Enterprise is a

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...

in the

South Slave Region The South Slave Region is one of five administrative regions in the Northwest Territories of Canada. According to Municipal and Community Affairs the region consists of seven communities with the regional office situated in Fort Smith and a su ...

of the Northwest Territories, Canada, located between

Great Slave Lake Great Slave Lake (french: Grand lac des Esclaves), known traditionally as Tıdeè in Tłı̨chǫ Yatıì (Dogrib), Tinde’e in Wıìlıìdeh Yatii / Tetsǫ́t’ıné Yatıé (Dogrib / Chipewyan), Tu Nedhé in Dëne Sųłıné Yatıé (Chi ...

and the

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 ...

border on the Hay River. Enterprise is at an important junction of the

Mackenzie Highway The Mackenzie Highway is a Canadian highway in northern Alberta and the Northwest Territories. It begins as Alberta Highway 2 at ''Mile Zero'' in Grimshaw, Alberta. After the first , it becomes Alberta Highway 35 for the balance of its lengt ...

and the road to

Yellowknife Yellowknife (; Dogrib: ) is the capital, largest community, and only city in the Northwest Territories, Canada. It is on the northern shore of Great Slave Lake, about south of the Arctic Circle, on the west side of Yellowknife Bay near the ...

and was established when two service stations were built to take advantage of traffic along these highways. It has since grown to include a

weigh station A weigh station is a checkpoint along a highway to inspect vehicular weights and safety compliance criteria. Usually, trucks and commercial vehicles are subject to the inspection. Weigh stations are equipped with truck scales, some of which are ...

, Winnie's Restaurant, and a motel to accommodate travellers. Most of the remaining commercial region, however, is currently closed for business and looking for buyers. It is a significant point on the Northwest Territories highway system, as all traffic that heads to the two largest population centres, Yellowknife to the north, and the nearby town of Hay River to the northeast, must pass through. As such, a tourism centre/visitors centre is located right in the heart of town, where the old weigh station used to be.

History

With the completion of the Mackenzie Highway in 1948 from

Grimshaw, Alberta Grimshaw is a town in northern Alberta, Canada. It is approximately west of the Town of Peace River at the junction of Highway 2 and Highway 2A and along Mackenzie Northern Railway. By virtue of being the original starting point of Highway ...

, to Hay River on the shores of Great Slave Lake, a number of new service stops were built along its length. In the winter of 1948/1949, Jack Parnall, a freight operator based in Hay River, opened a service station at the junction of the Mackenzie Highway and the Mills Lake winter road, which connected to the Mills Lake freight staging area on the Mackenzie River below Fort Providence. In the late 1950s, the highway was extended to Yellowknife on the north side of Great Slave Lake, and Enterprise became the important junction. Jerry and Mae Eyford opened a Pacific 66 garage in 1956 and Sammy Petersen built a motel and general store in 1964. The community is a service centre for travellers and is also the base of operations for GNWT highway maintenance in this region.

Demographics

In the 2021 Canadian census conducted by Statistics Canada, Enterprise had a population of 75 living in 33 of its 51 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 106. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021. At the 2016 Canadian census there were 30

First Nations First Nations or first peoples may refer to: * Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area. Indigenous groups *First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including: **First Natio ...

, 10 Métis and 10

Inuit Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories ...

. The main languages, besides English, are North and South Slavey,

Inuinnaqtun Inuinnaqtun (; natively meaning ''like the real human beings/peoples''), is an indigenous Inuit language. It is spoken in the central Canadian Arctic. It is related very closely to Inuktitut, and some scholars, such as Richard Condon, believe ...

( Inuvialuktun) and German.

Incorporation

In 2007, Enterprise filed a petition to change from settlement status to

, which would allow for greater powers by council, a public voting for mayor, and freedom to set property tax rates. On 27 October 2007 the community was officially incorporated and Allan Flamand became the first mayor.

Climate

Enterprise has a subarctic climate ( Dfc) with the yearly mean temperature being below zero in spite of the relatively warm summers around resulting in Enterprise being well below the

tree line The tree line is the edge of the habitat at which trees are capable of growing. It is found at high elevations and high latitudes. Beyond the tree line, trees cannot tolerate the environmental conditions (usually cold temperatures, extreme snow ...

in the

boreal forest Taiga (; rus, тайга́, p=tɐjˈɡa; relates to Mongolic and Turkic languages), generally referred to in North America as a boreal forest or snow forest, is a biome characterized by coniferous forests consisting mostly of pines, spruc ...

. Winter average highs are around with lows being , typical of the boreal forests north of the prairies. *Hay River is approximately away

Notes

References