How old is medicine hat alberta

In the midst of all this, the Blackfoot came upon the Cree unaware and ambushed them. The Cree were forced to cross the river. That night, the Cree decided to get back at the Blackfoot. Using rocks and earth, they built seven humanlike figures and stuck feathers in their heads. Then they made a campfire in the midst of them.

When they had finished their handiwork, they retired to the cover of the trees and waited. After some time, the Blackfoot wandered by to inspect the scene. The Cree sprang from concealment and attacked. Many Blackfoot warriors were killed in the initial assault. The survivors fled across the river and scattered.

In the hopes of winning a contest organized by the Medicine Hat Chamber of Commerce, Fuller submitted his story, along with a watercolor of an Indian headdress. Many winters ago, before the coming of the white man, a band of Peigan Blackfoot were camped on the South Saskatchewan River near present day Medicine Hat. In those days, the Indians of the plains were without horses, and so they could not carry enough food with them to survive the winter.

Instead, they depended almost entirely on fresh game during the cold winter months. The buffalo, afraid to cross the ice, often accumulated in the river bend where the east-running South Saskatchewan River turns north Medicine Hat. There, Indian hunters could make short work of the buffalo and survive the winter.

This particular winter, however, was especially severe. The winter had taken its toll on the buffalo population, and so the Peigan were forced to turn to alternative sources of sustenance like deer, rabbits and prairie chickens. Although prairie Indians would typically avoid eating fish, as they regarded underground and underwater creatures with fear, these Peigan realized that even a fish would fill a hungry belly.

After several hunters unsuccessfully tried to spear fish through openings in the ice, an old man, who had travelled many trails, spoke of how the tribes to the south caught fish. These tribes, he said, would wait until nightfall before lighting torches, which they would hold above the water on the side of their canoes. The fish would swim up towards the light, where they could be caught more easily.

Many of the superstitious Peigan felt that venturing out onto the ice at night was bad medicine, and so few volunteered for the job. One young woman, however, along with her grandmother, agreed to go out onto the ice.

Several days earlier, the chiefs announced that they would hold a sacred dance intended to bring luck to the hunters, and so the girl secretly made a red-dyed porcupine quill headdress for her lover to wear at the dance. She kept this headdress tucked into her bosom for fear that her father might find it.

The night before the dance, the girl and her grandmother ventured out onto the ice, one with a torch and the other with the spear. The rest of the tribe watched fearfully from the shore in superstitious anticipation. As soon as the women leaned over a hole in the ice with their torch, the ice underneath them cracked.

There was a shriek, a loud noise and then a huge burst of fire that lit up the entire width of the river. In an instant, the flame died out and the two women were nowhere to be seen. In , when the Saamis Teepee that had once stood in Calgary Olympic Park was re-erected above the Saamis archeological site in Medicine Hat, another story explaining the origin of the name Medicine Hat emerged.

Together, they came to what is present day Medicine Hat. The woman showed Eagle Birth the headdress, but upon closer inspection they discovered that it was only a huge piece of sagebrush. That night, Eagle Birth dreamed that a merman spoke to him, offering to make him a better hunter in exchange for a human to eat.

The merman, apparently, was displeased with the substitute. The next day, after being visited again by the disappointed merman in his dreams, Eagle Birth set out to find a solution. As he was contemplating, he happened upon a starving stranger wearing a lynx hat. After conversing with the stranger via sign language, Eagle Birth discovered that he was a member of the Snake tribe, and therefore a bitter enemy of the Blackfoot. Eagle Birth, desperate to appease the merman, invited the Snake to eat with him in his teepee.

Along the way, the Snake stopped for a drink by the river, and as he did so Eagle Birth grabbed a large stone and clubbed the Indian to death. Eagle Birth dove into the river with the body and discovered a large teepee beneath the water. Inside the teepee, he saw the merman from his dreams. True to his word, the merman bestowed Eagle birth with special hunting powers.

Before he could leave the underwater teepee, however, Eagle Birth was approached by an otter. After a brief conversation with the otter and the merman, Eagle Birth discovered that this otter was regularly drowning his fellow Blackfoot upriver near present day Lethbridge.

Eagle Birth took the lynx hat off the dead Snake and presented it to the otter as a gift. The otter was so pleased that he gave Eagle Birth permission to draw the waves of the river on his teepee. With his new powers, Eagle Birth killed many animals and eagles. His lover tanned the hides and then selected the finest eagle tail feathers, working them into a headdress that resembled the sagebrush headdress they had seen on the cliff.

Eagle Birth instructed his wife to present the feathers and hides to her husband as a gift. The husband accepted the gifts and made peace with Eagle Birth, who then built a teepee and painted it with the waves of the river. Some people suggest that Medicine Hat was named after a cliff or hill in the area that bears the resemblance of a Medicine Hat. The most common of these claims are described below. One of the earliest claims that Medicine Hat was named after a landmark comes from a marking on a map that was completed in , the year that Medicine Hat was founded.

According to this supposed account, Johnson was searching for a place to build a homestead after his discharge from the service in One day, while he was riding across the prairies near the South Saskatchewan River, he was joined by a lone Blackfoot warrior.

Although certainly not a traditional explanation for the naming of Medicine Hat, the existence of the Badlands Guardian is an interesting coincidence.

Discovered in on Google Earth, the Badlands Guardian is a valley less than 50 km east of Medicine Hat closer to Walsh, Alberta that, when viewed from above, bears a strong resemblance to the head of an Indian medicine man wearing a plumed headdress. With its gaze towards Medicine Hat, the Badlands guardian almost suggests a mystical connection between the land itself and the Indian legends that surround it.

According to a journalist named Bob Edwards, an Indian camping by the South Saskatchewan River on a night many years ago noticed that the moon cast a strange-looking shadow on the ground. I know little of my history and found this website very interesting. Just discovered your site and name origins for Medicine Hat.

Good job! There is another legend researched and carved in brick by local artist Jim Marshall mural is in City Hall. It involves a Blackfoot who sacrificed his wife to the river god in order to learn how to find food for his band in a cold winter.

He was directed to make a feathered bonnet from eagle feathers to be found in the cliffs above the river. Little Corn was a close associate of my great-grandfather James Hargrave. About Medicine Hat Menu. History of Medicine Hat. Statement of Acknowledgement, Recognition and Respect. View full menu Toggle Section. Toggle Section Budgets and Finance Menu. Contact Us. This summer, the team persuaded Willie Desjardins to return and coach the team.

Desjardins coached the Tigers to two league championships when he headed the team from to If Rudyard Kipling, the British poet and travel writer, owned the hockey team, he likely would have called them the Flames, or the Devils or maybe even the Trap Doors.

Kipling was mesmerized by The Hat and its gas wells. He visited three times. More than 6, of the 40, German PoWs asked to stay in Canada at the end of the war. They were all sent home, but many later immigrated back to Canada. German, British and Canadian tanks train together on the huge base of open prairie.

Correction - July 26, This article was edited from a previous version that misstated the league that the Medicine Hat Tigers belong to. The team is part of the Western Hockey League. Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited.

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