating. Despite this, few know his story and very little is known about the true nature of his life.

John Ware, rancher, with wife Mildred and children Robert and Nettie in southern Alberta, [ca. 1896], (CU1107289) by Unknown. Source: Glenbow Library and Archives Collection, Libraries and Cultural Resources Digital Collections, University of Calgary.
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So Far from Home: Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation and Red Deer Industrial School

So Far from Home: Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation and Red Deer Industrial School

Jared

Editor’s note: September 30 is National Day for Truth and Reconciliation and Orange Shirt Day. Reading residential school histories can be a painful process. If reading this is causing pain or bringing back distressing memories, please call the Indian Residential Schools Crisis Line at 1-866-925-4419. The Crisis Line is available 24 hours a day and can also provide information on other health supports provided by the Health Canada Indian Residential Schools Resolution Health Support Program.

An earlier version of this article appeared in the December/January 2024 issue of Nisichawayasi Achimowina.

Written by: Laura Golebiowski (Indigenous Consultation Adviser), in collaboration with Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation.

“Eight children, an equal number of boys and girls, were going with us to enter a Residential School… I applied, but without success, to the Principal of the Brandon Residential School, for the admittance of the Indian children. That they were “non-treaty” was the alleged objection. As, however, the Red Deer school was willing to receive them, we decided to take them there…In the course of two or three years, five of those apparently healthy children had died from Tuberculosis.”

– Samuel Gaudin, in Forty-Four Years with the Northern Crees

Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation are the Nisichawayasi Nehethowuk: the people whose ancestors lived near where the three rivers meet and who speak Nehetho, the language of the four winds. Their territory includes the rich lands of the Canadian Shield and boreal forest in what is now northern Manitoba. Their central community hub is located at Nelson House, a long-time place of Indigenous occupation where the Hudson’s Bay Company established a trading post in the late 1700s.

The rocky shoreline of Footprint Lake, Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation territory near Nelson House, Manitoba. Source: Laura Golebiowski.
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Public archaeology in Nose Hill Park

Jared

Written by: Sam Judson and Lindsay Amundsen-Meyer, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary.

Calgary was incorporated as a Canadian city in 1884 and, since then, has grown to be a city of more than 1.5 million people. Although the City of Calgary is less than 150 years old, people have lived in this area, called this place home, and taken care of these lands for thousands of years. This long history is told through the numerous archaeological sites within and beyond Calgary’s city limits. Examples such as the Hawkwood site, Everblue Springs site and Mona Lisa Site demonstrate that this part of Alberta has been inhabited for approximately 8,000 years.

Nose Hill is a testament to Alberta’s long-standing Indigenous history. More than 40 recorded Precontact Indigenous archaeological sites are known within this City of Calgary park space, most first recorded by archaeologists in 1978 ahead of the creation of the park. The majority of these are camp sites made up of one or many stone circles, but kill sites and lithic scatters are also present. Not only was Nose Hill utilized frequently by Indigenous groups before contact, but it was also extensively used by citizens in the early days of Calgary’s existence as a settler municipality. Animals grazed on Nose Hill, northern areas of the hill were cultivated for crops, and a gravel pit was active on Nose Hill for several years. Despite these modern activities, Nose Hill Park remains one of the largest undisturbed grasslands in the Calgary area. As a result, the archaeological sites of Nose Hill are remarkably well preserved and tell a story of thousands of years of human occupation and connection with this prominent landform.

University of Calgary Staff and Students at Nose Hill Park, Calgary. Source: Lindsay Amundsen-Meyer.
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Bringing Buddhism to southern Alberta

Bringing Buddhism to southern Alberta

Jared

Editor’s note: This article was originally published on the RAM Blog, the official blog of the Royal Alberta Museum.

Written by: Chihiro Iwamoto, Administrative Assistant, Royal Alberta Museum

When Canada declared war on Japan in 1941, people of Japanese ancestry were met with intense discrimination. The Canadian government ordered the removal of Japanese Canadians from the West Coast of British Columbia in 1942, and within two months, approximately 22,000 Japanese Canadians, about three-quarters of whom were born in Canada, were forced to leave their homes and their properties were confiscated.

Most male Japanese Canadians were sent to labour camps to work on road construction, while their families were sent to internment camps in interior British Columbia. 

Around this time, Alberta’s sugar beet industry struggled to secure labour due to the heavy, harsh, labour-intensive nature of sugar beet cultivation. A group of 560 Japanese families agreed to move to Southern Alberta by 1943, where they signed a labour contract to work in the sugar beet fields because it allowed the families to stay together. One of the communities they were relocated to was the small town of Picture Butte, about 27 km north of Lethbridge.

Black and white portrait photographs of a woman and man, Nobuichi Takayasu and his wife Shizuyo
Nobuichi Takeyasu and his wife Shizuyo.
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Coal Mining History and Heritage Conservation at the Bellevue Mine

Jared

Written by: Fraser Shaw, Heritage Conservation Advisor and Allan Rowe, Historic Places Research Officer

The Crowsnest Pass is a landscape of remarkable history and exceptional natural beauty in southwest Alberta. Highway 3 winds through the mountain corridor past the former site of the West Canadian Collieries Mine, where an enormous tipple once straddled rail spurs on what is now the highway. The tipple and above-ground operations were dismantled after the mine’s closure in 1961 but the distinctive concrete portals remain and are clearly visible from the road. Now a historic site, the Crowsnest Pass Ecomuseum Trust Society owns and operates an interpretive facility and maintains a portion of the main tunnel where public tours and thousands of visitors experience an underground mine that historically extended for kilometres along the coal seams.

The Bellevue Mine in June 2024 retains its distinctive paired portals with the name and construction date cast into the concrete facade. The portals and tipple walkway, a remnant of which survives beside the portal today (arrows), both appear in a 1951 photograph in the Provincial Archives of Alberta looking south from the escarpment (above right). Above left, an image of West Canadian Collieries from the collection of the Crowsnest Archives looks north to Bellevue, with stairs ascending the steep slope from the tipple and portal complex (not visible) to the wash house on the ridge above. Source: Historic Resources Management Branch.

Designated as a Provincial Historic Resource in 2011, the former mine exemplifies the early mining history of the Crowsnest Pass and represents industrial practices and technologies at one of Alberta’s most significant underground mining operations in this important historic coal-producing region.

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Season of the Birch: Continuing Practices of Woodland Cree First Nation

Season of the Birch: Continuing Practices of Woodland Cree First Nation

Jared

Editor’s note: Tansi! June is National Indigenous History Month, the opportunity to learn about the unique cultures, traditions and experiences of Indigenous communities in what is now Alberta and across Canada. This month also marks the 125th anniversary of the signing of Treaty 8, which encompasses a land mass of approximately 840,000 kilometres and includes portions of Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and the Northwest Territories. In Alberta, much of Treaty 8 territory is delineated by the Athabasca River extending north. Treaty 8 territory also includes the north shore of Lac La Biche extending northeast to the Saskatchewan border, as well as portions of Jasper National Park.

The banner image above is courtesy of Laura Golebiowski.

Written by: Laura Golebiowski (Indigenous Consultation Adviser) in collaboration with Woodland Cree First Nation.

“I believe Spring speaks its truest word when you can see the women setting out pails to get that sap from the birch tree,” Chief Dan George narrates in the 1973 film Season of the Birch. The short documentary focuses on intangible heritage knowledge and practices that are still present in Cree communities in Treaty 8 today: the tapping of birch trees and the making of birch syrup.

The window for birch tapping is incredibly narrow. The waskwayâpoy (birch sap) runs best in the early spring when the snow has melted, but before the tree leaves appear. At the kind invitation of Lawrence Lamouche, Traditional Lands Manager, I visited Woodland Cree First Nation in late April, to witness this centuries-old practice and learn how Knowledge-Keepers harvest waskwayâpoy and make birch syrup.

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Love and Marriage at the Provincial Archives of Alberta

Love and Marriage at the Provincial Archives of Alberta

Jared

Editor’s note: The banner image above is from the wedding of Sandy and Diane Weir, November 1974. Photo courtesy of the Provincial Archives of Alberta.

Written by: Heather Northcott, Government Records Archivist, Provincial Archives of Alberta

Showcasing a variety of archival records and images, the Provincial Archives of Alberta (PAA) is pleased to present its latest exhibit “Love and Marriage.”

The exhibit was inspired by the often joyful and sometimes sad stories that fill the archival vaults waiting for discovery. Visitors to the exhibit will first encounter images and letters about love blossoming before exploring narratives of engagement and marriage. The arc of romance and marriage leads naturally to anniversaries, divorce and death. The exhibit would not be complete without addressing who is missing – the groups or communities not well represented by the archival documents – and putting a call out for records donations.

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