This is Alderson

It’s been wiped off the face of the earth. Where once there was hope and promise, now it’s little more than an empty field. If not for close inspection it’d be easy to miss, but underfoot are subtle reminders of what was. Here’s a row of cellar-pits where buildings once stood. There, it’s scattered brick, the odd piece of metal, some hunk of concrete and little discarded things scattered about.

As journalist Johnnie Bachusky has been heard to say, “it’s the saddest place on earth”. And that about sums it up. It’s a little town here and gone in a moment of time that today has been almost completely forgotten. This is (heartbreaking) Alderson Alberta and here’s a humble little “pop history” piece we hope informs and entertains.

1879: Tall prairie grasses bend in the breeze, a hawk is heard on high, but mostly there’s silence. On the horizon, far away, it’s silhouettes…tepees, people, horses. Come’s the sunset and soon after complete and utter darkness. Nothing more is heard. The world here will soon change.

Paying our respects.

1882-1883: The Canadian Pacific (Transcontinental) Railway arrives. Now it’s smoke belching monsters and an end to the peace and quiet these plains have know for eons. There is no town here and won’t be for a while. With the climate extreme and harsh no one was crazy enough to try (yet). Even so, there was a flag stop in the area (later) serving a few settlers here.

1910: Alderson is founded. Only it wasn’t called that then and instead carried the name Carlstadt by German-speaking folk who came here to settle. In few short years the town would boom with the population quickly approaching two hundred. Streets were laid out during this early period and a business district built. There was all the usual trappings…hotels, land offices, hardware stores, apothecaries, meat shops, churches and a school. The future was bright and everyone was riding the wave. Heady times were these!

1915: With anti-German sentiment high during World War One, the town’s name was changed to Alderson. In spite of being decimated by fire the year prior, the people would rebuild with population topping out at two hundred and some that year. Soon it’d all fall apart. Where optimism reigned, came hopelessness. There was crop failures, another disastrous fire and with that a mass exodus soon followed. They’d had enough.

1920s: Alderson is seriously on the decline. Businesses close, buildings are moved away or demolished and people continue to hightail it OUT of town. Picture a complete retreat, in stark contrast to the prosperity of only a few short years before. The “Star of the Prairies” is dying.

1930s: The town’s population remains low if steady, with many vacant lots and few building still standing and in use. There’s little signs of life if one looks hard. The few hold outs must be nervous…this is the dry-belt after all and it’s only a matter of time before drought results in yet another farm failure and more of the populous leaving. As the decade progresses the town loses status as a village. Alderson, officially, is no more. Still a store & post office continues to operate, as does the school, for a time after.

1940s-1950s: With only a few hardy souls remaining, the town is near in ruins. Buildings are moved off site where as others succumb to time and the elements and simply collapse. Then the last residents leave. It’s gone…it’s all gone. RIP Alderson (Carlstadt); 1910-1950(ish). Ghost town status has been reached.

1950s & Beyond: The last building left falls to vandals but otherwise there’s little change in the ensuing decades. A town obliterated interests few, so outside the occasional curiosity seeker, no one even bothers to stop by. Alderson is out of sight and out of mind.

2019: Team BIGDoer pays this vanished town a visit, tagging along with our host Johnnie Bachusky. He carries the title of Mr Alderson account his long time fascination with the subject. No one has documented it more than that history wrangler. We step out of the car into an oven. It’s the hottest day on record, I swear, and speaks of the always dry conditions encountered here. What were they thinking?

We first wander the old cemetery, located down the tracks a bit. There next to the busy CPR mainline and old Trans-Canada alignment (now a gravel backroad), a still-tended plot of land with a few visible grave markers. There’s said to be about thirty people interred here and most are from the town’s early period. Many lack head stones but a few remain, even if some are made hard to read account constant weathering. The names: Dyvig, Gleddie, Wanvig, Goehring, Ames and others. We pay our respects, between passing freights.

We’re at a “vanished” town called Alderson.

Then it’s a short hop into “town”. The railway is the only sign of life now and the trains pass by Alderson unceremoniously. Soon it’s depression after depression, all orderly in a line, marking the location of some former business or dwelling. Some foundations are of concrete others of stone rubble. A big old furnace remains behind in one. That’s where the livery stood and over that way the hotel and pointing in a general direction, the school. Down by the tracks there was a train station and some grain elevators stood.

There’s scattered metal (sharp and dangerous if inattentive) and bits of brick and stone. Is that a car hood? An old bike wheel? The crushed frame from of a baby carriage? So many tin cans! You can almost make out where the streets were – the dirt’s a little more packed down. A Geo-cache is found and we sign our names. Looks like we’re the first to do so for a month or so. Alderson is not hard to find, but with most ghost-town types into places more intact, it remains pretty quiet.

We picture ourselves here in the boom days. We’re right in downtown now. “It’s hot as Hades and damn a cold one would go down good at the hotel. What’s this crazy talk of prohibition? The train’s due in soon and I’m expecting a box from Eaton’s. Crop’s struggling this year but we’ll make it…I think. Going to check out one of those newfangled Model Ts at Steed’s garage.” We’re taken back. Then the silence is broken yet again, thanks to another passing train and much like Alderson so vanishes our daydream. From the crew comes a friendly (if quizzical) wave…“what are you guys doing there in that field?” We envy the train crews this day. They have AC, right? I wish I had AC right now. Need AC! BTW, the mighty BIGDoer-mobile lacks such a convenience, something we come to regret on days like this. But understand it was purchased on a very strict budget leaving us no choice. Can you say minimally optioned!

Up Railway Avenue, down Suffield Street. Then it’s Alberta Avenue, Tilley and Bowell Streets and we’ve done the full tour. Amazingly all these still show on Google Earth – old maps indicate many more lanes planned but never put in. Trains after train, the insufferable heat and much discussion of a town that was. Sometimes we’re a group, and at other points well separated and almost alone. So many emotions, so many questions never to be answered. It’s a tale of unbridled confidence and then despair, birth and death, a town that came and went in a generation or so.

Toot-toot, comes another greeting and another of look of surprise. Do they think us lost out here in the middle of nowhere? And crazy from the heat? This section of the CPR’s Brooks Subdivision travels through some bloody remote territory home to almost no one, so I don’t think they expect to see many souls out here like us. With us three on the ground, the county’s population has near doubled!

And with the sun still beating down, a realization that we had better move on. No AC but if we drive fast enough open windows will help…once we’re back on pavement that is. Sure we saved a few hundred bucks, but at what cost? More heartbreak this day.

Wow, hard to think this gravel track passing Alderson was formerly a main highway. Then it’s crazy to believe there was a town here too. Puzzled by it all.

German names are common – here it’s Goehring.

A look at the old Glenbow Photo Archives, now at the UofC, brings up lots of photos of old Alderson (and earlier Carlstadt). Wow, it was a happening place, at least in most photos. A few show scenes after the party ended, but most while it thrived. We look at downtown – those foundations we saw must belong to these buildings. Photos and our memories merge – Alderson is a town once again as we marvel at these scenes from a century ago. Everyone looks confident.

“Vanish: to pass completely from existence.” Merriam-Webster. “Gonesville: out, out of style, all the way out, vacant, gone, outta here, someplace else.” Definithing.com. Two words we thought fitting here.

Damn, this one went long.

They’re saying…

”These two are amazing !! I love following their adventures and the photography is jaw dropping. Enjoy your working vacation, Chris & Connie !! I’m looking forward to living vicariously” Dayna Kent.

Completely forgotten…
This is Carolside – Similarly wiped off the map.
80 Years Empty – Last lived in before WW2!
St Elias – An abandoned monastery in the woods.

If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by all means contact us!

Date of Adventure: A Hellish hot July, 2019.
Location(s): Cypress County, Alberta.
Article references and thanks: Johnnie Bachusky, From Celebration to Oblivion by John Althouse,
FindAGrave, Glenbow Library and Archives,
If you visit Alderson, please be respectful.

Only passing trains break the silence.

In town now.

Pits mark the sites of former buildings.

Here it’s an old furnace.

Here’s one that had a foundation of cement.

Time to sign.

Then it’s back into this geocache box.

Slowly returning to the earth.

Many buildings had rubble foundations.

It takes imagination to picture the town.

A good size one.

Hanging with Johnnie at the saddest place.

Scattered reminders of what was.

Alderson started off with much promise.

For a short time it was a happening place.

Fickle fate dealt it a blow.

And now it’s all gone.

The loneliest of crossings.

In this remote corner the only signs of life.