Alberta History 1910-1912

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Jasper Alberta's Historic View

1910

(IV)-Marion Elizabeth Salzl is born December 23, 1910 Edmonton, Alberta, daughter (III)-Mathias Salzl born 1885 and (IV)-Gerusha Anne McDougall born 1889. The Edmonton, Dunvegan and British Columbia Railway had reached the French Catholic town of Morinville.

The Grand Trunk and Great Northern Railway was built 1910 to 1915 through the Yellowhead Pass towards the Pacific. Babe Coteau smuggled liquor to the construction crews.

Some say the first automobile arrived in High River this year.


1910 St. Paul des Metis

The Canadian Navy from 1910 to 1972 was given a daily tot of rum in the English Navy tradition. A tot is a small child and evolved to mean a child's cup, hence a small portion of rum.





1911

In 1911 the Saskatchewan legislature prohibited any Japanese, Chinese or other Oriental from employing any white woman or girl, and British Columbia and Ontario soon followed suit. This year the act was repealed but it was replaced by an act which required Chinese businessmen to obtain a special license to hire a female.

The Kicking Horse Pass Tunnel, in the Canadian Rockies, on the continental divide, on the B.C. Alberta boarder, is completed this year, being first considered as a pass in 1858. A spiral tunnel reduced the grade from 4.5% to 2.2%.

The Edson to Grande Prairie, Alberta Trail was in operation 1911 to 1916.

S.S. City of Edmonton in 1911

The S.S. City of Edmonton, a steamboat, was first launched in 1904 with Capt Grant in command. Abram Pearce who built steamboats only had mates papers but this year he finally received his masters certificate when he became Capt of the S.S. City of Edmonton. The long delay in receiving command, he considered the greatest humiliation of his life. He would retire in a few years. This picture taken in 1911 and is loading at the wharf just below the Low Level Bridge in Edmonton, Alberta on the North Saskatchewan River.

Most of the Counts, Dukes, Sirs and Earls who came to Alberta to create their own empire failed. Many underestimated the cost of creating their grandiose plans. Others like Viscount Alphonse de Seyssel and M. Emile Janet planned to manufacture gruyere cheese. They bought a large herd of cattle, built a factory, installed machinery, imported labor. They failed to test the milk which was not suitable for this cheese. Some tried raising sugar beets but failed to check government regulations which prohibited using beets for making alcohol. Others raised big herds of swine but failed to plant sufficient grain for feed.

April 29: The United Farmers of Alberta joined the Edmonton Board of Trade to ban settlement of Black people from Oklahoma in the Province. Three thousand and four hundred righteous souls signed the petition. The promise of free land had brought one hundred and twenty thousand United States settlers to the Canadian Prairies. There is lots of room for Anglo-Saxon settlers but no room for Blacks, Jews, Chinese, Mormons, Metis, Indians or Russians. The Anglo-Saxon Germans are not liked but tolerated for their agricultural skills. The breaking of the Standard Oil Company (EXXON) monopoly, based on the Sherman Anti-trust Act of 1890, occurred this year.

June 1: The population of the west is: Saskatchewan 492,432, Manitoba 461,000, B.C. 392,480, Alberta 374,295, NWT 8,512 and Yukon 8,512.

October: Louise McKinney one of the infamous Alberta Five women brought the Women's Christian Temperance Union to Alberta. They were devoted to protecting 'the Home' and strengthen 'Family Life' through eugenics and prohibition. They pushed for sterilization of visible minorities (Slavic peoples especially), the poor, the sick and those considered feeble-minded. Louis McKinney, Emily Murphy, Nellie McClung and Henrietta Edwards are criminals guilty of crimes against humanity. The Nuremberg trials declared sterilization as a crime against humanity.



1912

Guy Weadick proposed the first Calgary Stampede to be held this September.

St. Paul de Metis became the village of St. Paul de Metis. It appears to have retained the de Metis title until the late 1920's. This assumption has its basis in the reference material of the time.

This is the year of the Edmonton land boom and bust. Property on Jasper Avenue sold for two thousand a front foot, site unseen. Six months later seventy-five thousand lots reverted to the city for taxes. The City of Edmonton absorbed Strathcona this year.

The Toonerville Trolley started up this year with one track and one car running along white avenue until 1947. It had a colorful history.

The completion of a one hundred and seventy-mile pipeline, from the Bow Island region on the Oldman River, brings natural gas to Calgary.

The concept of picnic and Big Island is lost to future generations. A picnic requires at least three hundred people. It starts in the morning, and there must be a three-hour boat ride to get to the picnic ground. There must be a barrel of beer in the woods, and the picnic dinner must last for two hours. Then, in the evening, there must be a three hour boat ride home again, time for a full-fledged dance on board. That was a picnic, the boat being supplied by John Walter, the location being Big Island, sixteen miles up river from Edmonton.

The population of Edmonton is recorded as 53,611 but it was contested as hundreds of travelers were included in the count as were folks not part of Edmonton proper.

The railway came to Trochu, Alberta in the form of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway and much of the town site had to relocate to be closer to the railway.

February: The Provincial legislature decided to extend the franchise to tenants.

February: Strathcona was amalgamated into Edmonton, Alberta.

June 30: A tornado hit Regina, cutting a six block wide path of death and destruction.

Jasper Alberta's History