This post has been updated: An Evening in Meeting Creek The old photos and a few snippets have been kept and are seen below… …Inside are a number of displays and bits related to the day to day operations of an elevator, including a very old drive engine, in the...
The two pictures we’ll be looking at in this report show the Fort MacLeod Alberta post office at two completely different times in the building’s history. The first image, scanned from an old postcard, was shot sometime in 1950s and we return some sixty years later to see how it...
In May 2014 we toured the southwest corner of Saskatchewan on a quest to find grain elevators, ghost towns and abandoned farms. We also came in search of vintage cars, trucks (especially), strange and odd motorhomes, locomotives – anything old and interesting that has wheels and an engine. And guess...
Picture Butte, a small town located just north of Lethbridge, is home to one traditional wooden grain elevator, which is today’s subject. This massive structure, long since closed down by it’s original owner, but today being used by a local farmer to store grain, sits alongside an abandoned rail line....
This was not our first trip up Powderface Ridge this year, Earlier in the spring we hiked it, but a thick fog prevented us from seeing anything once at the summit. What a bummer, as we heard the views were stupendous. Even before we finished that first trip, we vowed...
For this delightful foothills hike we follow the Elbow Valley trail east from the Ing’s Mine day use area, then loop back to where we started using the Sulphur Springs trail on the return leg. While much of the trip is in the trees, every now and then things open...
Boler spotting can be thought of as a big game of hide and seek. These trailers are often secreted away on someone’s property, in a backyard, in alleys or parked on tree lined driveways, and as such are often difficult to catch. A passionate player of the Boler spotting game...
Some forty years separate the two images seen here in this report. In them we look at the CPR’s Crowsnest Line, in the town of Crowsnest, straddling the BC/Alberta border. The first photograph was submitted to us by a reader of the BIGDoer.com website, and was taken way back in...
A short and steep trail heads up to the South End of Lawson, aka Little Lawson or simply South Lawson, a rocky summit with stupendous views of Peter Lougheed Provincial Park, Kananaskis Lakes and the Opal Ranges (among others). This destination is a highpoint on a long undulating ridge that...
The small southern Alberta community of Milk River is home to three very photogenic traditional-style wood cribbed grain elevators. It’s almost a “row”, which I know is technically four or more, but does it really matter here? Trivialities aside, finding this many elevators in one spot in 2014 is pretty...
This report we’ll be looking at another of Saskatchewan’s iconic bowstring arch bridges. In the 1920s and 30s around eighty of these graceful structures were built, and fair number remain today. Some are still being used for road traffic, some are pedestrian use only, and others have been abandoned like...
In this “then and now” we look at the Maple Creek Saskatchewan Post Office, first in 1911, via a photo from an old postcard, and then how the fine old building appears today. And it looks wonderful. This series was shot during our (now, almost famous) spring 2014 Saskatchewan grain...
This 13 foot Boler – or 3.96 metre if we must metric-ize it – and I usually do but admittedly the conversion here is downright awkward – was spotted on a blustery, miserable, cold and rainy day in the central Alberta town of Innisfail. It was not a day conducive...
The unofficially named Greenhill Mine Ridge or simply Greenhill Ridge, a modest sized bump that was once mined for coal, offers some surprisingly good views from its lowly summit. This hike follows a series of old roads, 4×4 tracks with the occasional bit of bushwhacking thrown in for good measure....
The small community of Rosedale Alberta is located in the scenic Red Deer River valley near Drumheller and is home to one relatively modern wooden grain elevator. This imposing structure, today is in private hands, yet it’s still painted in the colours of its former owner. Until recently there was...
The Diplomat Mine interpretive site is home to two gargantuan mining shovels, built on such a scale that it’s hard to even describe them. Even in person, their size is simply overwhelming. Both are quite old and each toiled away for years at the mine extracting coal and overburden day...
Situated along the Canadian Pacific Railway’s busy east/west mainline, Gull Lake Saskatchewan is home to two old and very photogenic traditional style wood-cribbed grain elevators; and one newer high throughput concrete grain terminal. The former will be the subject of this report, the latter, being too new and not terribly...
Chris rushed in excitedly and showed me this comparison, but after a short pause, his look changed. It's that confused expression one gets just before the face-palm, when they realize something they did just doesn't add up.
One year shy of a century separates the two images but as it turns out, they're not even of the same building. The top is Westmount School and the bottom McDougall School, both in Edmonton and not far from each other.
It took this long to realize we'd been shooting at the wrong place all this time! The two schools were built in the same year and very close in design, so it's still an interesting comparison. We had a good laugh and we'll give Chris a mulligan on this one.
Looks like we're going have to head back for a do-over.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photos: 1924 and 2023. Submitted by Connie.
It's amazing how many of these Canada Centennial Maples Leafs still exist out in the wild across the prairies. We could fill an album with the ones we've photographed. It seems rural folks embraced patriotism with more fervor than their urban counterparts, but that's just an observation.
This example was found in a small Saskatchewan town. When they placed this up above the community hall there was a certain optimism that's not seen now. Today, only a handful of people call the community home, and it's that close to being a true ghost town. Almost sixty years in place and this memorial to a 100 year celebration is still here.
If our readers have found any of these while out exploring, please share in the comments. We'd love to see them.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2014. Submitted by Connie.
Billy Clark’s Cabin in Meadow Creek BC and it dates back over a century. Now at the local museum it formerly stood in a valley a little to east and on the shores of Duncan Lake (now Ducan Lake Reservoir).
Billy was a trapper, hunter, and woodsman. All he had was this tiny log house, a small plot of land, the surrounding wilderness, and his wits for survival. Nothing more. That spirit of self reliance seems to be a lost art today.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2022. Submitted by Connie.
Both Chris and I both grew up in the malaise era for cars and get giddy when we spot one from that time out in the wild. It's like meeting an old friend. This '80s beauty was found out in a hiking area of Kananaskis and by all appearances, looks to be driven regularly.
The malaise era is marked by cars with uninspired design, quirky traits, hobbled performance and often questionable quality. Depressing stuff. This Cutlass is probably one of the better GM cars of the time, and both Chris and our son Will have owned examples in the past.
Have a malaise era story or photo to share? Post it in the comments!
Out in nature with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2023. Submitted by Connie.
We come over many rises on a the prairies and on doing so surprised by many interesting things. This one caused a double take.
This lonely locomotives sits at the then very end of track outside Leader SK and was out of service at the time. Guess they socked it away out of sight to forget about it. We found photos showing it in service the year before our visit but here it was cold and dead.
Since this photo was taken, the Great Sandhills Railway has extended the track across the road and set up some kind of transloading operation. In years passed, the track (under CP ownership) continued west all the way into Alberta, but that's a distant memory.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2014. Submitted by Connie.
The messages have been coming fast and often. No, the book we produced a couple years back is not being published after all, in spite of appearing on many websites recently. Oddly some are showing it with the cover from another volume altogether. Please don't order and it must be a glitch.
The other two books shown in our capture are available however (and are awesome) and were produced by some friends. Interestingly, Chris contributed to each and those you can order.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Submitted by Connie.
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