Category: Exploring History

It’s of the era and has a style and vibe that would make a Brady (famously from that quirky ’70s TV show) proud. There’s thick shag carpeting, mirrors and pillars, pastel shades and rich wood panelling. There’s avocado coloured appliances, rock and brick work, marble, brass and all things satin,...

It was only matter of time. Everyone knew it. When is something bad going to happen at the old Enoch Sales House? Will they find a corpse inside? Will it get torched? Given the level of neglect shown it by its owners, Calgary Municipal Land Corp a city department, something...

One evening in Coleman Alberta, in the wondrous Crowsnest Pass. With no goals or plans in mind we simply wander the historic downtown taking in this and that, passing trains and old buildings from the boom days when coal mining drove the local economy. It’s about getting out, working those...

Amazingly one can find the remains of long abandoned railway lines deep inside the city of Calgary. And here’s a most interesting section. There’s the old roadbed, grassed over and a dumping ground for things unwanted and most fascinating to the railway archaeologist, telegraph poles, cross-bucks and all still standing...

We’ve visited the Payroll Property a number of times before. The mine here never amounted to much, even if one shipment of ore was sent out to the smelter long ago. They were testing the waters for its development potential and came up short. It was a “prospect” mine…finger’s crossed...

It just might hold title as Calgary’s oldest gas/service station still in operation and original in form. Here, tucked away in a corner of Calgary’s Lakeview Community, set back from all the hustle and bustle of the big city and perhaps a bit lost in time, is Lakeview Husky. It’s...

It’s a marvel of engineering, a multi-kilometre long concrete structure a century old. Towering over the lone prairie it once brought life giving water to this parched region of Alberta, but today is unused. It was replaced – everything and everybody has that fate eventually – but stands as a...

Another instalment in what’s become a most enjoyable series revisited each and every year. In these we wander Calgary’s downtown core in search of single detached dwellings to document, so houses, or places that were once houses and maybe repurposed but retain that “home sweet home” vibe. These are real...

It’s a pittance really, a short one hundred and twenty seconds, a mere two minutes*. It’s what’s asked of you and I to give, come 11am November 11th, that you stop, and there in total silence and contemplation, you take that moment, no, embrace the moment, in honour of those...

Deep in the mountains of the East Kootenays of British Columbia, up the Wildhorse River, there’s a special place, a town that used to be. This is Fisherville, dating from the 1860s and on this world for but a mere moment in time. It came and went quickly. And here...

All that’s left is a concrete shell, remains connecting back to a huge lumber mill that once operated on this property long ago. We’re looking at the Powerhouse Building put in by the Crowsnest Pass Lumber Company here in Wardner British Columbia, about a century ago. Considered too expensive to...

There’s this charming little ghost town out there on the Alberta Plains that like the mythical Scottish Village of Brigadoon springs to life, not once every hundred years, but one Saturday per month*. The people they come for “Pizza Night” and to partake in the ambience, all those amazing old...

Given the sheer number of forgotten and abandoned places we get to visit (and we so love being that busy), it’s inevitable we cross paths with ones we’ve documented before. Quite honestly it’s sometimes hard to return as often the building or site is rarely as it was – for...

Presenting a most fantastic find, an old house and outbuildings, long abandoned, lonely and isolated, sitting there in a field with nothing else speaking of human habitation to be seen in any direction. And take in those stunning Alberta Badlands as a backdrop…a more picturesque setting could not be imagined....

Moyie is a charming little town in the East Kootenays of British Columbia. Tied to mining for its first few decades – the St Eugene was a huge producer of lead and zinc, silver and gold – today it’s a sleepy little community with a retirement vibe, split by a...

We’re in Brant Alberta to take in this prairie skyscraper, taller than anything around, standing in a sleepy little burg down by the tracks and where there were others it’s now the last one. With some good timing, those amazing colours and that “mood” one can only get as the...

There’s quite a contrast here. On one side there’s an ancient grain elevator, all old and weather beaten but still solid and unmoving, standing where built over a century ago. And on the other there’s a modern railway with a singular function, the moving of goods. Watch the freights run...

If you find yourself out near Brooks Alberta, turn south on Highway #36 just west of town and head on down to a little community called Scandia. They’ve got an extra special prairie-life themed open air museum there that you can take in. A vintage grain elevator and old train...

Our little group of history nuts has visited the Hanna Alberta Roundhouse many times over the years. In the past it stood there abandoned with an uncertain future and we fully expected when next we returned it’d be gone. Fast forward to today and the building (since late 2013), is...

How about some bridges? Train bridges that is…it’s been a while. Here’s a pair, not all that far apart, both easily approached from public property, both about a century old, and both belonging to the same railway, although when built each was along a competing line. Take in these impressive...