The company that makes Trilliums today (officially Outback Trailers by Team Trillium of Calgary), also repairs, renovates and fixes up older fiberglass trailers. And it’s not limited to examples bearing the Trillium name, other makes are done as well, including, of course Bolers. Seen here on a warm February 2015...
Built just over a hundred years ago, the old Number One Fire Hall, located in Calgary’s downtown core, was last used by the fire department in the 1970s. Now surrounded by looming office towers, it almost gets lost in the clutter. Today it’s a car rental outlet and appears in...
The Turner Valley Gas Plant was the first in Alberta, the one that started it all, and today is museum you can visit. We join a group of passionate amateur photographers (perhaps some pros too), from the Foothills Camera Club, who’ve arranged a private tour of the complex and invited...
In this early season warm up hike we follow the Death Valley Trail then loop back on the Pine Ridge Trail, where we gain some modest elevation, before dropping back down to our starting point. Our “summit” goal is a long and low undulating hill, Pine Ridge proper. Aligned in...
Old industrial remains are a natural attractant to the BIGDoer.com crew and in this post we take a quick look at an old tank car loading station. Located deep in the middle of nowhere on the Alberta prairies, it sits along an abandoned railway branch line. The station was fed...
As traditional style wood-cribbed grain elevators go, this example, located in the small prairie town of Stavely Alberta, is both huge and relatively new. Towering over a very busy highway, this massive “prairie sentinel” is seen by thousands of passing motorists each and every day but I doubt many pay...
Once the darling of the mining sector, Bre-X Minerals of Calgary was later the subject of one of the largest stock swindles in Canadian history. Born of obscurity, the company quickly rose to great heights before crashing back down – spectacularly. Millions, no billions of dollars were lost on one...
This was a plan “B” hike, quickly decided upon given our original goal, a modest sized hill/mountain would soon be surrounded by clouds and likely covered in snow due to ever worsening weather conditions. Better stay low, and better avoid any steep slopes. We didn’t know this when heading out,...
The old Parrish and Heimbecker (P&H) grain elevator in Stettler Alberta has seen close to a hundred years pass, boy it looks great, and today is a museum you can tour. Located right across the tracks from the Alberta Prairie Railway Excursions (APRE) station, tour trains, some of them steam...
One very distinct advantage to owning a Boler, given their small footprint, is that they can be placed nearly anywhere on a person’s property without getting in the way. They can be stored in the back yard or take up little space on the driveway, or one can do like...
In this train themed then and now we position ourselves at the east end of the Canadian Pacific Railway’s huge Alyth Yards Calgary, in an attempt to duplicate a photo, sent to us by a reader, that dates from the 1980s and shows that very location. Not only were we...
What a huge difference a couple short decades make. Back in the 1990s when the first photo in this then and now series was captured, Vulcan Alberta had a huge and much celebrated grain elevator row. It was giant – count them – there are five singles and three sets...
This is a follow up report to one we did approximately a year ago, where were do a casual survey of all the houses, either lived in, empty or converted to businesses, left in Calgary’s downtown core. There are not many left. We lost one since that last report, and...
Not a lot of years separate these two photos but in that time the change has been dramatic. The trains are no more and the row of elevators has been reduced to one.
Down by the tracks in Arrowwood Alberta, 1997 and 2015. Interestingly the then photo is from us and this a rare case of Team BIGDoer shooting both. It was captured by Chris back when he was doing oilfield hotshot.
The last elevator standing is a former Alberta Wheat Pool facility and dates from the 1970s. That's it's fairly modern is perhaps the reason it survived into today and it's now used by a local farmer for grain storage.
Check the comments to know more 👇
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Posted by Connie.
Spotted while documenting The Great Beater Challenge, 2021 edition! Here, it's a little diversion into the near ghost town of Orkney Saskatchewan to look at a disused Patterson Grain Elevator. The structure dates from the 1970s and was built with features foreshadowing those used in high throughput grain terminals of today. Fast load systems and the like.
Check out that vintage yield sign and we doubt it's really needed any more. There's no traffic on these streets.
BTW, we got to chase the Beater Challenge 2023 and we'll post about it soon.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2021. Posted by Connie.
After we drop off a couple rolls for processing, we'll call home! A little corner pharmacy, in a nondescript Calgary strip mall, and it's sort of lost in time. Shot in 2016 and we find anachronisms like this fascinating!
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Posted by Connie.
St Francis in the Woods out in BC's East Kootenay region dates back over a century. It's sort of hidden away down a little backroad and is far removed from the modern world. While no longer used in a spiritual capacity, it still hosts community functions from time to time. Otherwise, silence rules.
Know more about this subject in a link posted to the comments.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2023. Posted by Connie.
The same stone house about a century apart and from almost the same angle. It came close to being a proper Then & Now, but interestingly, we didn't know of the old photo when we captured ours.
The house was only lived in for a few decades, starting about 1910 and abandoned on account of arid conditions.
A family of twelve (yes, two parents plus TEN kids) lived in this modest-sized dwelling. Those early pioneers were hardcore. A house in the middle of nowhere, farming conditions that at best were marginal, brutal winters, few neighbours, little of anything and a bus load of children to raise in a house the size of a garage. Give them credit!
Know more via a link in the comments.
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Photo: 2015. Posted by Connie.
The Fort Motel in Fort MacLeod Alberta, seen in an old postcard circa 1960 and again on a quiet evening late in 2023. It's one of many old style motor-court motels in this historic town and as you can see it's little changed over time. Too bad about that sign, though. The Fort Motel first makes mention in phone directories in the early fifties.
To know about our subject scroll down to a link in the comments. Hey Lethbridge Historical Society, thought you'd like this!
Exploring history with Off the Beaten Path with Chris & Connie. Posted by Connie.
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