Founded just over a century ago, the tiny community of Robsart Saskatchewan is today a shadow of its former self, home to many, many more ghosts than people. It’s one of the more picturesque such towns ever visited by BIGDoer.com (that’s a big statement) and our group has seen its...
In the days before 7-11s and Macs, one shopped at local mom and pop owned corner stores located right in your own neighbourhood. They used to be everywhere, a place to pick up a jug of milk and loaf of bread on the way home from work. They were a...
The unique chalet style A-frame condos seen here are clearly a product of the the late 1970s, they scream it, and were interesting enough to be included in an article published in National Geographic magazine, many years ago; not as the main subject matter mind you, but still seen none...
Sometimes we just sit and watch trains go by. We have a special spot in town were we do this, that we call our own, along a section of public pathway with some grass to sit upon, that parallels the CPR’s mainline just east of the Alyth Yards. The action...
The little red caboose seen in this article is located at the Stettler Alberta museum and can be viewed by anyone visiting that venue. Once owned by Canadian National Railways, it was originally a boxcar built in 1918, so darn near a century ago, that in the 1950s was converted...
After looking at this Boler, it’ll be clear why many people refer to them as eggs on wheels, especially so if coloured white, as this example is. You’d lose it in a snowstorm for sure and looks how it blends so well into the featureless sky behind. It was spotted...
Built over a hundred years ago, the rather spindly looking St George’s Island (12th St SE or Zoo Island) bridge still carries traffic, although its future is somewhat up in the air. Crossing the mighty Bow River just east of downtown Calgary, it connects the community of Inglewood, with others...
An “almost” ghost town, Lemsford Saskatchewan is located in the western part of that province and is home to a little brick schoolhouse, a nice one too, that’s sadly seen better days. Long since closed as learning facility, it was later used for grain storage (as strange as that seems)...
This report we tour the compressor building at the historic Turner Valley Gas Plant, just south of Calgary. Inside this long cavernous structure is a bank of ancient engines with integral compressors, the size of which are are hard to describe. They’re big, really big…let’s call them behemoths! These were...
This fairly long urban trek is part loop and part out and back and takes us west from Edworthy Park to our final destination, Bowness Park. Along the trip, paralleling and close to the Bow River much of way, we’ll pass through many parks, natural areas and green spaces via...
Spanning the Elbow River just before it empties into the Bow, the 9th Avenue road bridge connects the Calgary downtown core with communities to the east. Built just over a hundred years ago, this fine old structure sees heavy use and as such, according to the city anyway, is wearing...
The giant globe shaped tanks seen here are known as Horton Spheres and are located at the historic Turner Valley gas plant. Built in the the early 1940s, these “Big Balls” were used to store specialized gaseous products produced at the facility, most notably a World War Two era fuel...
The fine looking church we’ll be discussing here is located in the old Calgary community of Bridgeland and is just over a century old. In fantastic shape given its age, over the years it has served two separate Christian based faiths. We’ll look at the building twice, first in the...
The old road bridge we’re looking at here, located in Moose Jaw Saskatchewan, is something close to a hundred years old and is still sees use to this day. Crossing over the placid Moose Jaw River, a winding and rather muddy water course, it’s located inside a city park. That...
This 13 foot Boler (when built Canada did not use the metric system) was found in southwest Calgary, not terribly far from where were live, on a blustery cold day in early December 2014. You might say it’s feeling a little blue, what with the low temperatures, that blue bottom...
Join us as we take a tour of an abandoned school in the Crowsnest Pass of Alberta, a fine looking albeit simple two storey brick structure constructed close to a hundred years ago. It’s been a very long time since it was last used as a learning facility and today...
The large wooden structure seen here is an annex, a simple ancillary building used to increase the storage capacity of a grain elevator. This particular example used to sit along the trains tracks in the tiny burg of Legend Alberta, in the proverbial middle of nowhere. After the elevator it...
In this post we find ourselves at Parade Square in the old Currie Barracks base, officially Canadian Forces Base Calgary, in the southwest quadrant of the city. The first image takes us way back to 1971 and shows a military ceremony taking pace here. In our photo, captured in March...
This old fire hydrant and the tall tower seen in behind, emblazoned with the Firestone Company name, are pretty much all that’s left of a tire plant that once operated in Calgary. In production from 1960-1978. the factory lands are for the most part an empty field, siting next to...
This cute little 13 foot Boler was found in a back alley – these sort of locations are a absolute goldmine for Boler spotters – in the Calgary community of Ramsay. You’ll notice the trailer and garage almost match in colours. A strange coincidence perhaps? Hmmm. This one was found...
Even in winter months, we still get out and hike. More times than not we stay in town, but given there are a huge number of public pathways to choose from in this fair city, this works out well. Often though, these types of outings are rather dull and mundane...
We’ll call this motley grouping of vehicles the Badland’s Collection for no reason other then they were found in the scenic Badlands of Alberta, in the Red Deer River Valley near the town of Drumheller. We were on foot wandering about the area, looking for adventure and fun and any...
In this “then and now”, we take two scenes from the 1985 Disney flick Journey of Natty Gann, set in the 1930s, then return to the exact spots where they were shot to document what things look like today. The location here is downtown Coleman Alberta, in the historic Crowsnest...
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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