Mistusinne ( 2016 population: ) is a

resort village A resort village is a type of incorporated List of communities in Saskatchewan#Urban municipalities, urban municipality in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Saskatchewan. A resort village is created from an organized Ha ...

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 ...

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 ...

within Census Division No. 7. It is on the eastern shore of Gordon McKenzie Arm of

Lake Diefenbaker Lake Diefenbaker is a reservoir and bifurcation lake in the southern part of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It was formed by the construction of the Gardiner Dam and the Qu'Appelle River Dam across ...

in the Rural Municipality of Maple Bush No. 224.

History

The resort village's name is derived from the Plains Cree word ''mistasiniy'' or ''mistaseni'' (meaning "big stone"), which refers to a 400-ton

glacial erratic A glacial erratic is a glacially deposited rock (geology), rock differing from the type of country rock (geology), rock native to the area in which it rests. Erratics, which take their name from the Latin word ' ("to wander"), are carried by gla ...

that resembled a sleeping

bison A bison (: bison) is a large bovine in the genus ''Bison'' (from Greek, meaning 'wild ox') within the tribe Bovini. Two extant taxon, extant and numerous extinction, extinct species are recognised. Of the two surviving species, the American ...

. It once rested in the

Qu'Appelle Valley The Qu'Appelle River is a river in the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba that flows east from Lake Diefenbaker in south-western Saskatchewan to join the Assiniboine River in Manitoba, just south of Lake of the Prairies, near t ...

and served as a sacred gathering place for the Cree and

Assiniboine The Assiniboine or Assiniboin people ( when singular, Assiniboines / Assiniboins when plural; Ojibwe: ''Asiniibwaan'', "stone Sioux"; also in plural Assiniboine or Assiniboin), also known as the Hohe and known by the endonym Nakota (or Nakoda ...

peoples before Lake Diefenbaker was built. During the

South Saskatchewan River The South Saskatchewan River is a major river in the Canadian provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan. The river begins at the confluence of the Bow River, Bow and Oldman Rivers in southern Alberta and ends at the Saskatchewan River Forks in ce ...

dam project, the erratic was in the flood path of the new reservoir that would become Lake Diefenbaker. In 1966, the

Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration The Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration (PFRA) was a branch under Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC), a department of the Federal Government of Canada. The Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration was established by an Act of Parliam ...

had the rock blasted apart with explosives, despite efforts by groups to save it. Pieces of the rock were used in monuments to Chief

Poundmaker Poundmaker ( – 4 July 1886), also known as ''pîhtokahânapiwiyin'' (), was a Plains Cree chief known as a peacemaker and defender of his people, the Poundmaker Cree Nation. His name denotes his special craft at leading buffalo into buf ...

and a memorial to the boulder itself in

Elbow The elbow is the region between the upper arm and the forearm that surrounds the elbow joint. The elbow includes prominent landmarks such as the olecranon, the cubital fossa (also called the chelidon, or the elbow pit), and the lateral and t ...

. Large fragments were located under the waters of the lake in 2014. Mistusinne incorporated as a resort village on August 1, 1980.

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

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 ...

, Mistusinne 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. In the 2016 Census of Population conducted by

, the Resort Village of Mistusinne recorded a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change from its 2011 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2016.

Attractions

Douglas Provincial Park extends from the community to the

Qu'Appelle River Dam The Qu'appelle River Dam is the smaller of two embankment dams along the South Saskatchewan River that created Lake Diefenbaker in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. The bigger of the two dams is Gardiner Dam, which is the largest embankme ...

. It is about south of the village of Elbow on Highway 19. The community serves as a summer retreat that contains many cabins and a

golf course A golf course is the grounds on which the sport of golf is played. It consists of a series of holes, each consisting of a teeing ground, tee box, a #Fairway and rough, fairway, the #Fairway and rough, rough and other hazard (golf), hazards, and ...

, with a view of Lake Diefenbaker. Part of the golf course along the shore had to be rebuilt when Lake Diefenbaker's water rose in 1998 and collapsed the shoreline.

Government

The resort village of Mistusinne is governed by an elected municipal council and an appointed clerk that meets on the third Saturday of every month. The

mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...

is Lloyd Montgomery and its clerk is .

References

External links