Calgary
Calgary is the largest city in the Canadian province of Alberta. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, making Calgary the third-largest city and the fifth-largest metropolitan area in Canada.
Calgary is at the confluence of the Bow River and the Elbow River in the southwestern portion of Alberta, in the transitional area between the Rocky Mountain Foothills and the Canadian Prairies. It is about east of the front ranges of the Canadian Rockies, roughly south of the provincial capital, Edmonton, northwest of Medicine Hat, and approximately north of the Canada–United States border. The city anchors the south end of the Statistics Canada-defined urban area, the Calgary–Edmonton Corridor.
Calgary's economy includes activity in many sectors: energy; financial services; film and television; transportation and logistics; technology; manufacturing; aerospace; health and wellness; retail; and tourism. Greater Calgary is home to Canada's second-largest number of corporate head offices among the country's 800 largest corporations, and Downtown Calgary has more skyscrapers than any other municipality in Western Canada. In 2015, Calgary had the largest number of millionaires per capita of any major Canadian city. In 2022, Calgary was ranked alongside Zürich as the third most livable city in the world, ranking first in Canada and in North America. In 1988, it became the first Canadian city to host the Olympic Winter Games, at the Scotiabank Saddledome, Olympic Oval, McMahon Stadium, and others.
Origin of name
Calgary was named after Calgary Castle on the Isle of Mull in Scotland. Colonel James Macleod, the Commissioner of the North-West Mounted Police, had been a frequent summer guest there. In 1876, shortly after returning to Canada, he suggested its name for what became "Fort Calgary".The Treaty 7 or southern Alberta First Nations peoples, refer to the Calgary area as "elbow", in reference to the sharp bend made by the Bow River and the Elbow River. In some cases, the area was named after the reeds that grew along the riverbanks, reeds that had been used to fashion bows. In the Blackfoot language, the area is known as Mohkínstsis akápiyoyis, meaning "elbow many houses", reflecting its strong settler presence. The shorter form of the Blackfoot name, Mohkínstsis, simply meaning "elbow", is the popular Indigenous term for the Calgary area. In the Nakoda or Stoney language, the area is known as Wîchîspa Oyade or Wenchi Ispase, both meaning "elbow". In the Cree language, the area is known as otôskwanihk meaning "at the elbow" or otôskwunee meaning "elbow". In the Tsuutʼina language, the area is known as Guts’ists’i meaning "elbow". In Kutenai language, the city is referred to as ʔaknuqtapȼik’. In the Slavey language, the area is known as Klincho-tinay-indihay, meaning "many horse town", referring to the Calgary Stampede and the city's settler heritage.
There have been several attempts to revive the Indigenous names of Calgary. In response to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, local [|post-secondary institutions] adopted "official acknowledgements" of Indigenous territory using the Blackfoot name of the city, Mohkínstsis. In 2017, the Stoney Nakoda sent an application to the Government of Alberta, to rename Calgary as Wichispa Oyade meaning "elbow town"; however, this was challenged by the Piikani Blackfoot.
History
Early history
The Calgary area was inhabited by pre-Clovis people whose presence traces back at least 11,000 years. The area has been inhabited by multiple First Nations, the Niitsitapi, îyârhe Nakoda, Tsuutʼina peoples and Métis Nation, Region 3.In 1787, David Thompson, a 17-year-old cartographer with the Hudson's Bay Company, spent the winter with a band of Piikani Nation encamped along the Bow River. He was also a fur trader and surveyor and the first recorded European to visit the area. John Glenn was the first documented European settler in the Calgary area, in 1873. In spring 1875, three priests Lacombe, Remus, and Scollen built a small log cabin on the banks of the Elbow River.
File:FortCalgary1878.jpg|thumb|left|In 1875, the North-West Mounted Police erected Fort Calgary to police the area.
In the fall of 1875, the site became a post of the North-West Mounted Police . The NWMP detachment was assigned to protect the western plains from US whisky traders, and to protect the fur trade, and Inspector Éphrem-A. Brisebois led fifty Mounties as part of F Troop north from Fort Macleod to establish the site. The I. G. Baker Company of Fort Benton, Montana, was contracted to construct a suitable fort, and after its completion, the Baker company built a log store next to the fort. The NWMP fort remained officially nameless until construction was complete, although it had been referred to as "The Mouth" by people at Fort Macleod. At Christmas dinner NWMP Inspector Éphrem-A. Brisebois christened the unnamed Fort "Fort Brisebois", a decision which caught the ire of his superiors Colonel James Macleod and Major Acheson Irvine. Major Irvine cancelled the order by Brisebois and wrote Hewitt Bernard, the then Deputy Minister of Justice in Ottawa, describing the situation and suggesting the name "Calgary" put forward by Colonel Macleod. Edward Blake, at the time Minister of Justice, agreed with the name and in the spring of 1876, Fort Calgary was officially established.
In 1877, the First Nations ceded title to the Fort Calgary region through Treaty 7.
In 1881 the federal government began to offer leases for cattle ranching in Alberta under the Dominion Lands Act, which became a catalyst for immigration to the settlement. The I. G. Baker Company drove the first herd of cattle to the region in the same year for the Cochrane area by order of Major James Walker.
The Canadian Pacific Railway reached the area in August 1883 and constructed a railway station on the CPR-owned Section 15, neighbouring the townsite across the Elbow River to the east on Section 14. The difficulty in crossing the river and the CPR's efforts to persuade residents resulted in the core of the Calgary townsite moving onto Section 15, with the fate of the old townsite sealed when the post office was anonymously moved across the icy Elbow River during the night. The CPR subdivided Section 15 and began selling lots surrounding the station, $450 for corner lots and $350 for all others; and pioneer Felix McHugh constructed the first private building on the site. Earlier in the decade it was not expected that the railway would pass near Calgary; instead, the preferred route put forward by people concerned with the young nation's defence was passing near Edmonton and through the Yellowhead Pass. However, in 1881 CPR changed the plans preferring the direct route through the prairies by way of Kicking Horse Pass. Along with the CPR, August 1883 brought Calgary the first edition of the Calgary Herald published on the 31st under the title The Calgary Herald, Mining and Ranche Advocate and General Advertiser by teacher Andrew M. Armour and printer Thomas B. Braden, a weekly newspaper with a subscription price of $1 per year.
Over a century later, the CPR headquarters moved to Calgary from Montreal, Quebec, in 1996.
Residents of the now-eight-year-old settlement sought to form a local government of their own. In the first weeks of 1884, James Reilly who was building the Royal Hotel east of the Elbow River circulated 200 handbills announcing a public meeting on January 7, 1884, at the Methodist Church. At the full meeting Reilly advocated for a bridge across the Elbow River and a civic committee to watch over the interests of the public until Calgary could be incorporated. The attendees were enthusiastic about the committee and on the next evening a vote was held to elect the seven members. A total of 24 candidates were nominated, which equalled 10 per cent of Calgary's male population. Major James Walker received 88 votes, the most amongst the candidates, the other six members were Dr. Andrew Henderson, George Clift King, Thomas Swan, George Murdoch, J. D. Moulton, and Captain John Stewart. The civic committee met with Edgar Dewdney, Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories, who happened to be in Calgary at the time, to discuss an allowance for a school, an increase from $300 to $1,000 grant for a bridge over the Elbow River, incorporation as a town, and representation for Calgary in the Legislative Council of the North-West Territories. The committee was successful in getting an additional $200 for the bridge,
In May, Major Walker, acting on instructions from the NWT Lieutenant-governor, organized a public meeting in the NWMP barracks room on the issue of getting a representative in the NWT Council. Walker wrote the clerk of the Council that he was prepared to produce evidence that Calgary and environs held 1000 residents, the requirement for having a Council member.
A by-election was held on June 28, 1884, where James Davidson Geddes defeated James Kidd Oswald to become the Calgary electoral district representative on the 1st Council of the North-West Territories.
As for education, Calgary moved quickly: the Citizen's Committee raised $125 on February 6, 1884, and the first school opened for twelve children days later on February 18, led by teacher John William Costello. The private school was not enough for the needs of the town and following a petition by James Walker the Calgary Protestant Public School District No. 19 was formed by the Legislature on March 2, 1885.
On November 27, 1884, Lieutenant Governor Dewdney proclaimed the incorporation of The Town of Calgary. Shortly after on December 3, Calgarians went to the polls to elect their first mayor and four councillors. The North-West Municipal Ordinance of 1884 provided voting rights to any male British subject over 21 years of age who owned at minimum $300 of property. Each elector was able to cast one vote for the mayor and up to four votes for the councillors. George Murdoch won the mayoral race in a landslide victory with 202 votes over E. Redpath's 16, while Simon Jackson Hogg, Neville James Lindsay, Joseph Henry Millward, and Simon John Clarke were elected councillors. The next morning the Council met for the first time at Beaudoin and Clarke's Saloon.
Law and order remained top of mind in the frontier town, in early 1884 Jack Campbell was appointed as a constable for the community, and in early 1885 the Town Council passed By-law Eleven creating the position of Chief Constable and assigning relevant duties, a precursor to the Calgary Police Service. The first chief constable, John S. Ingram, who had previously served as the first police chief in Winnipeg, was empowered to arrest drunken and disorderly people, stop all fast riding in town, attend all fires and council meetings. Calgary Town Council was eager to employ constables versus contracting the NWMP for town duty as the police force was seen as a money-making proposition. Constables received half of the fines from liquor cases, meaning Chief Constable Ingram could easily pay his $60 per month salary and the expense of a town jail.