Place:Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

source: Family History Library Catalog

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Edmonton is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta. The city is located on the North Saskatchewan River in the central region of the province, an area with some of the most fertile farmland on the prairies. It is the second largest city in Alberta, with a population of 752,412 (2008), and is the hub of Canada's sixth-largest census metropolitan area, 1,081,300 making it the northernmost North American city with a metropolitan population over one million.

At , the City of Edmonton covers an area larger than Chicago, Philadelphia, Toronto, or Montreal. Edmonton has one of the lowest population densities in North America, about 9.4% that of New York City. A resident of Edmonton is known as an Edmontonian.

Edmonton serves as the northern anchor of the Calgary-Edmonton Corridor (one of four regions that together comprise 50% of Canada's population) and is a staging point for large-scale oil sands projects occurring in northern Alberta and large-scale diamond mining operations in the Northwest Territories.

Edmonton is Canada's second most populous provincial capital (after Toronto) and is a cultural, government and educational centre. It plays host to a year-round slate of world-class festivals, earning it the title of "The Festival City." It is home to North America's largest mall, West Edmonton Mall (which was the world's largest mall for a 23 year period from 1981 until 2004.), and Fort Edmonton Park, Canada's largest living history museum. In 2004, Edmonton celebrated the centennial of its incorporation as a city.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Settlement and exploration

The first inhabitants settled in the area that is now Edmonton around 3,000 BC and perhaps as early as 10,000 BC, when an ice-free corridor opened up as the last ice age ended and timber, water, and wildlife became available in the region.

In 1754, Anthony Henday, an explorer working for the Hudson's Bay Company, may have been the first European to enter the Edmonton area. His expeditions across the Canadian Prairies were mainly to seek contact with the aboriginal population for the purpose of establishing the fur trade, as competition was fierce between the Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Company. By 1795, Fort Edmonton was established on the north bank of the river, as a major trading post for the Hudson's Bay Company. It was named after Edmonton, London, the home town of HBC deputy governor Sir James Winter Lake. In the late 19th century, the highly fertile soils surrounding Edmonton helped attract settlers, further establishing Edmonton as a major regional commercial and agricultural centre. Edmonton was also a stopping point for people hoping to cash in on the Klondike Gold Rush in 1897, although the majority of people doing so chose to take a steamship north to the Yukon from Vancouver.

Incorporated as a city in 1904 with a population of 8,350, Edmonton became the capital of Alberta as the province joined Confederation a year later, on September 1, 1905.In November 1905, the Canadian Northern Railway (CNR) arrived in Edmonton, accelerating growth.

The war years

During the early 1910s, Edmonton grew very rapidly, causing rising speculation in real estate prices. In 1912, Edmonton amalgamated with the city of Strathcona, south of the North Saskatchewan River; as a result, the city extended south of the river.

Just prior to World War I, the real estate boom ended suddenly, causing the city's population to decline sharply—from over 72,500 in 1914 to under 54,000 only two years later.^[1] Recruitment to the Canadian military during the war also contributed to the drop in population. Afterwards, the city was slow to recover in population and economy during the 1920s and 1930s, until World War II.

The first licensed airfield in Canada, Blatchford Field (now Edmonton City Centre (Blatchford Field) Airport), commenced operation in 1929. Pioneering aviators such as Wilfrid R. "Wop" May and Max Ward used Blatchford Field as a major base for the distribution of mail, food, and medicine to Northern Canada; hence Edmonton's role as the "Gateway to the North" was strengthened. During World War II saw Edmonton's becoming a major base for the construction of the Alaska Highway and the Northwest Staging Route.

The oil boom years

The first major oil discovery in Alberta was made on February 13, 1947 near the town of Leduc, south of Edmonton. As early as 1914, oil reserves were known to exist in the southern parts of Alberta (see Turner Valley, Alberta), but they produced very little oil compared to those around Edmonton. Additional oil reserves were discovered in the late 1940s and the 1950s near the town of Redwater. Because most of Alberta's oil reserves were concentrated in central and northern Alberta, Edmonton became home to most of Alberta's oil industry.

The subsequent oil boom gave Edmonton new status as the "Oil Capital of Canada," and during the 1950s, the city increased in population from 149,000 to 269,000.^[1] After a relatively calm but still prosperous period in the 1960s, the city's growth took on renewed vigour concomitant with high world oil prices, triggered by the 1973 oil crisis and the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The oil boom of the 1970s and 1980s ended abruptly with the sharp decline in oil prices on the international market and the introduction of the National Energy Program in 1981; that same year, the population had reached 521,000.^[1] Although the National Energy Program was later scrapped by the federal government in the mid-1980s, the collapse of world oil prices in 1986 and massive government cutbacks kept the city from making a full economic recovery until the late 1990s.

Recent history

In 1981, West Edmonton Mall, the world's largest at the time, opened. Still the biggest in North America, the mall is one of Alberta's most-visited tourist attractions, and contains an indoor amusement park, a large indoor waterpark, a skating rink, a New Orleans-themed bar district, and a luxury hotel, in addition to over 800 shops and services.

On July 31, 1987, a devastating tornado (ranked F4 on the Fujita scale) hit the city and killed 27 people. The storm hit the areas of Beaumont, Mill Woods, Bannerman, Fraser, and the Evergreen Trailer Park. The day became known as "Black Friday." Then-mayor Laurence Decore cited the community's response to the tornado as evidence that Edmonton was a "city of champions," which later became the city's official slogan.

The city entered a recent period of economic recovery and prosperity in the late 1990s, aided by a strong recovery in oil prices and further economic diversification. While oil production and refining remains the basis of many jobs in Edmonton, the city's economy has managed to diversify significantly (e.g., an explosion in high-tech jobs). Downtown Edmonton and parts of the inner city, after years of extremely high office vacancy rates and neglect, have recovered to a great degree, with office vacancy rates in downtown Edmonton at 5.0%. The downtown area is still undergoing a renaissance of its own, with further new projects underway or about to become reality and more people choosing to live in or near the downtown core (although suburban sprawl is still growing significantly).

In recent years, downtown Edmonton has become much more vibrant, with streets like Jasper Avenue and 104 Street featuring many clubs, shops, restaurants, and galleries. The new Art Gallery of Alberta is under construction in the downtown core;The first new office tower in 22 years, the EPCOR Tower, began construction in 2008 and is slated for completion in 2012. The Icon Towers (expected completion: 2008 for Tower I, 2009 for Tower II) will be the tallest residential buildings in the city when completed,while many other high-rise condos are still under construction in the downtown core. Due to demand of density outside the core, three neighbourhoods (two just outside of downtown)—Century Park, Glenora, and Strathearn—have proposed new high-rise urban villages.

Also in the outskirts, new subdivisions are being built. These include Tamarack, Lewis Estates, Cameron Heights, Windermere, Ellerslieand many more, as well as new power centres such as The Meadows and Windermere.

This economic prosperity is bringing in large numbers of workers from all over Canada. It is forecast that 83,000 new residents will move to Edmonton between 2006 and 2010, twice the rate that city planners had expected. Many of the new workers moving to the city are young men.

Research Tips