Category: Then And Now

We’re standing smack dab in the middle of Second Street West, Munson Alberta, much to the amusement of some locals, shooting a trademark BIGDoer.com then and now. We’ve come armed with an old photo, taken close to a century ago, have plopped ourselves down in the spot where it was...

East Coulee, in the Alberta Badlands, is split by the slow flowing Red Deer River. Space was limited in this deep valley, so homes and businesses, the highway and in years past, the railway, were all located on the north side, while on the south there were coal mines and...

Few have seen the film Wild Horse Hank. No blockbuster here, no awards won, no darling of the critics…still, it’s a pretty good flick. Just one that wasn’t seen by a lot of eyes. A late 1970s TV production, it follows the adventures of its namesake character, Hank, played by...

Flashback some thirty five, maybe even forty years. We’re at the University of Calgary witness to a couple of “interesting” fellows hamming it up for the camera somewhere on the sprawling campus. Jumping in the time machine, it’s 2016 and C&C are on the scene, hoping to duplicate that photo...

The images we’ll be viewing today were captured two decades apart. The location is Empress Alberta, the scene taking us to the old railway line that once passed by town. In the first photo, we’re witness to perhaps the last run on the soon to be abandoned branchline, an enthusiast...

Yes, it’s time for another BIGDoer.com movie then and now. Man, it’s sure been a while. In this one we visit a location seen in the film Brokeback Mountain, specifically Brokeback Meadows, in the real world a grassy swath on the flanks of Moose Mountain just west of Calgary. This...

Two photos shot at almost the exact same location but some sixty five years apart, each showing a passing Calgary Transit vehicle. The location here is the community of Ogden, along Ogden Road to be exact, the background showing a railway bridge and in the older photo, bits from a...

A BIGDoer.com then and now – where we take an old photo showing a building or street scene from way back when, return so the location seen and shoot an image that’s similarly composed. Fun or what? The subject this day is an interesting one and for the then bits...

This post has been updated and can be found here: MacDonald Bridge Calgary ~70 Years Apart. Random awesomeness… The Sectionman’s Home (Middle of Nowhere). A Few Minutes in Stavely Alberta. On the Job: ’73 Kenworth W925. Little Green Mart. If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by...

Something close to forty or forty five years separate the two images used in this then and now. Our subject is the Homestead Museum, well their sign anyway, located deep in the Badlands of Alberta in the town of Drumheller. The old image comes via a reader of this website...

A good sixty five years separate the two images used in this then and now article. The scene is Rosedale Alberta, in the Red Deer River Valley badlands, first along the train tracks in 1948 and then again in 2016, the same spot, but with the rails now gone. The...

For this then and now we’re in the “almost” ghost town of Rowley Alberta. Home today to a couple people at most, in the past it was a much busier and more populace place. Many of the buildings in town, long vacant, have been lovingly restored. Included in that are...

This post has been updated and can be found here: Chinook Motel Crowsnest Pass ~50 Years Apart. More Then & Nows… Shaunavon Saskatchewan ~70 years apart. Downtown Trout Lake British Columbia. Grain Elevators at Carbon Alberta. If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by all means contact...

The Greenhill Hotel can be found in Blairmore (well…West Blairmore) Alberta, in the historic Crowsnest Pass, in the southwest corner of the province. The barn-shaped structure has been around for well on ninety plus years. Once a busy watering hole for local coal miners and also accommodation for those visiting...

Fifty years separate the two images used in this then and now. Our subject will be the Canadian Pacific Railway and the location, a spot by the Elbow River, in the community of Inglewood, just east of downtown Calgary. We’ve been supplied an old image showing a passing train and...

The subject of this then and now is the former Canadian Pacific Railway Lethbridge Alberta Train Station. A fine old structure at the north end of downtown it’s well over a century old and stands where built, but is now no where near the tracks. They moved them out of...

The old building we’ll be chronicling this day is located in Lethbridge Alberta. While now a residence, it was for much of its history a grocery store, with many, many different owners over the years. We’ve come armed with an old photo showing it way back in 1980, with the...

This post has been updated and can be found here: Fort Motel Fort MacLeod Alberta. More Then & Nows… CC Snowdon Building Calgary. The Highway Bridge at Wardner BC. Calgary Then & Now: From Tom Campbell Hill. If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by all means...

This post has been updated and can be found here: Grain Elevators of Arrowwood Alberta (x2). More grain elevators… Prairie Sentinels: Fort MacLeod Alberta. Neidpath Grain Elevators Revisited. Grain Elevators of DeWinton. If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by all means contact us! Date of adventure:...

The location for today’s then and now shoot is Crescent Heights High School in Calgary. The old photo used (from about the 1960s) comes in from an associate and shows a group of students participating in some sort of demonstration in front of the building’s main entrance. On our visit things were a bit quieter.

This railway themed then and now takes us to the East Kootenays of BC. For the first shot we’ve been allowed use of an old photo showing a Canadian Pacific Railway train back in the 1970s. Our goal, find that same spot and shoot something similar, chronicling what’s changed at the scene in the in years since, and what’s not.

The lovely old church seen here, St Andrew’s United, is just over a century old and is the subject for this then and now study. Located in the community of Lacombe, in central Alberta, the substantial and very handsome building will be seen twice, first how it appeared in the early days via an old photo found online and again how it looks in 2015.

Join us as we connect two eras via a trademark BIGDoer.com then and now. In this ongoing series, we take an old photo, we track down where it was shot, then we do our best to duplicate the angle and composition as closely as possible. Today’s theme is Calgary Transit. The date of the old photo is 1974.

We’re deep inside gorgeous Banff National Park armed with an old photo showing a train. Our goal, find the spot where that image was captured – easy enough – and then shot a similar one for inclusion in this BIGDoer “then and now” post. To complete our project we’ll need a train to show, but we won’t have to wait long for that to happen.

We’ve been given an old photo, one from the late 1910s or perhaps the early 1920s, or thereabouts (does it really matter), showing a street scene Brock Saskatchewan. We return to the same spot where it was captured oh so long ago, to see what we can see and we’re...

Netherhill, a pinhead-sized dot on the map, blink and you’ll miss it kind of place, a mostly forgotten backwater on the great plains of western south-central Saskatchewan. It’s a tiny community, a few blocks square, and a wee bit quaint, as small prairie towns often are. Off the beaten path...

The Alsask Saskatchewan School, a charming and nicely photogenic two-story brick and concrete structure, is one hundred and one years old. The last classes let out decades ago and while it’s all boarded up now and unused, it remains in decent shape. The most prominent and majestic building in the...

We’ve obtained two late 1970s era photos showing the impressive grain elevator row in Innisfail Alberta, perfect fodder for a BIGDoer.com then and now post. My how things have changed and on visiting the same location in 2015 we see that almost everything single thing in the old images is...

Legendary photographer Harry Palmer sent us an image showing “downtown” Alsask Saskatchewan in 1985 to use in one of our trademark then and now series. Thirty years after he captured his wonderful photo, we venture back to the exact spot where he stood to record how the scene looks today....