How Strathcona County Got Its Name

How Strathcona County Got its Name

By Tom Monto

As Strathcona County celebrates its 120^th anniversary, it may be interesting for readers to learn about the origin of its name and its history. In the late 1800s, what is now Strathcona County filled with farmers, immigrants from eastern Canada, Britain and Continental Europe, the U.S. and other parts of the world. The new arrivals were serviced by the nearby railway town of South Edmonton, later Strathcona. This centre gave its name to the various forms of rural government that oversaw development in the surrounding countryside, just as, for example, Lamont was the commercial hub and namesake of the County of Lamont. The larger centre of Edmonton on the northside was less convenient than southside Strathcona to residents of what would be the Strathcona County.

The earliest community in what would be Strathcona County was the settlement of Clover Bar that grew up in the 1870s on the west edge of the present county, centred on the pioneer home of gold-panner Thomas Clover. He also was the source of the name of the Edmonton riverflats community of Cloverdale, through which people travelled to get to Clover Bar from the “Twin Cities” of Edmonton and Strathcona. Clover Bar was officially recognized 120 years ago, in 1893, by the Territorial Legislature (it was then part of the North West Territories) as Statute Labour District #2. In a Statute Labour District, work on local roads was paid for by land taxes or as was usually the case, local farmers worked to pay off the land taxes they would otherwise have to pay. In 1913 this Statute Labour District was renamed Local Improvement District #517 (Clover Bar) and later re-organized again as a municipal district.

Meanwhile, a farming area east and south of the old city Strathcona and outside the legal boundaries of the City of Edmonton was organized as Local Improvement District in 1917. It was re-organized the following year as the Municipal District of Strathcona (#518). The Municipal District had offices in the Sheppard Block. This building, at 10318 Whyte Avenue, is still standing today (although basically re-built after a fire in 1990).

Areas as close in to Edmonton as the site of present-day Southgate Mall were outside the city and in this new municipal district. The book The Schools of Strathcona County, A Success Story lists numerous small school districts that oversaw schooling in those early days in areas that of course now are well and truly within the City's boundaries but at the time were in the Municipal District of Strathcona.

The earliest was East Edmonton School District (#98), formed in 1887 with its western boundary at Mill Creek and its southern boundary around 58 Avenue. The local multitudinous Inkster, Fulton and Rice Sheppard family filled its schools.

The Whitemud Shool SD (#293), formed in 1893, served pupils living southwest of present-day Fort Edmonton Park. It closed up after a new Ellerslie School was built in 1955.

The Oliver SD (#622), formed in 1901, drew children from families living in an area spanning Calgary Trail from 51 Avenue to 23 Avenue. Despite the large area covered, it had low enrollment and was given “rights” to pupils living on the southern edge of the Edmonton School District. The District's one school closed its doors in 1957, and its area would now be located within the city of Edmonton.

One of the last schools built for the East Edmonton SD, described above, was King George Park, which opened in 1951 at 85 Avenue and 73 Street, a location almost unbelievably close-in to be legally outside Edmonton as late as the 1950s. This school was rolled into the Edmonton Public School system in 1961.

Prior to the date of the establishment of the King George Park School, the municipal districts of Clover Bar and Strathcona had merged, in 1943, and taken the name Municipal District #83 (Strathcona). Twenty years later, Municipal District #83 joined with the local school divisions that had succeeded the school districts and officially became a county, the County of Strathcona (#20). This form of rural organization, relatively new to Alberta, oversaw all the facets of rural government services, including schooling, under one roof and within unified boundaries.

The county offices were, like the municipal districts before them, located in Old Strathcona, in a new custom-built building at 10426 - 81 Avenue. The “Rural Administration Building” also held the Leduc-Strathcona Health Unit and the Alberta Association of Municipal Districts. The county offices stayed there until new ones were built in 1976 in the hamlet of Sherwood Park, which had been created in the 1950s and 1960s. The County of Strathcona officially changed its name in 1996 to Strathcona County and received Specialized Municipality status.

Through the years, there was great overlap between the farmers of what was then the predecessors to Strathcona County and the city of Strathcona. Thomas Daly resigned his place on the Strathcona city council to return to farming on his Clover Bar farm. His life unfortunately ended tragically a short time later. Orlando Bush who also served on the Strathcona City council balanced his city involvement with his activities on his farm at Clover Bar.

Rice Sheppard, who would be one of the longest-serving aldermen in Edmonton's history, also had a farm just outside Strathcona in what is now Avonmore but at the time 1897 to 1910s in the rural area that would be covered in the East Edmonton School District, described above as one of the early schools of Strathcona County. William Ball, his friend and fellow political campaigner – they were both fundamental to the early development of the United Farmers movement – was a prominent farmer just east of present-day Sherwood Park. That is, he was a farmer there until he over-stretched his finances during the heyday of WWI and was caught short in the post-war recession.

And even after the creation of Sherwood Park, businesses and cultural sports facilities in what had been the downtown of the old city of Strathcona and areas surrounding it were depended on by Sherwood Park residents. For example, the swimming pools at Bonnie Doon and Strathcona High Schools, and the University Hospital, were well used by County residents, as the County, in an effort to keep taxes low for residents, did not build its own pool or hospital for many years.

The long-standing interconnection between the County of Strathcona and the one-time City of Strathcona is still shown by the name the county carries to this day.

(Further information on the people mentioned here is available in my books Old Strathcona Edmonton's Southside Roots and Protest and Progress, Three Labour Radicals in Early Edmonton, both available at Alhambra Books, 10115 – 81 Avenue.)