Cloudy skies, cool temperatures and light rain all conspired to make for a gloomy day. It was not a promising outlook and it seemed a waste heading into the hills. With that in mind, perhaps this would be a good time to explore Calgary’s living history museum, Heritage Park. It’s been a few years since we visited and anyway we’ve been talking about returning. Why not?
Expecting huge crowds due to the long weekend, we are pleasantly surprised to find the park near deserted.
Our intentions were to document some specific exhibits, some train stuff in particular, plus we planned do a few of our trademark movie then and now shots – many films have used the park as a setting (the National Dream for one). Be sure to watch for these reports coming soon.
Be sure to comment on this post (below pictures).
We also wished to check out the grain elevator. One of the parks earlier exhibits, it’s been here since 1966. A real honest to goodness former working elevator, and not simply a modern built exhibit, it was moved here from Shonts Alberta (now ghost town SE of Edmonton). Transporting it must have been quite a task – did they cut into pieces or keep it whole?
While this elevator may seem pretty typical, looking much like the countless others that used to dot the prairies, this one is rare one due to its lineage. Painted for the Security Elevator Company Ltd, this is the very last extant building connected to the firm. All other elevators it once owned are long gone. The company was one of the smaller players and was merged and assimilated out of existence by the late 1920s.
Founded in 1908 Security owned some 130-ish elevators by time it merged with the Northern Elevator Company circa 1929. Many of those were built by the firm, but some were acquired by taking over a competitor in the early 1920s. The name Security then seemed to vanish. Northern, along with a couple other grain companies, became National Grain Company in 1940 (and later Cargill in the 1970s). This elevator was sold to the Alberta Wheat Pool, the province’s largest grain company, soon after World War Two, however. The Pool closed it a short time before it was moved to the Park.
As you can see, mergers, acquisitions and take overs are the rule in the grain industry. Grain Elevator family trees can be confusing as heck. It’s not clear if this building always wore this paint scheme we see now or it was repainted in the colours of one the successor companies. We found no photos showing it later in its career.
This author has not been able to find the exact date this structure was built but we’ve seen photos at the Glenbow photo archives dated 1911-ish showing this same elevator looking all shiny and new, so at that time is a good bet (update, Heritage Parks says 1909 or 1910). The rail line here, the former Grand Trunk Pacific (now CNR) main line between Edmonton and Wainwright similarly dates from 1910.
While Shonts never seemed to amount to much, and certainly little remains today, there is a second elevator still standing along the rail line there. It’s privately owned now. Both Shonts elevators survive – not bad for a town that itself does not exist any more. It’s nice that a small part of its legacy lives on.
The elevator at Heritage Park sits alongside a working track so there are often good opportunities to capture a train passing it by. I hope they have plans to acquire a suitable grain box car to spot in front of the building, but for now there is a stock car, tank car and railway snow plow in front (???) – not cars ones would expect to find in front of a grain elevator.
I am afraid the dreary sky did nothing to help our pictures, but it did keep the crowds away, and that was nice (for us anyway but not the park who needs the income I guess).
We’ve documented some other Heritage Park exhibits, train themed ones in this case and to see them, click the links below… Coal mine locomotives. And at the other end of the scale… CPR Selkirk locomotive 5931.
Lived on a farm at Shonts (1/2 mile north) 1957 – 1969. Jim Weir was the Alberta Wheat Pool Grain Buyer during this time and stayed on as quasi security and clean-up man until the remaining newer Elevator was purchased by Killarney Farms.
I had hauled grain for Jim, out of that older Elevator (which he had a peculiar fondness for) a few times to bring over wheat for mixing to maximize the wheat grade being shipped out. Jim was a master blender and his customers around Shonts, ALWAYS got paid for a better grade of wheat than any surrounding neighbours.
I got to this thread while looking for pictures of the dismantling of the old Security Elevator uploaded to the internet by Gary Paterson who was involved in the job along with my kid brother.
My family is from Shonts, where this elevator was from. I recall before we moved away in the early 1960s seeing it along the rail line. I was about ten back then. It’s so nice it was saved when so many fell. Like you said in other articles, the mass demolition of these elevators caught everyone off guard. More should have been saved.
Heritage park was busy last week when we visited, but we all has a great time. The kids loved it. The grain elevator was running and it was so interesting to see how one operated.
We used to do something called the "pointless challenge" 🤪 and miss those days. It was so much silly fun and often frustrating as heck. In these we'd invite people to send in random photos of obscure locations, but not give any information, and then we'd track where it was and shoot something similar.
Most of these came from old family collections, as was the case here. Anyone up to resurrecting the series?
In hindsight, why didn't we pose someone in our shot?
Pointless: “Devoid of meaning (or) senseless” Merriam-Webster.
If you like what we do and want to support this ongoing project (12 years now), go here: https://www.BIGDoer.com/help-the-society/ Thanks to Connie for making this post possible.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: ca1970 and 2014. Posted by Connie.
Captured on a cold, cold day many years ago. We've been passing this old house for decades and it's little changed in that time. At some point we expect to drive by and it'll be gone.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2017. Posted by Connie.
When retired old railway cars usually get cut up for scrap. Sometimes, however, they find their way into the hands of the general public or whomever. Flat cars make good bridges, and boxcars can be transformed into storage buildings and the like. Case in point here. We see them used like this often enough and in this case, it's part of a corral.
Incidentally, this boxcar dates from 1950 and this was found by tracing the old road number, which is still visible.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2017. Posted by Connie.
This central Alberta racetrack was never a commercial operation but instead just a fun place for car enthusiasts in the area to get together. Early '70s or thereabouts and it only lasted a few years. Even thought it's been abandoned for that long, there is no doubt what was here.
You know we like the the obscure stuff and this one fits the bill perfectly. Found by accident while backroad cruising and the history comes thanks to local car guy Mike.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2022. Posted by Connie.
On top of little Myrtle Mountain in the Kimberley (BC) Nature Park.
There's some good wilderness fun to be had here and nice views as you can see, but the real reason we came is mining history. The whole area near the ski hill was extensively worked over a century ago and we were looking for evidence of this. We didn't find much in the area searched, but it's a big chunk of property and we hope to return to cover more ground again soon. Of all the subjects we cover, mining related is a favourite.
Still, it was a good hike and that can't be bad. Look to the comments for more info 👇.
Exploring nature and history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2022. Posted by Connie.
It's a strange curiosity in south Kananaskis, there on a hillside and we have no idea who created it. We asked around and no one's completely sure about its history. In the past it showed the Canada 100 logo from 1967 but in 2017 someone changed it to reflect the country's 150th.
That's our friend Emily from DanOCan.com having a look.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2017. Posted by Connie.
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Lived on a farm at Shonts (1/2 mile north) 1957 – 1969. Jim Weir was the Alberta Wheat Pool Grain Buyer during this time and stayed on as quasi security and clean-up man until the remaining newer Elevator was purchased by Killarney Farms.
I had hauled grain for Jim, out of that older Elevator (which he had a peculiar fondness for) a few times to bring over wheat for mixing to maximize the wheat grade being shipped out. Jim was a master blender and his customers around Shonts, ALWAYS got paid for a better grade of wheat than any surrounding neighbours.
I got to this thread while looking for pictures of the dismantling of the old Security Elevator uploaded to the internet by Gary Paterson who was involved in the job along with my kid brother.
Awesome, thanks for sharing this!
My family is from Shonts, where this elevator was from. I recall before we moved away in the early 1960s seeing it along the rail line. I was about ten back then. It’s so nice it was saved when so many fell. Like you said in other articles, the mass demolition of these elevators caught everyone off guard. More should have been saved.
Wow, very cool story! Agreed, we lost too many of these iconic structures.
Heritage park was busy last week when we visited, but we all has a great time. The kids loved it. The grain elevator was running and it was so interesting to see how one operated.
I love the old engine in the grain elevator’s powerhouse. So cool!
Great shots and it’s so nice to hear the history of that building. I’ve often wondered.
Thanks, we love to share!