Alberta History 1915-1918

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1915

Some time during 1912 and 1915 (III)-Mathias Salzl rented a horse and buggy to take a friend out and look at a homestead in the District of Sand Hills across the river from Leduc, Alberta. The friend decided he didn't want the homestead. However Mathias decided to take it and spent a number of summers improving it by clearing land and building a log home. It is during this period that Mathias shot a large bird and years later that he discovered that it had been a Whooping Crane. The family believes he filed on this homestead in the Sand Hills District in 1915. Some homesteaders however appear to have squatted for a number of years before applying for title. This item needs more research in order to tie down the actual date. It is also during this period that his wife (IV)-Jerusha Anna McDougall learned about all the wild Alberta plants that could be eaten.

The Edmonton Grads started to dominate world basketball this year until 1940, when there was no one left to defeat, and they disbanded. Percy Page, their coach, led them to win five hundred and two games of five hundred and twenty two played. This year the Alberta prohibition era began and lasted until 1923.

The manager of John Walters Lumber Mill in what was to become Edmonton stole $50,000.00 and fled the area. Walters had other mishaps that contributed into causing him to plunged from a millionaire into heavy debt, from which he never recovered.


Some say the Alberta Railway aka. Great Waterways Line had so many washouts, so many times it took 5 days to go 60 miles. There wasn't anything to eat. The passengers complained and the conductor said; Just you wait in a little while you will have all you want to eat. In three miles the train stopped beside a blueberry patch. The conductor said here we are, get out and help yourself.

June 28: The Saskatchewan River flooded Edmonton leaving two thousand people homeless. The flood this year swept away fifty homes including the Edmonton Lumber Company, John Walter's Mill and the City Boilers. Flooding also cut off the electrical supply to the city. The loss of John Walter's Lumber Mill destroyed him financially and he never recovered. Being old and unused, Fort Edmonton is dismantled this year to be preserved and later restored by the city. However, this never happens.



1916

Father Pere Lacombe, born 1827 Quebec, came west in 1849, died 1916 in Calgary, but is buried in Edmonton, Alberta. The Blackfoot called him the man with a good heart. His heart remains in the Blackfoot Country as it was sealed in a container and buried behind the Lacombe Nursing Home in Calgary, Alberta.

Father Lacombe, born 1827, died December 2, 1916 at a home for the aged in Midnapore, Alberta and John McDougall the Methodist died the following January 1917. Emily Murphy, in Edmonton, became the first woman Magistrate in the British Empire. A young lawyer challenged her judicial powers claiming under British law "women are persons in matters of pains and penalties but are not persons in matters of rights and privileges". The young lawyer is absolutely correct according to British Common Law. It should be noted that Canadian Aboriginal Common Law has included women's voting rights for centuries before the arrival of Europeans.

Prohibition was declared in Alberta from 1916 to 1923. It is noteworthy that the scientist at this time believed that alcohol and smoking acted as a shield against infection. When the 1918 flu hit Alberta, many believed the lack of alcohol, resulted in the high mortality rate in Alberta from the disease.

March 14: Women are allowed to vote in Saskatchewan. On April 27, 1916, Alberta women regain the right to vote and this follows the Manitoba lead of January 27. Red-necked British Columbia and Ontario finally follow to allow the female vote on April 4, 1917 and April 12 respectively.

April: The Peace River Oil Company hit a gusher of salt water with a minor amount of natural gas at 346 meters (1,136 feet). The well was located 4-31-85-20W5 about 24 km NE of the town of Peace River on the east bank of the Peace River. The well spewed 30,000 barrels of salt water and 340,000 cubic feet of natural gas each day, at its peak. The company attempted to plug the well in June 1917, but they failed. The well flowed into the Peace River until 1955 when it was finally plugged. The well again was running wild in 1982. The well ran wild until 2003 when it was finally capped.





1917

During the period 1917 to 1921, the prairies suffered a prolonged drought forcing many people from the lands into the growing cities and towns. Many return to the United States from where they originated. Farm abandonment reached 80% in some areas. This exceeded the Great Depression. It is ironic that the region that was well known as the Prairie dry belt (southern Alberta/Saskatchewan) produced a mammoth harvest in 1915-1916.

Charles Stewart, Liberal, is elected Premier of Alberta 1917-1921. He would be the last Liberal Premier elected in Alberta this century.

Few Canadians realize that a war internment camp was created at Yoho National Park, about 30 kilometers west of Lake Louise, to hold Austro-Hungarian immigrants in Canada where they were forced to do hard labor. My grandfather was a Austro-Hungarian but fortunately was not interned. Not learning from this experience, we Canadians repeated this practice in the second World War against the Japanese Canadians.

June 2: William Avery (Billy) Bishop (1894-1956 was awarded the Victory Cross. He was the most successful Canadian airman, eventually shooting down 72 enemy aircraft. He was described as a terrible pilot but a fantastic shot.





1918

Manfred von Richthofen, "the Red Baron" of Germany, their top ace airman, is shot down by Roy A. Brown of Canada (1893-1944).

The first Hutterite settled in Alberta and the men adopt the wives last name. The first air mail is delivered in the west between Calgary and Edmonton by Miss Stinson, on July 9, in her single engine Curtis Biplane with two hundred and fifty nine letters. Nine thousand Native people are living in Alberta.

In March of 1918 a new, virulent type of flu virus appeared in the army training camps at Fort Riley and Camp Funston in Kansas, United States. The virus is a mutation that evolved in U.S. pigs and is considered the worst infectious disease episode ever. This American flu is a genetic cross between a human flu virus and a pig virus. The flu is believed to then spread to England, then to Spain. More recent research (2004) suggests the flu originated from the Chicken flu using mutated memagglutinin H1 receptors to jump to humans. This new strain of American flu virus is closely related to the swine flu and would claim more than twenty one million lives worldwide between 1918-20, 450,000 in Russia, 375,000 in Italy, 228,000 in Great Britain, 5,000,000 in India and 550,000 in United States. In Alberta the death rate was 4,300. The United States losses are more than ten times the American losses in battle during all of World War I. Soldiers from Kansas had carried the flu to the French front there and the American flu became renamed as the Spanish flu, probably to divert the blame of its origin. Mutations of the swine flu in two waves spread world wide as the Asian flu in 1957 and the Hong Kong flu in 1968 but none as devastating as the American flu of 1918.

John Oxford believes the predecessor of the 1918 flu originated in Etaples, Englind, the first case being Harry Underdown who contracted a flu in December 1916 and he died February 1917. It is believed the flu came from birds to pigs to soldiers. Many cases of flu erupted after this initial case.

The remedies for the flu included alcohol, opium and cocaine. Smoking was encouraged as it was believed to kill germs. Unfortunately prohibition was declared in 1916-1923 in Alberta and many blamed the high death rate on this law. Alberta had a population of 590,000 people and 38,000 came down with the flu and 4,300 died. The Flu weakened the immune system and most died from pneumonia. All attempts at quarantine, and isolation world wide failed and some speculated the disease is spread by the wealthy who were immune to the disease. The flu attacked young adults age 25 to 34 years of age and the children. Some believe the elderly were spared because they had an immunity to it from previous flu's.

The Spanish Flu (American flu) at Morinville hit the French very badly however the Austrian and German families seemed to have escaped.

A doctor declares Philip Salzl dead of the Flu. His mother refused to accept the prognosis and continued to bath his body with cold water. He revived and lived a normal life.

November 11: In Edmonton, two hundred and sixty two people died from the American Flu. Schools, churches and public buildings were closed from October 18 yet the infection spread. At St. Paul de Metis, thirty, out of a population of five hundred, died.

Jasper Alberta's History