Edmonton

Edmonton ⁱ/ˈɛdməntən/ is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Capital Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region.

The city had a population of 877,926 in the 2014 census, making it Alberta's second-largest city and Canada's fifth-largest municipality. This population represents 66 percent of the total 2014 population of 1,328,300 within the Edmonton census metropolitan area (CMA), Canada's fifth-largest CMA by population. Edmonton is the northernmost North American city with a metropolitan population over one million. A resident of Edmonton is known as an Edmontonian.

Edmonton's historic growth has been facilitated through the absorption of five adjacent urban municipalities (Strathcona, North Edmonton, West Edmonton, Beverly and Jasper Place) and a series of annexations ending in 1982. Edmonton serves as the northern anchor of the Calgary–Edmonton Corridor. Known as the "Gateway to the North", the city is a staging point for large-scale oil sands projects occurring in northern Alberta and large-scale diamond mining operations in the Northwest Territories.

Fort Edmonton

Fort Edmonton (also named Edmonton House) was the name of a series of trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company from 1795 to 1891, all of which were located in central Alberta, Canada. From 1795 to 1821 it was paired with the North West Company's Fort Augustus. It was the end point of the Carlton Trail, the main overland route for Metis freighters between the Red River Colony and the west and an important stop on the York Factory Express route between London, via Hudson Bay, and Fort Vancouver in the Columbia District.

The fifth and final Fort Edmonton was the one that evolved into present-day Edmonton.

Fort Edmonton was also called Fort-des-Prairies, by French-Canadians trappers and coureurs des bois, and Amiskwaskahegan or "Beaver Hills House" by the Cree Indians during the 19th century.

Fort Edmonton, Mark I (1795–1801)

In the late 18th century, the Hudson's Bay Company was in fierce competition with the North West Company for the trade of animal furs in Rupert's Land. As one company established a fur trading post, the other would counter by building another post in close proximity. Expansion down the Saskatchewan River began in the 1790s. In the summer of 1795, the North West Company constructed Fort Augustus where the Sturgeon River (Alberta) meets the North Saskatchewan River near the present-day city of Fort Saskatchewan. In the following autumn, Hudson's Bay constructed Edmonton House nearby, where the Sturgeon River meets the North Saskatchewan River 34 km northeast of modern Edmonton. In a possible revelation of the competitive nature of the companies, Fort Augustus and Edmonton House's distance was described as being a "musket-shot" apart, yet the proximity also offered mutual security to the European traders of both companies in a land where they were all intruders.