Parade celebrating anniversary of the Hudson's Bay Co

The first inhabitants settled in the area that is now

Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city anch ...

, Canada 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.

Early history

Edmonton, like many places in North America, had been inhabited for thousands of years by

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 ...

groups.

Fur trade

In 1795, European traders of the

North West Company The North West Company was a fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in what is present-day Western Canada and Northwestern Ontario. With great weal ...

(NWC) established Fort Augustus north of Edmonton. The

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 di ...

(HBC), a competitor with the North West Company in the

North American fur trade The North American fur trade is the commercial trade in furs in North America. Various Indigenous peoples of the Americas traded furs with other tribes during the pre-Columbian era. Europeans started their participation in the North American fur ...

, built

Edmonton House Fort Edmonton (also named Edmonton House) was the name of a series of trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) from 1795 to 1914, all of which were located on the north banks of the North Saskatchewan River in what is now central Alberta, ...

(later Fort Edmonton) adjacent to Fort Augustus a year later. In 1802, both forts were moved south to the Rossdale Flats, south of present-day

downtown Edmonton Downtown Edmonton is the central business district of Edmonton, Alberta. Located at the geographical centre of the city, the downtown area is bounded by 109 Street to the west, 105 Avenue to the north, 97 Street to the east, 97 Avenue and Rossdale ...

. The forts were briefly moved north, before they moved back to the Rossdale Flats site in 1813. Following the merger of the HBC and NWC in 1821, the name Fort Augustus was dropped, with operations centralized under Fort Edmonton. The fort served as headquarters for the HBC fur trade operations North Saskatchewan District of Rupert's Land. The Rossdale location remained in use until 1830 when flooding forced the construction of a new Fort Edmonton on higher ground. The area presently occupied by the

Alberta Legislature Building The Alberta Legislature Building is located in Edmonton and is the meeting place of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta and the Executive Council of Alberta. It is often shortened to "the Ledge". The Alberta Legislature Building is located at 10 ...

was selected as the site for the new Fort Edmonton. The decline of the fur trade in the 1860s led to the abandonment of several buildings at Fort Edmonton in the following decades. The fort was eventually dismantled in 1915.

Early settlement (1870–1945)

The first settlement outside of the fort was in the 1870s, pioneer farmers living in rustic log cabins along the river - these farms formed the structure for the 1882 survey of the land into "River lots". "1885 Street" at Fort Edmonton Park represents the early hamlet of Edmonton. The Town of Edmonton was established in 1894. The town encompassed modern

Boyle Street Boyle Street is a neighbourhood located in central Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, immediately east of the downtown core. The neighbourhood is bounded by Grierson Hill to Rowland Road until Alex Taylor Road and then Jasper Avenue east until 82 Stre ...

(the original downtown) and McCauley neighbourhoods. LegislatureFortEd

In 1870, the

had been granted a reserve on much of the present downtown, but by 1913, the peak of the World War I land price inflationary boom, it was all sold off. Edmonton got its first railway in 1903 when a branch line from Calgary via southside Strathcona was built to cross the Low Level Bridge. 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 Highland is a broad term for areas of higher elevation, such as a mountain range or mountainous plateau. Highland, Highlands, or The Highlands, may also refer to: Places Albania * Dukagjin Highlands Armenia * Armenian Highlands Australia *Sou ...

, and Westmount were built at 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 Amalgamation is the process of combining or uniting multiple entities into one form. Amalgamation, amalgam, and other derivatives may refer to: Mathematics and science * Amalgam (chemistry), the combination of mercury with another metal **Pan ama ...

with the

city of Strathcona Strathcona was a city in Alberta, Canada on the south side of the North Saskatchewan River. Originally founded in 1891, it amalgamated with the City of Edmonton in 1912. History Strathcona's recorded history began in the 1870s. Its first r ...

, south of the

North Saskatchewan River The North Saskatchewan River is a glacier-fed river that flows from the Canadian Rockies continental divide east to central Saskatchewan, where it joins with the South Saskatchewan River to make up the Saskatchewan River. Its water flows event ...

; as a result, the city extended south of the river. Just prior to

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, 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. The high rate of volunteer enlistment to the army during the war contributed to the drop in population. The city slowly grew in population and economy during the 1920s and 1930s, until taking off during and after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. The first licensed airfield in Canada, Blatchford Field (now Edmonton City Centre (Blatchford Field) Airport), commenced operation in 1926. 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 Northern Canada, colloquially the North or the Territories, is the vast northernmost region of Canada variously defined by geography and politics. Politically, the term refers to the three territories of Canada: Yukon, Northwest Territories an ...

; hence Edmonton's role as the "Gateway to the North" was strengthened. World War II saw Edmonton's becoming a major base for the construction of the

Alaska Highway