Exploring the rich history of Whyte Ridge

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 23/01/2017 (3359 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

As we celebrate Canada’s 150th birthday this year, I thought it might be interesting to see how the Whyte Ridge area has evolved since that event.  

In the first two or three decades of the 1800s, activities in the Whyte Ridge area were mainly along trails several kilometres to the east and north, connecting fur trading posts, forts and settlements along the rivers.

However, in the mid-1800s stories about the fertile Red and Assiniboine river valleys began to attract interest from European settlers in eastern Canada, where prime agricultural land was becoming less available.

Two years after Confederation, Prime Minister Sir John A. MacDonald sent surveyors west to identify lands to be annexed by the Dominion of Canada. It was in the vicinity of Whyte Ridge that Louis Riel stopped the surveyors in 1869, before seizing Fort Garry and establishing a new provisional government in Manitoba, events which ultimately led to Manitoba entering Confederation the following year.

In the late 1870s the first steam locomotive arrived in Winnipeg and shipments of wheat began to leave Winnipeg for overseas markets.  It’s therefore likely that portions of Whyte Ridge area were under cultivation by this time.  A United Grain Growers elevator was located just north of the present day community centre until 2000, when it burned down.

With the development of rail through the 1870s and 1880s, came several conflicts regarding ownership and monopolies, including a famous incident just north of Whyte Ridge, where, in 1888, William Whyte, superintendent of the Canadian Pacific Railway’s western division, tried to stop construction of the Manitoba-sponsored Northern Pacific and Manitoba Railway across a CP track. Whyte used a rail car to block the track and assembled 200 men to guard “Fort Whyte” to stop the Manitoba-sponsored workers from continuing. After a lengthy standoff the Supreme Court of Canada ruled against CP but the name Fort Whyte remained.

The first substantial development in the Whyte Ridge area occurred in 1911 (coincidentally, the year William Whyte retired), when the newly-formed Canada Cement Company built a manufacturing plant immediately to the north. The facility employed up to 100 people, which resulted in the development of housing, stores and a school immediately north of what is now the Whyte Ridge Community Centre, known as Fort Whyte. The school closed in 1972 and was demolished in 2005.

The cement plant remained in operation until the late 1980s but the site is still used as a transportation distribution centre and some of the houses remain today. Much of the manufacturing site was transformed into FortWhyte Alive in 1983, with interpretive trails and educational features promoting wildlife conservation.

Next month I’ll discuss the conditions that caused the development of the Whyte Ridge subdivision, and the growth of the surrounding areas.

Nick Barnes is a community correspondent for Whyte Ridge.