Coleman, Alberta
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Coleman is a scenic town of about 2500 people located in the Crowsnest Pass in the Rocky Mountains of southern Alberta near the border with British Columbia, in Canada. It is served by the Crowsnest Highway and the Canadian Pacific Railway. It is part of the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass (population: about 6500).
[edit] History
In 1903 a new townsite was laid out a few kilometres west of Blairmore, Alberta, to service a new coal mine operated by the International Coal and Coke Company. Initial names of Paulson’s Camp or McGillivray Hill were rejected by the post office, settling on Coleman (after Coleman Flumerfelt, the daughter of the mine owner A. C. Flumerfelt). A feature of the town was the mine’s 100 (later 216) coke ovens located at the edge of town, which operated from 1906 to 1952. The town grew rapidly, surpassing its neighbor Blairmore as the largest in the region. Coleman boasted a successful opera house from 1908 until it burned down in 1948.
Coleman persevered through strikes (1911 and 1932), floods (1923 and 1942) and fires (1948). As the coal mines in the region gradually closed, Coleman's commercial importance waned in favor of Blairmore. Coleman joined four other local towns in amalgamation into the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass in 1979.
Coleman's coal mining heritage is evident in its several historic buildings, a regional museum, the ruins of its coal plant and coke ovens, several nearby abandoned mines and the "biggest piggy bank in the world" made from a 36-inch gauge air driven thermos bottle mine locomotive.
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