Drumheller

Drumheller /drʌmˈhɛlər/ is a town (formerly a city) within the Red Deer River valley in the badlands of east-central Alberta, Canada. It is located 110 kilometres (68 mi) northeast of Calgary. The Drumheller portion of the Red Deer River valley, often referred to as Dinosaur Valley, has an approximate width of 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) and an approximate length of 28 kilometres (17 mi).

History

The town is named for Colonel Samuel Drumheller, who bought land in 1910 and started coal mining operations there in 1911. Drumheller became a railway station in 1912. It then incorporated as a village on May 15, 1913, a town on March 2, 1916 and a city on April 3, 1930. Over a 15-year period, Drumheller's population increased 7002857000000000000♠857% from 312 in 1916 to 2,987 in 1931 shortly after becoming a city.

The City of Drumheller amalgamated with the Municipal District (MD) of Badlands No. 7 on January 1, 1998 to form the current Town of Drumheller. Some of the reasons the two municipalities amalgamated included the MD of Badlands No. 7 having more in common with Drumheller than other surrounding rural municipalities and both were experiencing similar planning and development issues due to their locations within the Red Deer River valley. The amalgamated municipality opted for town status rather than city status so that highways within would remain the responsibility of the Province of Alberta. As a result of the amalgamation, Drumheller became Alberta’s largest town in terms of land area at 107.93 square kilometres (41.67 sq mi).

Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology

The Royal Tyrrell Museum is a Canadian tourist attraction and a centre of palaeontological research noted for its collection of more than 130,000 fossils.

Located 6 kilometres (4 mi) northwest from Drumheller, Alberta and 135 kilometres (84 mi) northeast from Calgary, the museum is situated in the middle of the fossil-bearing strata of the Late Cretaceous Horseshoe Canyon Formation and holds numerous specimens from the Alberta badlands, Dinosaur Provincial Park and the Devil's Coulee Dinosaur Egg Site.

The Royal Tyrrell Museum is operated by Alberta's Ministry of Culture.

History

The Museum is named in honour of Joseph Burr Tyrrell, a geologist who accidentally discovered the first reported dinosaur fossil in the Red Deer River valley in 1884 while searching for coal seams. The carnivorous dinosaur was later named Albertosaurus sarcophagus. The museum opened September 25, 1985 and was given "Royal" status in 1990.

Collections and exhibits

Atlas Coal Mine

The Atlas Coal Mine National Historic Site is a former coal mine in Alberta, Canada. Located in East Coulee, it is considered to be Canada's most complete historic coal mine and is home to the country's last standing wooden coal tipple. It was designated an Alberta Provincial Historic Resource in 1989 and a National Historic Site of Canada in 2002.

History

The sub-bituminous coal from the Drumheller mining district was mainly used for home heating, cooking and electrical generation. It was also be used to power the steam locomotives of the Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railways on the prairies. The flat-lying seams were easier to mine than those found in more mountainous areas, with lower levels of methane gas. The coal-mining era lasted from 1911 to 1984, when the Atlas No. 3 and 4 mines closed. The Atlas No. 3 Mine structures are preserved and form the basis of the National Historic Site, administered by the Atlas Mine Historical Society.

The mine features the last wooden coal tipple in Canada. Built in 1937, the tipple is a coal loading and sorting machine. At over 7 storeys tall the tipple now serves as a reminder of the rich mining history of the Drumheller Valley. Old mining equipment, including a working pre-1936 battery powered locomotive and several buildings including the wash house, supply house, lamp house, and mine office still stand at the site. The site preserves the stories and artifacts of the men who once mined the black. The Atlas is the last of 139 mines that once ruled the valley.