Category: Exploring History

Creston British Columbia Elevators

Creston BC Grain Elevators

British Columbia! Endless forests, precipitous peaks, bears, lumberjacks, bears eating lumberjacks, raging rivers, a moose, a squirrel, all things wild. No arguments here! But what’s this in Creston? Grain elevators, aka “prairie sentinels”…here in the mountains – emphasis on mountains? What the? Aren’t these associated with the vast (and very...

Alberta Country Church

St Peter and Paul

Under powder blue skies and wispy white clouds, amid endless fields of yellow, we find ourselves at the door of St Peter and Paul Church. Quaint, charming and oh so picturesque it can be found on a lonely Alberta crossroads. We’ve come to explore it, photograph it, learn something about...

Roland School #2892

Roland School

The final count is thought to be somewhere between three and five thousand (reports vary) of them. That’s the approximate number of one room schools that were once located in Alberta. The first opened in the 1800s (some say 1860s, others 1880s), the last closing a scant dozen or so...

Ymir BC Yankee Girl

Yankee Girl

The history obsessed crew at BIGDoer.com pays a visit to British Columbia where we’ll explore the remains of the historic Yankee Girl Mine overlooking the tiny community of Ymir. There’s the mine dumps where non-ore bearing material was discarded, some collapsed buildings, bits from a tramway, rails, metal, who knows...

Bridge Troup Junction

Troup Junction

Railway history time! And today’s subject, what’s left of Troup Junction along the shores of Kootenay Lake near Nelson BC. The former line, going back to the late nineteenth century, has been abandoned for decades. On a small jut of land, they managed to fit in an amazing array of...

Historic Bridge Waneta BC

Bridge Hunting – Waneta British Columbia

Here we look at the bridges of Waneta British Columbia. One, the elder of the pair, historically far more interesting and oh so photogenic, dates from the 1890s and once carried trains, It’s now used by highway traffic and is the oldest such span in this service in the province....

New Brigden Water Tower

New Brigden Water Tower

Here’s an undeniably rare find, an original standing-where-built railway water tower that was once used fill the boilers of steam locomotives. Way back when there used to be literately thousands of these across the country in strategic places up and down every main or branch line (steamers required a lot...

Empress Subdivision Bridge

Empress Subdivision Bridge

Bridges, we love bridges! In fact, we can’t get enough of them! The fine bit of engineering we’ll be looking at today was a mighty one, approaching three quarters of a kilometre in length from end to end (fractions with metric, shame on me). About a century old, it once...

Loading Grain Cars

Bashaw Processors

As recently as a few decades ago there was something close to a thousand wood-cribbed grain elevators in Alberta. Most of theses buildings, dating from the early 1900s to the mid-1980s, are gone now, having been replaced by newer, larger and more efficient “grain terminals” made of concrete or steel....

Hillcrest Mine Hoist House

Hillcrest Collieries Mine

Come along with us as we wander the remains of the old surface plant connected to the Hillcrest Collieries Mine in the Crowsnest Pass of Alberta. Closed down some seventy five years ago, a couple concrete buildings can be found at the site, all well overgrown, along with some bits...

Remains of Monastery

St Elias

Today we document the remains of a forgotten Monastery connected to the Orthodox Church, found in a remote corner of Northern Alberta. Deep in a wooded grove along a lonely back road, this unassuming cluster of small cobbled-together buildings are in varying states of advanced decay and most likely won’t...

Hillhurst United Stained Glass

Hillhurst United Church

Today we’ll be looking at Hillhurst United Church, a charming heritage building with amazing stained glass, wonderful woodwork, an impressive vintage pipe-organ, and a vibrant spirit. Just over a hundred years old and clearly well loved and cared for, it’s located is in an equally dynamic community of which it...

Grist Mill Alberta

Grist Mill Farm

Certainly the most interesting element found in this abandoned Alberta farm yard is a building that was once a wind powered grist mill. Unique in form, with an almost European flavour, for much of its history it was actually a blacksmith and metal shop. Come with us as we explore...

Spaca Moskalyk Church Lamont County

Spaca Moskalyk Church

Here’s a look at Spaca Moskalyk Ukrainian Catholic Church, impressive, photogenic, that when explored by the Team a few years ago had an uncertain future. Much like its fate, bleak was the day. Located along a lonely back road on the vast northern Alberta plains, the majestic building is not...

Buffalo 2000 Lyalta Alberta

Buffalo 2000

The elevator seen here really stands out as unique and was in the 1980s a highly innovative design, the future of the Alberta grain industry. The Buffalo 2000, the dawn of a bold new era, modern and efficient, a new way to do it. It was not just a means...

Rocky Mountain Raceway

Rocky Mountain Raceway Park

Rocky Mountain Raceway Park, we never really knew you. In operation for only a few short years, it was one of the last racetracks in the Calgary area. Now there are none. Built from passion by two dedicated enthusiasts, it was shuttered not really due to a lack of business,...

Railway Section House

Section House

When one thinks of structures associated with Canadian railways, things like stations or perhaps roundhouses probably come to mind first. They both pretty iconic. There are lots of other types of buildings connected to then however. One that was once very common, yet little known or understood, was the lowly...

Sharples AB grain elevator

Sharples P&H

Pretty much all that’s left in Sharples Alberta is an old grain elevator. The location here is a wide shallow valley, scenic, sort of unprairie-like and home to a meandering creek – a nice nice setting! The building is abandoned and while rough-looking and weather worn it has a certain...

Mossleigh grain elevators

Prairie Sentinels – Mossleigh Alberta

Three old grain elevators, very photogenic ones at that, can be found in small town Mossleigh Alberta. They’re located along a railway branch line that has been out of service for well over a decade, but as of spring 2015 (so just after our visit) hosts tourist trains coming in...

Doukhobors Alberta cemetery

Anastasia Lords

Today’s subject we briefly touch on a little known chapter in the province’s history, the life of Anastasia Holoboff (or Holuboff, sometimes Holobova, less common Golubova), aka Anastasia Lords. She was the one time spiritual leader of an little known Alberta based Doukhobor group and is interred near the former...

Alsask base church

Canadian Forces Station Alsask

Join us for a tour of the long decommissioned Canadian Forces Station base in Alsask Saskatchewan, in operation during the dark days of the Cold War. We’ll be given extra special permission and all the time we need to explore most of the of the buildings left standing in the extensive complex, inside and out, some of them still used for various functions, others closed up and literal time capsules.

Plenty Saskatchewan grain elevator

Prairie Sentinels – Plenty Saskatchewan

There is an old wood-cribbed grain elevator in Plenty Saskatchewan, which we’ll be looking at here. These once common buildings, which could be seen all over the prairies, are pretty few and far between today, most of them having been torn down in the last couple decades. This one is even more unique as it’s still being used.

Meniak Alberta grain elevator

Alberta Wheat Pool Menaik

This old “prairie sentinel” was once located along the railway line in Menaik Alberta, but for the last few decades has stood at farm not terribly far away, where for many years it was used for grain storage. Rendered obsolete by the passage of time and changes in agricultural techniques and technology, it’s no longer needed.

You cannot copy content of this page

Sorry for this!

This popup is only shown once per month. We hate them too, but need your help.

Donate & help keep new content coming...



Or

Chris & Connie thank you!