History of Edmonton

Parade celebrating anniversary of the Hudson's Bay Co., Edmonton, Alberta.

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.

History

Early Days

Edmonton, like many places in North America had been inhabited for thousands of years by indigenous groups. First permanent settlement by Europeans is known to have started around 1795, when Fort Edmonton was officially founded around present day Fort Saskatchewan.

In the early 19th century, the fort was moved to near the current (Alberta) legislature site. The fort was big in the fur trade business. The first settlement outside of the fort was on "River lots", which actually now consist of neighbourhoods. In 1894, settlement began outside the fort and the Town of Edmonton was established. The town encompassed modern Boyle Street (the original downtown) and McCauley neighbourhoods.

In the 1900-1910 period, the Hudson's Bay Company was granted a reserve on much of the Fort's land but in the decade it was eventually all sold off to Edmonton. Edmonton became a city in 1904 and shortly after, with a mere 5,000 people became Alberta's capital. With the new land west of Queens Avenue (modern 100 St) available to the city, the city grew tremendously, and Boyle Street was abandoned as the downtown for the new, current downtown. Many new communities like Glenora, Highlands, and Westmount were built in this time as the economy started to gain momentum. And 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.

Alberta Legislature Building and old Fort Edmonton from High Level Bridge, 1914.

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., 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 Leduc No. 1 oil well, now relocated to the southern entrance of Gateway Park on the Queen Elizabeth II Highway. The original site of the well just south and west of Edmonton is now a discovery centre.

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. 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. 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 700 shops and services.

Edmonton Tornado

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 Evergreen. 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.

Icon Tower I completed, spring 2009.

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, Ellerslie and 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.

In 2008 the Edmonton region population surpasses one million becoming the most northern city in North America with a population over one million.

See also

• Timeline of Edmonton history