Alberta

Locator map for the Canadian province of Alberta.

The Saddledome, Stampede Park, Calgary, Alberta, western Canada. The Saddledome, which is equipped for ice hockey and figure-skating, was built for the 1988 Winter Olympics.

Dinosaur excavation in the badlands of Alberta, Canada. In this part of the country more than 300 dinosaur skeletons have been found. The Dinosaur Provincial Park in eastern Alberta is now a World Heritage site.

Farm and oilseed rape field, Alberta, Canada. The most westerly of the prairie provinces, Alberta's agricultural industry is a mainstay of its economy.

Reflections in Lake Louise in the province of Alberta, in the Canadian Rockies. Situated at 1750 m/5,741 ft above sea level, the lake has a depth of 85 m/279 ft. It was named after a daughter of Queen Victoria.

The Saskatchewan Glacier in the Columbia Icefield, Alberta, Canada. The Columbia Icefield contains about thirty glaciers, and covers an area of 325 sq km/125 sq mi.

A glacier in the Columbia Icefield, viewed from the Icefields Parkway, Alberta, Canada. The Parkway is a 230 km/143 mi stretch of highway in the Canadian Rockies, between Jasper and Banff.

Hoodoos, east of Drumheller in Alberta Province, Canada. Sandstone rock has eroded into curious columns in the badlands of southern Alberta.

The shield depicts the wheat fields which dominate the province, while the cross of St George recalls Alberta's historical links with England.

The great peaks of the Canadian Rockies, which rise along Alberta's southwestern boundary, are cut by the Canadian Pacific Railway. Completed in 1885, it is one of the most impressive engineering feats in the world.

Province of western Canada; area 661,200 sq km/255,223 sq mi; population (2001 est) 2,974,800. Its capital is Edmonton, and the main towns and cities include Calgary, Lethbridge, Medicine Hat, and Red Deer. Oil extraction is the most important economic activity in Alberta, with the province accounting for most of the country's oil production. It became a province in 1905.

The region now occupied by Alberta lay largely within Rupert's Land, the area granted in 1670 to the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) to pursue their commerce in furs. In the 18th century, French traders from Montréal also began to operate here; organized by the North West Company from the 1780s, they regularly clashed with HBC traders until the two companies merged in 1821. Rocky Mountain House, Edmonton, and Fort Chipewyan were among the centres of the fur trade.

In 1870, the HBC sold its claims to the newly created Dominion of Canada, and the region became part of the Northwest Territories. The construction of the transcontinental Canadian Pacific Railway (1881-85) through Medicine Hat, Calgary, and the Kicking Horse Pass brought rapid settlement to the south. A further influx of immigrants arrived in the 1890s, when the Canadian Pacific Railway company built a second line through Lethbridge and the Crowsnest Pass. Activity throughout the region was stimulated by the Klondike gold rush of 1896, and in 1905 Alberta became a province. Created out of a southwestern area of Northwest Territories, it was named after one of Queen Victoria's daughters. At first, Alberta was primarily an agricultural province, with cattle and lumber as its main products. Its people suffered great hardship during the 1930s as a result of the Great Depression and periods of severe drought. However, the building of Canadian National Railway lines through Edmonton and the Yellowhead Pass in the 1910s, and the province's contribution to the Allied war effort during World War II (notably, military aviation and related activities) helped alleviate periods of economic depression.

After World War II, the discovery of huge mineral deposits, such as the major oil strike at Leduc and the exploitation of vast tar sands along the Athabasca River near Fort McMurray, brought new prosperity to the province. Edmonton and Calgary developed into financial, commercial, and cultural centres that numbered among Canada's most populous and affluent cities.

Geography The most westerly of the Prairie Provinces, Alberta is bordered by Saskatchewan on the east and British Columbia on the west (with the Continental Divide in the Canadian Rocky Mountains forming much of the boundary). To the south of Alberta, below the 49th parallel, lies the US state of Montana, while to its north, above the 60th parallel, are the Northwest Territories.

Most of Alberta lies in the northern Great Plains, with High Plains areas along the edge of the Rocky Mountains to the southwest. The Rockies here rise to 3,747 m/12,294 ft at Mount Columbia, the highest point in the province, and contain many other high peaks, icefields, and glaciers. The Crowsnest, Kicking Horse, and Yellowhead mountain passes, which were critical to the opening up of the Canadian west to settlement, are located here. Alberta's rivers flow from the Rockies: In the north, the Hay, Peace, and Athabasca rivers flow northeast, toward the Mackenzie River system and the Arctic Ocean. To the south, the North Saskatchewan, Red Deer, Bow, and South Saskatchewan rivers are all part of the Saskatchewan River-Lake Winnipeg-Nelson River system, draining east to Hudson Bay. In the far south, the Milk River is the most northwesterly headwater of the Missouri-Mississippi River system, which eventually drains southeast and south to the Gulf of Mexico. The extreme northeastern corner of the province, around Lake Athabasca, is situated on part of the Canadian Shield, while across the centre of the province, between Edmonton and Calgary, lie the Parklands, a mixed region of grassland and groves of trees (principally aspen).

Economy Oil extraction is the most important economic activity in Alberta. Almost all of Canada's domestic reserves are located here. The major Leduc oilfield south of Edmonton was discovered in 1947. From here, oil is piped directly to Lake Superior for shipment across the Great Lakes. In addition, to the southwest of Lake Athabasca, the McMurray district has huge deposits of bituminous sands that become economic to work for oil at times of high world fuel prices. Alberta's other great energy resource is coal; it has the largest reserves in the country. There are eight surface mines, and Alberta is the largest producer of any province. Mines are located near Edmonton and at Mountain Park, Lethbridge, and Canmore. Mining at Anthracite has since closed, and mining in Banff National Park was banned in the 1930s.

In the northwest of the province, the valley of the Peace River is the most northerly grain-producing region and grazing land in North America (except for some isolated Inuit pastures). Lumbering is also an important industry in the forested north of the province, and commercial fishing is undertaken on Lesser Slave Lake. There are good grazing lands for livestock in the foothills of the Rockies. In the southeast, irrigation of formerly arid prairie land (‘Palliser's Triangle’, also extending into Saskatchewan) has led to widespread livestock-rearing and cultivation of sugar-beet and other ground crops. Palliser's Triangle often accounts for over half of Canada's annual agricultural production.

Climate In the south of the province, the rain shadow of the Rockies leaves the area around Lethbridge and Medicine Hat and the Red Deer River valley extremely dry. Close to the Rockies is a belt of land affected by chinooks. These warm, dry Pacific winds that spill over the mountains can suddenly raise winter temperatures tens of degrees, melting snow and leaving the ground bare.

Transport and tourism Resorts in the Rocky Mountains, such as Banff and Lake Louise, attract many visitors to Alberta. There are many areas of outstanding natural beauty, and recreational facilities include the national parks at Banff, Elk Island, Jasper, and Wood Buffalo (the last of these is a huge nature reserve on the border with Northwest Territories). Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park, which straddles the frontier between Alberta and Montana, USA, is a World Heritage Site. Other tourist attractions include the annual ‘Calgary stampede’ (a major rodeo event held every year since 1923), and the extensive fossilized remains of dinosaurs found near Drumheller.

People and culture Alberta's people are primarily of English and northern European descent. There are numerous distinct religious and ethnic groups, including Mormons (at Cardston) and Métis.