Garson Lake is a

northern settlement Communities in the Province of Saskatchewan, Canada include incorporated municipalities, unincorporated communities and First Nations communities. Types of incorporated municipalities include urban municipalities, rural municipalities and nort ...

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

on the eastern shore of Garson Lake. It is located near the Alberta border and can be accessed by Highway 956 off of Highway 155. A winter road connects it to

Fort McMurray Fort McMurray ( ) is an urban service area in the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo in Alberta, Canada. It is located in northeast Alberta, in the middle of the Athabasca oil sands, surrounded by boreal forest. It has played a significant ...

, Alberta in the winter months. Garson Lake is from

La Loche La Loche () is a village in northwest Saskatchewan. It is located at the end of Highway 155 on the eastern shore of Lac La Loche in Canada's boreal forest. La Loche had a population of 2,827 in 2016 and is within the Northern Saskatchewan Admini ...

and from Fort McMurray. The population of this northern settlement is 34 and is led by

Chairman The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...

Donald A. Laprise. The northern settlement is an unincorporated community in the

Northern Saskatchewan Administration District The Northern Saskatchewan Administration District (NSAD) is the unorganized area of the Canada province of Saskatchewan. Overwhelmingly larger than the province's other communities, it encompasses approximately half of Saskatchewan's landmass, an ...

History

The lake has been called Swan Lake then Whitefish Lake (Lac Poisson Blanc in French). In 1911 the lake was renamed Garson Lake after a

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake business div ...

post manager at Onion Lake, Saskatchewan. Mgr. Grandin

O.M.I. 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, ...

wrote in 1880 that there were 200 people at La Loche Lake and Whitefish Lake. In 1895, Father Penard of the La Loche Mission wrote that there was a settlement of 50 people at Whitefish Lake. On August 4, 1899 the

Dene The Dene people () are an Aboriginal peoples in Canada, indigenous group of First Nations in Canada, First Nations who inhabit the northern Boreal forest of Canada, boreal and Arctic regions of Canada. The Dene speak Northern Athabaskan languag ...

residents of Garson Lake signed an adhesion to

Treaty 8 Treaty 8, which concluded with the June 21, 1899 signing by representatives of the Crown and various First Nations of the Lesser Slave Lake area, is the most comprehensive of the one of eleven Numbered Treaties. The agreement encompassed a la ...

at Fort McMurray. Their descendants came to be known as the Portage La Loche Band. Today they form the

Clearwater River Dene Nation The Clearwater River Dene Nation ( chp, Tı̨tëlase tué) is a Dene First Nations band government in the boreal forest area of northern Saskatchewan, Canada. It maintains offices in the village of Clearwater River situated on the eastern shore ...

. In the Piercy Report of 1944, the settlement was called Garson Lake or Whitefish Lake. The community had 17 families with 50 children under the age of 18. The community had no services of any kind and was not accessible by road. In 1999, Garson Lake Road, a access road from Highway 155, was completed to Garson Lake.

Demographics

In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; french: Statistique Canada), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and cultur ...

, Garson Lake had a population of 10 living in 9 of its 16 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 10. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

References

Designated places in Saskatchewan Division No. 18, Unorganized, Saskatchewan Northern settlements in Saskatchewan Dene communities {{SKDivision18-geo-stub

History

Demographics

See also

References