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Fort Qu'Appelle () is a town in the
Canadian province Canada has ten provinces and three territories that are sub-national administrative divisions under the jurisdiction of the Constitution of Canada, Canadian Constitution. In the 1867 Canadian Confederation, three provinces of British North Amer ...
of
Saskatchewan Saskatchewan is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada. It is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and to the south by the ...
located in the
Qu'Appelle River The Qu'Appelle River is a river in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba that flows east from Lake Diefenbaker in south-western Saskatchewan to join the Assiniboine River in Manitoba, just s ...
valley north-east of Regina, between
Echo In audio signal processing and acoustics, an echo is a reflection of sound that arrives at the listener with a delay after the direct sound. The delay is directly proportional to the distance of the reflecting surface from the source and the lis ...
and
Mission Lake Mission Lake, also known as Lebret Lake, is a lake in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It is one of four lakes in the Qu'Appelle Valley known as the Fishing Lakes. Echo Lake is upstream and Katepwa Lake is downstream. The lake was name ...
s of the Fishing Lakes. It is not to be confused with the once-significant nearby town of Qu'Appelle. It was originally established in 1864 as a
Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...
trading post A trading post, trading station, or trading house, also known as a factory in European and colonial contexts, is an establishment or settlement where goods and services could be traded. Typically a trading post allows people from one geogr ...
. Fort Qu'Appelle, with its 1,919 residents in 2006, is at the junction of
Highway 35 The following highways are numbered 35: The Karakoram Highway (Urdu language, Urdu: شاہراہ قراقرم, ''Śāhirāh-i Qarāquram''), also known as the KKH, National Highway 35 (Urdu language, Urdu: قومی شاہراہ ۳۵), N-35, and ...
, Highway 10, Highway 22, Highway 56, and Highway 215. The 1897 Hudson's Bay Company store, 1911 Grand Trunk Pacific Railway station, Fort Qu'Appelle Sanatorium ( Fort San), and the Treaty 4 Governance Centre in the shape of a teepee are all landmarks of this community. Additionally, the Noel Pinay sculpture of a man praying commemorates a burial ground, is a life-sized statue in a park beside Segwun Avenue.


Origins and early history

The current site is the third Fort Qu'Appelle. The first was a
North West Company The North West Company was a Fur trade in Canada, Canadian fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in the regions that later became Western Canada a ...
trading post (1801–05), also in the valley but near what is now the Saskatchewan-Manitoba border. The Hudson's Bay Company itself first used the name for a post north of present-day Whitewood (some east of Regina on Highway 1) from 1813 to 1819. Prior to the mid-19th century establishment of the more lengthily surviving fur-trading post at the ultimate site of the town, it "was the hub of several historic trails that traversed the northwest". It was the site of a Hudson's Bay Company post from 1852 to 1854. An
Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...
mission was established, which still survives as the town's St. John the Evangelist Anglican parish church. The post was revived again from 1864 to 1911. With the signing of Treaty 4 by
Cree The Cree, or nehinaw (, ), are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people, numbering more than 350,000 in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada, First Nations. They live prim ...
and
Saulteaux The Saulteaux (pronounced , or in imitation of the French pronunciation , also written Salteaux, Saulteau and Ojibwa ethnonyms, other variants), otherwise known as the Plains Ojibwe, are a First Nations in Canada, First Nations band governm ...
peoples at Fort Qu'Appelle the
North-West Mounted Police The North-West Mounted Police (NWMP) was a Canadian paramilitary police force, established in 1873, to maintain order in the new Canadian North-West Territories (NWT) following the 1870 transfer of Rupert's Land and North-Western Territory to ...
, now the
Royal Canadian Mounted Police The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP; , GRC) is the Law enforcement in Canada, national police service of Canada. The RCMP is an agency of the Government of Canada; it also provides police services under contract to 11 Provinces and terri ...
(RCMP), arrivedMcLennon. and have maintained a continuous presence in the town ever since. Substantial transformation of Fort Qu'Appelle occurred when farm development began in the 1880s and farmers required a nearby urban centre for selling their grain and other products, purchasing agricultural and domestic supplies and for social gathering beyond rural schools and churches. It was not anticipated that initial partition of agricultural land into farms of one-quarter section () would not last long and farm population would substantially reduce very quickly; the process accelerated in the 1970s when farmers began selling their land and retiring in substantial numbers to Fort Qu'Appelle as the custom of elderly farmers remaining at home with offspring passed into history, and more retired to town. The name "Qu'Appelle" comes from is French for 'who calls' and is derived from its Cree name, kah-tep-was (in Modern Plains Cree: kâ-têpwêt ᑳ ᑌᐻᐟ 'river that calls'). There are several versions of the origin of this name, but the most popular suggests it refers to a Cree legend of two ill-fated lovers." The name refers to the once-popular legend of the Qu'Appelle Valley versified by E. Pauline Johnson and known nation-wide. "Fort Qu'Appelle was the crossroads of a number of historic trails that traversed the North-West Territories." The town is immediately adjacent to the site of the original Fort Qu'Appelle
Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...
trading post, whose "factory" is maintained as a historical site and museum. The Hudson's Bay trading post was built in 1864David McLennon, "Fort Qu'Appelle," ''Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan''.
Retrieved 19 November 2007
when the company's activity was still largely confined to the
fur trade The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal ecosystem, boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals h ...
with
First Nations First nations are indigenous settlers or bands. First Nations, first nations, or first peoples may also refer to: Indigenous groups *List of Indigenous peoples *First Nations in Canada, Indigenous peoples of Canada who are neither Inuit nor Mé ...
residents.McLennan, David. "Fort Qu'Appelle". The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. CANADIAN PLAINS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF REGINA. Retrieved 14 March 2012
/ref> " mmican was shipped down valley on a Hudson's Bay Company cart trail to supply the paddlers of the fur trade in more forested regions." Despite the once well-known gathering of General Middleton and soldiers at Qu'Appelle, at the westernmost extreme of the still-incomplete
Canadian Pacific Railway The Canadian Pacific Railway () , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadian Pacific Kansas City, Canadian Pacific Ka ...
(CPR) and some kilometres south of the Qu'Appelle Valley, " Middleton empowered Captain French, an Irish officer who had been in the North-West Mounted Police (NWMP), to raise a mounted force in the vicinity of Fort Qu'Appelle. ... This mounted troop ... joined the
10th Royal Grenadiers The Royal Grenadiers was an infantry regiment of the Non-Permanent Active Militia of the Canadian Militia (now the Canadian Army). The regiment was unique in its history as it was only one of two regiments in the Canadian Army to be designated ...
from Toronto and the Winnipeg Field Battery under the command of artillery officer Lieutenant-Colonel C.E. Montizambert, to form the west-bank column that would march from Qu'Appelle to Batoche", where the notorious battling would occur. After ethnic European settlement by farmers had become established in the 1880s—a post office being established in 1880—the original Hudson's Bay Company activity was replaced by its department store on Broadway Street in 1897. By this time the fur trade had lapsed but the town community and farmers travelling into town for shopping had substantially increased in number. The store building remains though long disused by the Bay. There was once certain ambiguity as to entitlement to the town-name between the present town and the once-significant regional centre bearing the name "Qu'Appelle"; the matter ceased to be an issue in 1911 when the two communities agreed to deem the then-CPR station site as Qu'Appelle and the town in the valley as Fort Qu'Appelle. As did the town of Qu'Appelle, Fort Qu'Appelle early-on had "a bid to succeed Battleford as the territorial capital" but "lost out to Regina ... in 1882". The name Fort Qu'Appelle was given to a number of trading posts in the Qu'Appelle valley. Near Fort Espérance both the Hudson's Bay Company and the
North West Company The North West Company was a Fur trade in Canada, Canadian fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in the regions that later became Western Canada a ...
had temporary posts that were apparently called Fort Qu'Appelle. (The Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Company merged in 1821.) From 1855 until 1864 the Hudson's Bay Company had a Fort Qu'Appelle a little south of where McLean was later established. It was an outpost of
Fort Ellice Fort Ellice was a Hudson's Bay Company trading post that operated from 1794 to 1892. It was first established in February 1794 by John Sutherland on the Qu'Appelle River about upstream from its mouth at the Assiniboine River, and known as the Qu ...
and was mainly a source of
pemmican Pemmican () (also pemican in older sources) is a mixture of tallow, dried meat, and sometimes dried berries. A calorie-rich food, it can be used as a key component in prepared meals or eaten raw. Historically, it was an important part of indigeno ...
. In 1864 it was moved to the present site of Fort Qu'Appelle. Three industrial boarding schools for First Nations adolescents were established in 1883, including one on the south side of Mission Lake across from Lebret on the north side of the lake, as well as Battleford and High River. It was often claimed that colonial administration of Canada, once
British North America British North America comprised the colonial territories of the British Empire in North America from 1783 onwards. English colonisation of North America began in the 16th century in Newfoundland, then further south at Roanoke and Jamestown, ...
, was very different from that in other British colonies. But it has been alleged to have been corruption on the part of Edgar Dewdney when he was Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories to place the capital in Buffalo Bones rather than Fort Qu'Appelle or Qu'Appelle. On the other hand, Fort Qu'Appelle is strikingly similar to
Murree Murree () is a mountain resort city in the northernmost region of the Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab province of Pakistan. Lying in the Galyat region of the Pir Panjal Range under the western Himalayas, it forms the outskirts of the Islamabad–Rawal ...
, northeast of
Rawalpindi Rawalpindi is the List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, third-largest city in the Administrative units of Pakistan, Pakistani province of Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab. It is a commercial and industrial hub, being the list of cities in P ...
and once the summer capital of
British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance in South Asia. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another ...
, and Maymyo,
Burma Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and ha ...
highlands. It was in 1915 that "Sir Robert Borden has been invited by the Saskatchewan Art Society to unveil a memorial at Ft. Qu'Appelle to the signing of the first treaty in 1874 between the Dominion and the plains Indians." The site of the fort was designated a
national historic site of Canada National Historic Sites of Canada () are places that have been designated by the federal Minister of the Environment on the advice of the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada (HSMBC), as being of national historic significance. Parks C ...
in 1953. File:Qu Appalle Valley 1885 Rebellion.jpg, Troops on the march,
North-West Rebellion The North-West Rebellion (), was an armed rebellion of Métis under Louis Riel and an associated uprising of Cree and Assiniboine mostly in the District of Saskatchewan, against the Government of Canada, Canadian government. Important events i ...
, Qu'Appelle Valley, 1885 File:Police parade before Fort mainstreat shop.gif, Police parade before Hudson's Bay Company shop, built before the town developed File:Hudson's Bay post pre-1914.jpg, Hudson's Bay post, pre-1914. Today a museum File:Treaty 4 monument.jpg, Monument to Treaty 4 signing


Demographics

In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by
Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; ), 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 culture. It is headquartered in ...
, Fort Qu'Appelle had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.


Development

The town's substantial growth beyond its status as a Hudson's Bay Company "factory" first occurred in the 1880s and 1890s when European settlement began in the region as the
Canadian Pacific Railway The Canadian Pacific Railway () , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadian Pacific Kansas City, Canadian Pacific Ka ...
moved westwards: a post office opened in 1880.David McLennan. "Fort Qu'Appelle." The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. CANADIAN PLAINS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF REGINA. Retrieved 10 July 2012
/ref> This coincided with the first development of British India after the seizing of control of India from the
East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...
by
The Crown The Crown is a political concept used in Commonwealth realms. Depending on the context used, it generally refers to the entirety of the State (polity), state (or in federal realms, the relevant level of government in that state), the executive ...
after the 1857 Indian Mutiny, and the town of Fort Qu'Appelle's striking similarity to the Indian hill stations of the early Raj has been widely commented upon by anyone who has seen both. Although the North-West Mounted Police headquarters was established in Regina once it was named capital of the North-West Territories in 1882, the substantial police station at the western end of the town of Fort Qu'Appelle remained significant as centre of service within the valley and in rural communities and to farms in the plains region: this became more important though less as nearby towns declined from the beginning of the
Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
in 1929 and continuing after World War II. Older residences and commercial premises together with the town's Anglican and United (formerly Presbyterian) churches are quintessentially of the 19th century hinterland
British Empire The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...
, a matter which local civic boosters and cultivators of tourism appear not yet to have capitalised upon. "In 1913, construction began on a fish culture station near Fort Qu'Appelle and, to date, the facility has supplied more than 2 billion fish to stock water bodies throughout the province.... e Fort Qu'Appelle Sanatorium ( Fort San) for tuberculosis patients... pened in1917." The commercial shops, being grocery and supply centres for the ample number of area farms, were substantially busier than they would have been if merely for town residents; the Fort Hotel of the early 20th century through the 1960s had a well-attended pub with its parking lot full late Friday afternoons through evenings. A large drive-in movie theatre stood on Bay Avenue south of the railway track just before the entry into the coulee on Highway 36 to leave the valley; it had lively attendance by townspeople, cottagers and farmers until the 1960s when home television significantly improved and the drive-in closed. Despite the accelerating decline of rural Saskatchewanian population in the post-World War II years as farms needed to be larger and therefore fewer in number for economic viability, the town grew through most of the 1950s and 1960s as a cottage community serving the Qu'Appelle Lakes summer-cottage country in the valley up- and down-river from the town. Cottagers from Regina and other southern Saskatchewan communities used Fort Qu'Appelle as a base from which to explore the scenic and historic river valley, purchase hardware and groceries and contract services; the town also benefited urban drift as farms and other towns steadily depopulated. This process was precipitately accelerated in the early 1960s. Highway 35 had reached Fort Qu'Appelle by branching off the
Trans-Canada Highway The Trans-Canada Highway (Canadian French, French: ; abbreviated as the TCH or T-Can) is a transcontinental federal–provincial highway system that travels through all ten provinces of Canada, from the Pacific Ocean on the west coast to the A ...
at the once-significant town Qu'Appelle and somewhat laboriously proceeding into the Qu'Appelle Valley by winding through an un-occupied coulee. The old highway was supplemented and effectively replaced by Highway 10, leaving the Trans-Canada at Balgonie and taking a straight route from the plain into the valley. This vastly eased access from the southwest and increased Fort Qu'Appelle's attraction over other market-places for farmers. In 1963, with steadily decreasing density of farm neighbourhood populations and increasing quality of highways, the rural school districts were abolished and farm primary and high school children—taught in one building with one or two classrooms—were thereafter bused to town schools. Rural churches having largely closed in the 1950s, the collapse of rural farming communities was now assured, to the benefit of minor metro-poles such as Fort Qu'Appelle though arguably to the impoverishment of the community as a whole. With the building of Highway 10 making access to Fort Qu'Appelle from outside the valley easier and faster, the process of farmers using it rather than previously substantial towns such as Qu'Appelle, Edgeley and Balcarres for selling grain and buying groceries further increased its size and vitality. The town itself is today "a shopping, service, and institutional centre serving the surrounding rming community, neighbouring resort villages, cottagers and summer vacationers." Many traditional lake summer cottages have become year-round residences, together with winter skiing further expanding demand for the town's shopping facilities.


Historic and current medical facilities

Maurice Macdonald Seymour, Commissioner of Public Health, was a
physician A physician, medical practitioner (British English), medical doctor, or simply doctor is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through the Medical education, study, Med ...
and
surgeon In medicine, a surgeon is a medical doctor who performs surgery. Even though there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon is a licensed physician and received the same medical training as physicians before spec ...
of the early
North-West Territories The Northwest Territories is a federal territory of Canada. At a land area of approximately and a 2021 census population of 41,070, it is the second-largest and the most populous of the three territories in Northern Canada. Its estimated pop ...
in Canada. He founded the Saskatchewan Anti-Tuberculosis League which incorporated and constructed the Fort Qu'Appelle sanitarium. This
tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...
sanatorium was operated by the provincial department of public health under the direction of R.G. Ferguson and opened in 1917 at nearby Fort San; when tuberculosis ceased to be a public health problem the facility was turned into a fine arts complex where a substantial summer program was operated 1967-91 when the provincial government terminated its funding: latterly it has become a resort village housing the Echo Valley Conference Centre. In addition to the ample summer lake cottages—in later years many occupied throughout the year—and the successive uses of the former Fort San tuberculosis, for many years the Regina
YMCA YMCA, sometimes regionally called the Y, is a worldwide youth organisation based in Geneva, Switzerland, with more than 64 million beneficiaries in 120 countries. It has nearly 90,000 staff, some 920,000 volunteers and 12,000 branches w ...
operated a summer camp on the north shore of Echo Lake just west of Fort San; the Anglican Church continues to maintain a similar summer camp on the south shore of Mission Lake the other, east side of the town. The former Fort Qu'Appelle Indian Hospital was replaced in 2004 by the All Nations Healing Hospital. The hospital is one of the first health care facilities in Canada owned and operated by First Nations governments. There are sixteen in total, five from Touchwood Agency Tribal Council and eleven from File Hills Qu'Appelle Tribal Council. The surrounding area both north and south but also to minor extent within the valley is site of grain and cattle farms, nowadays larger in size and smaller in number and population than in past years, small rural communities and sixteen
Indian reserve In Canada, an Indian reserve () or First Nations reserve () is defined by the '' Indian Act'' as a "tract of land, the legal title to which is vested in Her Majesty, that has been set apart by Her Majesty for the use and benefit of a band." ...
s.


Education

The town has one high school, Bert Fox Community High School, and one elementary school, Fort Qu'Appelle Elementary Community School. The former Central School, built in 1911, was converted to the Qu'Appelle Valley Centre for the Arts. Parklands College is located at the Treaty 4 Governance Centre. Schooling in Fort Qu'Appelle radically expanded immediately after the end of academic year 1962-63 when close by rural schools, which had pupils from kindergarten to grade 12, universally closed and their attendees were thereafter driven for school to the Fort. Such element in school pupils and students vastly diminished in subsequent decades, however, as farm population steadily declined. From 1967 through 1991 the closed tuberculosis sanatorium at Fort San was the location of the Saskatchewan Summer School of the Arts covering dance, music, visual art, writing and theatre. This drew a great many summer visitors to Fort San but also Fort Qu'Appelle and Lebret, whose Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church was site for liturgical music presentations; the School of the Arts closed due to elimination of provincial government funding.


Places of worship

Churches with long histories by local standards survive in nearby Lebret's Sacred Heart Roman
Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
; St. John the Evangelist
Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...
, being today's heir of the 1854 Church of England mission (Anglican Camp Knowles on Mission Lake continues to operate in summers); and St. Andrew's
United Church A united church, also called a uniting church, is a denomination formed from the merger or other form of church union of two or more different Protestantism, Protestant Christian denominations, a number of which come from separate and distinc ...
(Presbyterian until mid-1925). As in many if not most Canadian communities, church attendance in all traditional denominations has significantly declined, certainly in the Roman Catholic, United, Anglican and
Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...
churches, being the first- through fourth-largest Christian denominations in Canada. This perhaps especially noticeably affects traditionally dominant denominations among the area's farm communities of Roman Catholic, Presbyterian (cum-United Church in Fort Qu'Appelle albeit not universally in neighbouring Qu'Appelle and Indian Head) and Methodist (universally cum-United in 1925 hereabouts.) But the historic church buildings are nonetheless supplemented latterly by the more recently constructed Our Lady of Sorrows Roman Catholic Church, Our Saviour Lutheran Church, and the more recently arrived denominations' Valley Alliance Church and Kingdom Hall of
Jehovah's Witnesses Jehovah's Witnesses is a Christian denomination that is an outgrowth of the Bible Student movement founded by Charles Taze Russell in the nineteenth century. The denomination is nontrinitarian, millenarian, and restorationist. Russell co-fou ...
. Once-thriving rural United Churches survived until the 1950s but closed when farmers' regular access to town increased and more fundamentalist at-home meetings acquired some favour.


Climate

Fort Qu'Appelle has a
semi-arid A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a aridity, dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below Evapotranspiration#Potential evapotranspiration, potential evapotranspiration, but not as l ...
, highland
continental climate Continental climates often have a significant annual variation in temperature (warm to hot summers and cold winters). They tend to occur in central and eastern parts of the three northern-tier continents (North America, Europe, and Asia), typi ...
with dry winters and cool summers (
Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...
''BSk''), Fort Qu'Appelle's winters can be uncomfortably cold; but warm, dry
Chinook wind Chinook winds, or simply Chinooks, are two types of prevailing warm, generally westerly winds in western North America: Coastal Chinooks and interior Chinooks. The coastal Chinooks are persistent seasonal, wet, southwesterly winds blowing in from ...
s routinely blow into the city from the
Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...
during the winter months, providing the occasional break from the cold especially during the times of
El Niño–Southern Oscillation El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is a global climate phenomenon that emerges from variation in winds and sea surface temperatures over the tropical Pacific Ocean. Those variations have an irregular pattern but do have some semblance of cyc ...
. These winds have been known to raise the winter temperature by up to in just a few hours. Fort Qu'Appelle is a town of extremes, and temperatures have ranged anywhere from a record low of in January 1916 to a record high of on 5 July 1937. The closest weather station recording historic climate temperatures is at Qu'Appelle, south south-east on
Highway 35 The following highways are numbered 35: The Karakoram Highway (Urdu language, Urdu: شاہراہ قراقرم, ''Śāhirāh-i Qarāquram''), also known as the KKH, National Highway 35 (Urdu language, Urdu: قومی شاہراہ ۳۵), N-35, and ...
. According to
Environment and Climate Change Canada Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC; )Environment and Climate Change Canada is the applied title under the Federal Identity Program; the legal title is Department of the Environment (). is the department of the Government of Canada res ...
, the average temperature in Qu'Appelle ranges from a January daily average of to a July daily average of . As a consequence of Fort Qu'Appelle's relative dryness, summer evenings can be very cool, the average summer minimum temperature drops to . Fort Qu'Appelle has a
semi-arid climate A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of se ...
typical of other cities in the Western
Great Plains The Great Plains is a broad expanse of plain, flatland in North America. The region stretches east of the Rocky Mountains, much of it covered in prairie, steppe, and grassland. They are the western part of the Interior Plains, which include th ...
and
Canadian Prairies The Canadian Prairies (usually referred to as simply the Prairies in Canada) is a region in Western Canada. It includes the Canadian portion of the Great Plains and the Prairie provinces, namely Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. These provin ...
. Fort Qu'Appelle receives an average of of precipitation annually, with of that occurring in the form of rain, and the remaining precipitation as of snow. Most of the precipitation occurs from May to August, with June and July averaging the most monthly rainfall. Droughts are not uncommon and may occur at any time of the year, lasting sometimes for months or even several years.


Sports

The Mission Ridge Ski Hill, located just south of the town near the Treaty 4 Grounds, is open during the winter and is patronised by ski-enthusiasts from the valley and environs and from Regina and elsewhere in the region. On the July long weekend Mission Ridge plays host to Rockin' the Ridge, a one-day country/rock music festival. Recently, Fort Qu'Appelle and area were host to the 2007 Keystone Cup during 12–15 April. The Keystone Cup is the Junior "B" ice hockey championship and trophy for
Western Canada Western Canada, also referred to as the Western provinces, Canadian West, or Western provinces of Canada, and commonly known within Canada as the West, is a list of regions of Canada, Canadian region that includes the four western provinces and t ...
. The home town host, Fort Knox hockey club, placed 2nd and won the silver medal in the event. The town accommodated players, coaches, parents, and fans during the event. "The Fort Qu'Appelle Falcons, a midget-level team made up of 16- and 17-year-olds," finished the 2008–2009 season in first place and without any major infractions. The Fort Qu'Appelle Senior C team brought home the Jack Abbott Memorial Trophy in 1957, 2004 saw the Fort Qu'Appelle Flyers win the Female Pee wee A provincial championship. In 2004 and 2005, the fort Qu'Appelle Falcons Midge A team earned the Harold Jones Cup, 2006 saw the Female Bantam A team, the Fort Qu'Appelle Flyers rise to provincial championship level, and in 2007 provincial champions arose from Fort Qu'Appelle again when the Falcons Bantam A team achieved the honour of the John Maddia Cup. Starting his career in 1970–71 with the Fort Qu'Appelle Silver Foxes, Glen Burdon was selected in both the National Hockey League and the World Hockey Association drafts. The Fort Qu'Appelle curling club was established 1894. the first rink was north of the Canadian Pacific Railway line on Boundary Avenue North with one sheet of ice. The curling club competed with Lebret and the Sanitorium clubs during the 1940s. The curling club expanded in 1947 moving the Dafoe air force hangar into town. Fort Qu'Appelle Sioux Indians belonged to the Southern Baseball League. In 1961, Duane Ring of the Fort Qu'Appelle Sioux Indians was runner up for the hitting crown. He fell just .057 percentage points behind Lionel Ruhr.


Recreation, holidaying and tourism

Fort Qu'Appelle and nearby Qu'Appelle Valley sites have almost from the beginning of township provided ample recreational sites and are a notable tourist destination both in summer and winter. " n the years prior to World War I ...the recreational potential of the district began to be exploited and numerous cottages began to appear on the area lakes." The lakes afford swimming, boating and other water related activities in summer and
cross-country skiing Cross-country skiing is a form of skiing whereby skiers traverse snow-covered terrain without use of ski lifts or other assistance. Cross-country skiing is widely practiced as a sport and recreational activity; however, some still use it as a m ...
, snowmobiling and
ice fishing Ice fishing is the practice of catching fish with lines and fish hooks or spears through an opening in the ice on a frozen body of water. Ice fishers may fish in the open or in heated enclosures, some with bunks and amenities. Shelters L ...
in winter. There is also Echo Valley Provincial Park located between Echo Lake and Pasqua Lake. The park provides an
RV park A recreational vehicle park (RV park) or caravan park is a place where people with recreational vehicles can stay overnight, or longer, in allotted spaces known as "sites" or "campsites". They are also referred to as campgrounds, though a true ...
,
camping Camping is a form of outdoor recreation or outdoor education involving overnight stays with a basic temporary shelter such as a tent. Camping can also include a recreational vehicle, sheltered cabins, a permanent tent, a shelter such as a Bivy bag ...
,
swimming Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, such as saltwater or freshwater environments, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Swimmers achieve locomotion by coordinating limb and body movements to achieve hydrody ...
,
boating Boating is the leisurely activity of travelling by boat, or the recreational use of a boat whether powerboats, sailboats, or man-powered vessels (such as rowing and paddle boats), focused on the travel itself, as well as sports activities, suc ...
, and
fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment (Freshwater ecosystem, freshwater or Marine ecosystem, marine), but may also be caught from Fish stocking, stocked Body of water, ...
. "To the visitor, southern Saskatchewan Qu'Appelle Valley might, at first glance, appear to be a mirage. Bordered by seemingly-endless farmland flatness, the dramatic physical features of the valley appear somewhat out of place. The long-closed Fort Qu'Appelle station was originally built by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, "incorporated in 1903 as a subsidiary of the Grand Trunk Railway" and " 1923, iththe Grand Trunk Railway, and the National Transcontinental merged with the
Canadian Northern Railway The Canadian Northern Railway (CNoR) was a historic Canada, Canadian transcontinental railway. At its 1923 merger into the Canadian National Railway , the CNoR owned a main line between Quebec City and Vancouver via Ottawa, Winnipeg, and Edmonto ...
to form the new Canadian National Railway." " ny prairie branch lines closed after 1945; the passenger service was terminated in 1978." immediately to the west of Fort Qu'Appelle, approximately halfway along the south shore of the lake; a popular holiday resort and commuter community since the 1880s. The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway station nonetheless continues to stand, maintained as a site for current information on attractions and activities. After closure as a medical facility, Fort San was used as a summer musical facility until the 1990s with choir concerts in the nearby Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church in Lebret. The most notable tourist event is Treaty 4 Gathering, a week-long event celebrating the signing of Treaty 4. The event is held in September, during the week of the 15th.
Pow wow A powwow (also pow wow or pow-wow) is a gathering with dances held by many Native American and First Nations communities. Inaugurated in 1923, powwows today are an opportunity for Indigenous people to socialize, dance, sing, and honor their ...
s are held daily during the week. Aforementioned winter downhill skiing, currently at the Mission Ridge Ski Hill, attracts skiers not only from the town but elsewhere in the region including the city of Regina.


Notable people

* Walter Dieter, the founding chief of the National Indian Brotherhood in 1968, which is today known as the Assembly of First Nations. * James Henderson, "Saskatchewan's pre-eminent first-generation artist" spent much of his career working in Fort Qu'Appelle. * Mel "Sudden Death" Hill,
National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; , ''LNH'') is a professional ice hockey league in North America composed of 32 teams25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. The NHL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Cana ...
forward. *
Hockey ''Hockey'' is a family of List of stick sports, stick sports where two opposing teams use hockey sticks to propel a ball or disk into a goal. There are many types of hockey, and the individual sports vary in rules, numbers of players, apparel, ...
star and
Hockey Hall of Fame The Hockey Hall of Fame () is a museum and hall of fame located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Dedicated to the history of ice hockey, it holds exhibits about players, teams, National Hockey League (NHL) records, memorabilia and National Hockey Le ...
member Eddie Shore was born in Fort Qu'Appelle. * Noel Starblanket, the third chief of the National Indian Brotherhood.


Media

*The town's weekly community newspaper, the ''Fort Qu'Appelle Times.'' *The town has 3 television re-transmitters. The transmitters are used by
CBC CBC may refer to: Media * Cadena Baja California or Grupo Cadena, a radio and television broadcaster in Mexico * Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Canada's radio and television public broadcaster ** CBC Television ** CBC Radio One ** CBC Music ** ...
(channel 4),
Global Global may refer to: General *Globe, a spherical model of celestial bodies *Earth, the third planet from the Sun Entertainment * ''Global'' (Paul van Dyk album), 2003 * ''Global'' (Bunji Garlin album), 2007 * ''Global'' (Humanoid album), 198 ...
(channel 6), and CTV (channel 7).


Television and film location

* The movie '' Skipped Parts'', set in
Wyoming Wyoming ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States, Western United States. It borders Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho t ...
, had scenes filmed in Fort Qu'Appelle and in nearby towns as well as the city of Regina * The
CBC CBC may refer to: Media * Cadena Baja California or Grupo Cadena, a radio and television broadcaster in Mexico * Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Canada's radio and television public broadcaster ** CBC Television ** CBC Radio One ** CBC Music ** ...
movie ''Betrayed'' was filmed primarily in Fort Qu'Appelle, with notable sites including the old hospital (both in and out). * The television series ''Life Without Borders'' is filmed and produced in the Fort Qu'Appelle area.


See also

*
List of towns in Saskatchewan A town is a type of incorporated urban municipality in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. A resort village or a village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a populati ...


References


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fort Qu'appelle, Saskatchewan North Qu'Appelle No. 187, Saskatchewan Towns in Saskatchewan Hudson's Bay Company forts National Historic Sites in Saskatchewan Division No. 6, Saskatchewan