Archaeologists unearth clues about life in an Alberta boom town from the early 1900s

From pottery to stone tools, a team of archaeologists and enthusiastic volunteers are digging up history at the site of a northern Alberta boom town that went bust. 

The Old Bezanson townsite, located on a high terrace  above the Smoky River about 40 kilometres east of Grande Prairie, was settled in the early 1900s by A.M. Bezanson. Historical records say he chose the townsite based on planned railroad routes that never materialized.

By 1923, the townsite was empty, leaving behind 14 buildings that included residences, a sawmill and town livery stables. Three years later, the hamlet of Bezanson was settled farther north along what is now Highway 43. 

For the last year, an archaeology project led by Shawn Morton and Meaghan Peuramaki-Brown has been exploring what's left of the townsite in search of clues as to how its residents lived.

'Their history'

Peuramaki-Brown, an associate professor of archaeology at Athabasca University, said a key feature of the project has been to welcome local residents as volunteers.

"It's their history," Peuramaki-Brown said. "It's not Indiana Jones, maybe it used to be at one point in the history of our discipline, but it's not that anymore." 

Old Bezanson will be open on Heritage Day, with opportunities for the public to try their hand at archaeology. 

For the most part, the dig has turned up a lot of broken glass and nails so far, said Morton, an anthropology instructor at Northwestern Polytechnic in Grande Prairie.

A significant find was a toy fire truck made of cast iron, he said.

Small bits of pottery have also been found but larger pieces are needed to learn about the culture and economics of Old Bezanson, he said. 

"If we have the right pieces, and we have enough of it, we can look up where a dish was manufactured," Morton said. 

"But you can also get things like prices, right?" 

Shelena Stevens became aware of the project through one of Morton's classes at Northwestern Polytechnic.

It ignited a new passion. After finishing work on the project this summer, Stevens will be entering the anthropology program at University of Alberta in September. 

"I feel like I can kind of just reach through the past and touch it," Stevens said. 

Riley Steidel, a second-year anthropology student at University of Alberta, said working on the project for two years has been an adventure through time. 

"It's that excitement of connecting with other people," Steidel said. 

"Even though it's only 100 years, it seems impossibly far away for us," he said. 

Peuramaki-Brown and Morton have been studying shorter-lived communities, like Old Bezanson, for over 20 years in Belize. 

"Why do people settle on landscape? How do they make it or not make it? And then why do they choose to ultimately leave?" Peuramaki-Brown said. 

Indigenous presence 

While Old Bezanson went from boom to bust in less than 20 years, Peuramaki-Brown said there is evidence that it was an important location even before the settlers arrived. 

"We weren't that surprised when we started finding stone tools below the settler occupation,"  Peuramaki-Brown said. 

"And now we actually have evidence beyond oral traditions of their presence at the townsite," she said. 

Morton said the location where the Smoky and Simonette rivers meet was a traditional crossing point for Indigenous people.

"It would have been an attractive place for a very long time," Morton said. 

"There was a deep, long history of Indigenous presence here. And we're starting to document that."