Émile-Joseph Legal (October 9, 1849 – March 10, 1920) was born in France and went to

Lachine, Quebec Lachine () is a borough (''arrondissement'') within the city of Montreal on the Island of Montreal in southwestern Quebec, Canada. It was an autonomous city until the municipal mergers in 2002. History Lachine, apparently from the French term ' ...

, where he was ordained a

Roman Catholic priest The priesthood is the office of the ministers of religion, who have been commissioned ("ordained") with the Holy orders of the Catholic Church. Technically, bishops are a priestly order as well; however, in layman's terms ''priest'' refers only ...

in the

Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate (OMI) is a missionary religious congregation in the Catholic Church. It was founded on January 25, 1816, by Eugène de Mazenod, a French priest born in Aix-en-Provence in the south of France on August 1, ...

order in 1880. Legal worked briefly in the United States where he studied to acquire a knowledge of English. He was sent as a missionary to the Canadian northwest in 1881. He arrived at St. Albert,

North-West Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal territory of Canada. ...

(NWT), and was sent to carry out missionary work with the

Northern Peigan The Piikani Nation (, formerly the Peigan Nation) ( bla, Piikáni) is a First Nation (or an Indian band as defined by the ''Indian Act''), representing the Indigenous people in Canada known as the Northern Piikani ( bla, script=Latn, Aapátohsipi ...

Blackfoot The Blackfoot Confederacy, ''Niitsitapi'' or ''Siksikaitsitapi'' (ᖹᐟᒧᐧᒣᑯ, meaning "the people" or " Blackfoot-speaking real people"), is a historic collective name for linguistically related groups that make up the Blackfoot or Bla ...

people as well as pastoral duties in

Fort Macleod Fort Macleod ( ) is a town in southern Alberta, Canada. It was originally named Macleod to distinguish it from the North-West Mounted Police barracks (Fort Macleod, built 1874) it had grown around. The fort was named in honour of the then Commis ...

, NWT, to take over from Father

Constantine Scollen Father Con Scollen OMI. (4 April 1841 – 8 November 1902) was an Irish Catholic, Missionary priest who lived among and evangelized the Blackfoot, Cree and Métis peoples on the Canadian Prairies and in northern Montana in the United States. H ...

, who had established the first mission to the Blackfoot people of the southern

North-West Territory The Northwest Territory, also known as the Old Northwest and formally known as the Territory Northwest of the River Ohio, was formed from unorganized western territory of the United States after the American Revolutionary War. Established in 1 ...

in 1873, along with Father Leon Doucet, near

Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, makin ...

, NWT. He was made a bishop in 1897 and bishop of St. Albert in 1902 on the death of Bishop

Vital-Justin Grandin Vital-Justin Grandin (8 February 1829 – 3 June 1902) was a Roman Catholic priest and bishop known as a key architect of the Canadian Indian residential school system, which has been labeled an instrument of cultural genocide. In June 202 ...

. In 1905, the province of

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

was created out of the NWT, and in 1912 the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Edmonton was created, with Legal made archbishop on the 30th of November. The town of

Legal, Alberta Legal is a town in the Edmonton Metropolitan Region of Alberta, Canada within Sturgeon County. It is east of Highway 2 on Highway 651, approximately north of Edmonton. Legal was established in 1894 as a Francophone community, and is named in ...

, is named in his honour.

References

Biography at the ''Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online''
19th-century Roman Catholic bishops in Canada 20th-century Roman Catholic archbishops in Canada French emigrants to Canada Pre-Confederation Alberta people 1849 births 1920 deaths Roman Catholic archbishops of Edmonton Franco-Albertan people Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate {{Canada-RC-bishop-stub