Bellevue, Alberta

History

Bellevue was founded in 1905 on the flat land above the Bellevue Mine operated by the French-based West Canadian Collieries (WCC). Its post office opened in 1907. The naming of the town is credited to Elsie Fleutot, the young daughter of one of WCC's French Canadian principals, Jules J. Fleutot, after she exclaimed "Quelle belle vue!" (What a beautiful view!). In 1909, the Maple Leaf Coal Company commenced operations at the Mohawk Bituminous Mine and constructed the settlement of Maple Leaf adjacent to Bellevue. In 1913, WCC transferred many workers to Bellevue from its closed Lille operations. WCC displayed a five-ton coal boulder at the 1910 Dominion Exhibition in Calgary.

This period of growth was not without setbacks. An explosion in the Bellevue Mine during a partial afternoon shift on December 9, 1910, killed 30 miners. In 1917, a fire destroyed most of Bellevue's business section, followed by smaller fires in 1921 and 1922. A shanty-town called Bush Town, or Il Bosc, below Bellevue was flooded in 1923 but persisted for several years.

West Canadian Collieries opened the Adanac Mine at Byron Creek in 1945, but by 1957 all of the Bellevue area mines were closed. The tipple at Bellevue continued to process coal from WCC's Grassy Mountain open-pit, but was removed in 1962 after that operation closed. These closures caused a critical reduction in Bellevue's tax base.

Bellevue finally incorporated as a village on January 1, 1957. The realignment of Highway 3 in the 1970s led to a decline of Bellevue's business section. On November 3, 1978, the Government of Alberta passed the Crowsnest Pass Municipal Unification Act, which led to the formal amalgamation of the Village of Bellevue with the Town of Blairmore, the Town of Coleman, the Village of Frank, and Improvement District (ID) No. 5 on January 1, 1979.

Bellevue Café shootout

On August 2, 1920, local miners George Arkoff, Ausby Auloff and Tom Bassoff robbed the Canadian Pacific Railway's train at gunpoint, hoping to find wealthy rum-runner Emilio "Emperor Pic" Picariello aboard. Eluding the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Alberta Provincial Police and the CPR Police, Auloff escaped into the United States while Bassoff and Arkoff remained in the area. On August 7, the two were spotted in the Bellevue Café. Three constables entered the café through the front and back doors, and in the ensuing shootout Arkoff, RCMP Corporal Ernest Usher and APP Constable F.W.E. Bailey were killed, while Bassoff, though wounded, escaped into the rubble of the Frank Slide. During the pursuit, Special Constable Nicolas Kyslik was accidentally shot and killed by another officer. Bassoff was eventually apprehended without incident on August 11 at Pincher Station, 35 kilometres to the east.

Although testimony suggests that the police officers had failed to identify themselves and had probably fired first, Bassoff was found guilty of murder and hanged in Lethbridge on December 22, 1920.

Ausby Auloff was captured in 1924 near Butte, Montana, after trying to sell a distinctive railway watch. Auloff, who had not been involved in the shootout, was returned to Alberta where he was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment, and died in 1926.

Demographics

|1901|3 |1911|463 |1941|1182 |1951|1884 |1956|1419 |1961|1323 |1966|1174 |1971|1242 |1976|1186 |1981|1230 |1986|1048 |1991|1086 |1996|1046 |2001|-- |2006|803 |2011|-- |2016|866 |2021|911

In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Bellevue had a population of 911 living in 445 of its 555 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 866. With a land area of 3.01 km2, it had a population density of in 2021.

References

:* Crowsnest and its People, Crowsnest Pass Historical Society, 1979.

References

2. Crowsnest Pass Historical Society. (1979). "Crowsnest and its people". Crowsnest Pass Historical Society.
3. (1957). "Alberta Gazette". Government of Alberta.
4. (October 15, 2021). "Location and History Profile – Municipality of Crowsnest Pass". [[Alberta Municipal Affairs]].
5. "Fifth Census of Canada, 1911". [[Statistics Canada.
6. (March 31, 1954). "Ninth Census of Canada, 1951". [[Statistics Canada.
7. (October 25, 1957). "Census of Canada, 1956". [[Statistics Canada.
8. (March 8, 1963). "1961 Census of Canada". [[Statistics Canada.
9. (October 1967). "1961 Census of Canada". [[Statistics Canada.
10. (October 2023). "1971 Census of Canada". [[Statistics Canada]].
11. (June 1977). "Population: Geographic Distributions – Census Divisions and Subdivisions, Western Provinces and the Territories". [[Statistics Canada]].
12. (June 1977). "Census Canada 1986: Population". [[Statistics Canada]].
13. (April 1997). "96 Canada". [[Statistics Canada]].
14. Alberta Municipal Affairs. (2009-09-15). "Alberta 2009 Official Population List".
15. (February 9, 2022). "Population and dwelling counts: Canada and designated places". [[Statistics Canada]].