Three Hills (Alberta) @ Dawn

Ahead, it’s random things seen while exploring this prairie community, over two frigid mornings around sunrise. Thank you Mother Nature for this wonderful opportunity and there’s nothing more fun than freezing one’s appendages off. I can’t feel my fingers! This is Three Hills at dawn, in February, and in hindsight we should have remained holed-up at the motel instead. The warm inviting motel – coffee’s on, you know, and the heater’s cranked.

Morning 1-1) A relic from another time and do you remember renting movies? Yeah, of course you do, and those places did a good business too. It wasn’t that long ago you did the daily ritual – drop off in the morning, pick another selection in the evening, rinse and repeat. The good stuff was checked out by four and at beginning of each day, a traffic jam formed out front with everyone jostling to reach the “slot”.

Three Hills (Alberta) @ Dawn: damn it was cold! Frozen fingers and frozen toes with Chris Doering & Connie Biggart (BIGDoer/Synd)

Video Hut lasted longer than most, even with the onslaught of streaming services, and only closed perhaps five or six years back. Guess you don’t have to worry about returning that Johnny Mnemonic DVD now.

Morning 1-2) There’s was a little dusting of snow overnight and it crunched noisily underfoot, but otherwise think total silence. Snow has a way of muffling any noise and makes for a peaceful scene. Downtown Three Hills is a mix of new buildings and a smattering of older structures.

Morning 1-3) The town is home to two old grain elevators, not far away and down by the tracks. The blue-green building in the foreground in the relatively modern wood prairie sentinel and dates from the 1960s. Built for the Alberta Wheat Pool, and still wearing company colours (albeit very faded), it’s now privately owned.

The second in back is much older (built late 1910s, but steel bins are a newer addition) and while it too still wears the markings of a former owner (Parrish and Heimbecker), it’s presently not in use. Is it just another rural town structure with an uncertain future? There used to be many other grain elevators here in Three Hills, but they’re all a distance memory now and demolished years back. More history: Prairie Sentinels – Three Hills Alberta.

Now if only a train would show, but that’s wishful thinking here along this line – it’s not a busy one. Three Hills is a bit odd in that elevators were located on both sides of the tracks and not on one as was more typical. It must have seemed to trains crews that they’re going through a tunnel.

Morning 1-4) The former Alberta Government Telephones exchange building. Many small towns had similar structures, built to a fairly common design, and it would have been a base for the local operator, was where you paid your phone bill and it housed the switch gear. These were mostly put in during the 1920s and this example is still owned by AGT’s successor Telus to house what ever equipment is needed to serve the local population.

Morning 1-5 & 6) This could be a street scene in any small prairie town and it’s made up of a rag-tag row of old buildings, home to various small (and no doubt struggling) businesses. These old places have seen many winters and no doubt many tenants over the many decades that have passed. That old laundromat sign has been witness to a lot of change, but it’s as it was.

Morning 2-1) The former east gym once connected to the the Prairie Bible Institute (now Prairie College) and it’s clearly been a while since this old building last saw use. A sign out front speaks of its doom and the land is shown as available for redevelopment. This college had and continuities to have a big presence in Three Hills and their complex takes up several square blocks (and used to be even bigger). The sky displayed those soft pink tones for but a moment and the scene that much more magic as a result.

Morning 2-2) Alleys treasures: it’s two mid-1950s Ford products waiting for warmer weather no doubt. The left example is an early cab-over model and a rather strange looking beast if you were to ask us. Look at the hoar frost on the one tree in behind. This AM was even colder and more biting than the first.

Morning 2-3 & 4) Business in the front and party in the back. Someone had too much time on their hands and this odd Frankenstein-mobile the offspring of a deranged mind. It’s a Dodge pickup from the early 1990s and with a GMC or Chevrolet van body from roughly the same era grafted on, but with a Dodge badging on the door. Confusing to say the least and to those fanboys of one marque or the other (and you can’t love both), perhaps something a bit sacrilegious.

It doesn’t appear all that badly done, in the sense that things seems to fit and line up well enough, but still. We know…”what were they thinking…how much beer was involved…or was this done on a bet?” We applaud weird creativity and this vehicle displays it proudly, so we say throw caution to the wind.

Morning 2-5) Rounding out the morning and near the limits what we could take of the cold, it’s a look at this 1930s era Ford Truck. I think we ran into this same vehicle about ten years ago in this same alley, and if so, it’s little changed (we checked old photos), but with the frame shortened. A stalled resto-project or parts supply for another? That lawn mower won’t be needed anytime soon.

It was hoped a train would show so we could get it in the photo, and you can see the tracks right there in behind, but no such luck. They don’t run too often on this line, recall, and anyway conditions were no good for waiting around.

Three Hills dates back to the 1910s and present day home to about three thousand permanent residents and hundreds more temporary or transient in nature attending college. We were in town just because and when we’ve had our fill of Calgary, we simply point in a direction, pick a community, find a cheap dive motel and spend a weekend exploring. Simple as that and it’s always just the medicine needed.

Know more: (new window): Three Hills Alberta.

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Date of Adventure: February, 2022.
Location(s): Three Hills, AB.
Article references and thanks: Town of Three Hills, Prairie College and Jim Pearson’s book, Vanishing Sentinels.

Early Morning 1-1) Closed forever.

Morning 1-2) All quiet in Three Hills and damn was it cold!

Morning 1-3) Two old grain elevators down by the tracks.

Morning 1-4) A former AGT telephone exchange building.

Morning 1-5) It could be any small prairie town.

Morning 1-6) This vintage sign.

Morning 2-1) Former east gym of the Prairie Bible Institute.

Morning 2-2) The things you find in alleys.

Morning 2-3) Business in the front…

Morning 2-4) Party in the back.

Morning 2-5) Now I can’t feel my fingers…