I have started a podcast chronicling a long-forgotten comic book character. In Action Comics #42, Nov 1941, DC Comics debuted the adventures of the Vigilante, a “modern day” cowboy from Wyoming, descended from frontiersman and lawman who fights criminals of all stripes, across the US, and the world, with his unique western know-how and weaponry.
An interesting facet of “Vig” was his alter -ego: Greg Sanders, The Prairie Troubador, whose identity as a Cowboy singer in the vein of Gene Autry, took him on the road along with sidekicks Billy Gunn, an aging ex-lawman and Stuff, a Chinese-American orphan who picks up cowboy and fighting skills of his own.
The Vigilante feature ran from 1941 until 1954 in Action Comics, and also appeared in Leading Comics and Western Comics. The character was revived in the early 1970s for several adventurers, and rubbed shoulders in the comic book universe alongside more famous allies, such as Superman and the Justice League, appearing in Adventure Comics and World’s Finest in his own feature and elsewhere in the DC comic universe.
I hope you enjoy the podcast, which creating helps to take the edge off of my more academic writings and occupations. Keep watching this page for more updates, and maybe I’ll even start to update it with other features as well.
150 Years ago, this month, the last grand battle of two great indigenous confederacies occurred where Lethbridge, Alberta stands today. In 2000, while a volunteer for the original Fort Whoop-Up interpretive Society, I wrote this article in preparation for displays that would incorporate this history. I feel that it still stands up.
As published in True West, September 2000
Charles M. Russell’s unfinished commission for Charles Magrath, depicting the 1870 “Last Battle” between the Blackfoot and Cree-Nakoda alliance in the valley of the Belly River, today renamed as the Oldman River in the City of Lethbridge, Alberta.
When plains aboriginal tribes began to acquire horses and firearms in the 1700s, territorial rivalries became a fact of life. Among the bitterest of rivalries was that which existed between the Cree and the Blackfoot. One of the last Inter-Tribal Indian Battles in North America occurred in the valley of the Oldman River, what was then known as the Belly River, in the heart of what is now the small city of Lethbridge, Alberta.
Not a lot of love was ever lost between the nations of the Blackfoot and Cree confederacies. Most elders could always remember a time when warriors of either tribe were taking a vicious swipe at each other. For a few years, though, at the behest of missionaries and through the efforts of Maskipitoon of the Crees, the bloodshed had subsided. By 1870, as their traditional domains began to shrink, the prime times of both Confederacies on the plains were slowly coming to a close. But not before the Cree made a last grab for territory at the expense of their traditional foes.
In October of 1870, scattered bands of Nehiyawak, or Cree; and Nakoda, or Assiniboine; from the areas of the Touchwood Hills and Wood Mountain, gathered at the Vermilion Hills of southern Saskatchewan, the gathered party numbering between 600 and 800. Leaders of the assemblage had correctly received information that the Blood faction of the Blackfoot Confederacy were in a weakened state due to an 1869 smallpox epidemic, and that their camps and horses were vulnerable to attack. The Cree-Assiniboine faction was led by Big Bear, Piapot, Little Mountain and Little Pine. It was decided to launch an expedition into the heart of the Blackfoot territory, to make an attempt to establish Cree dominance.
The Blackfoot confederacy of the age consisted of the Siksika, or northern Blackfoot; two branches of the Piikani, or North Peigan and South Peigan; and Kainaiwa, the Blood. For countless ages, the Blackfoot nations had held sway on the portion of the prairies from the Red Deer River south, far into Montana Territory: Their domination of the buffalo trade, with the Hudson’s Bay Company and with American traders, had for years earned the envy of the Cree and Assiniboine rivals. For decades, Cree and Blackfoot played a chess game of coup-counting, horse stealing and hit-and-run warfare.
By 1870, the Blackfoot were in a favorable trade situation as American free traders, supplied by the merchants of Fort Benton, were operating well into their territory. Many circumstances were changing. The land itself had changed hands from the doinain of the Hudson’s Bay Company to the new nation of Canada. Relentless hunting pressure was beginning to dwindle the herds of buffalo. The US Army had exercised authority on their side of the line, when Major Eugene Baker engineered a massacre of Peigans on the Marias River in the spring. The results of the battle, and the return of the dread smallpox led to a seriously weakened Blackfoot Confederacy.
Into these circumstances an amassed Cree war pany decided to strike. The expedition followed the South Saskatchewan river upstream, eventually reaching the mouth of the Oldman, knowing the tributary would bring them to their quarry.
A couple dozen miles northeast of their eventual target, the war party made camp on the Little Bow river. That night Piapot had a fateful dream. Aboriginal culture takes their dreams very seriously; and base many of their decisions on such phenomenon.
A ten-year-old Cree boy, Iron Horn, told of the War Council he witnessed between Piapot and his soldiers. “My children, I had a dream last night. I saw a buffalo bull with iron horns goring, stamping and killing us. We were unable to destroy it. After long meditation, I have come to the conclusion that we must abandon this venture and return home, otherwise misfortune awaits us.” The Council was stirred by Piapot’s vision. Many heeded the warnings and turned back for home.
But a war chief with an opposing view, sought to rekindle the fires in Cree bellies, and went so far as to ridicule Piapot’s notions: “My children, don’t believe in a dream. Advance and capture the Blackfoot Nation, women and children. The smallpox killed off most of their fighters so we won’t be opposed by any great number.” Those warriors who had come so far, and were now so close to their goal, would not be dissuaded. The Cree raiders had come for a fight, and a fight they would have.
From the Little Bow River, scouting parties were dispatched to assess the military capability of the Blackfoot camps and the numbers of their horses. At 15 Mile Butte, Cree Scouts attacked a Blood family’s camp, killing everyone in it. But a small boy survived the attack and followed the Whoop-Up Trail to the St. Mary’s River to warn the encampment there.
Near the junction of the St. Mary’s and Belly Rivers, the scouts found some small Blood camps and gained their horses. But what these Cree scouts did not realize was that they were in the direct vicinity of the American-owned free trading post of Fort Whoop-Up. The managers of Whoop-Up, Alf Hamilton and John Healy, were on mostly good terms with the Blackfoot. For some reason, the scouts failed to take notice of the over200 Peigan lodges in the direct vicinity of Fort Whoop-Up. In fact the river juncture had been a traditional Blackfoot campsite for untold generations.
To make matters worse, on their way back to the Little Bow camp, the scouts reported on the existence of a few lodges on the west side of the Belly; three miles nonh of Fort Whoop-Up. Their observations supposedly complete, the scouts returned to the Little Bow, confidently reporting 60 Blackfoot lodges, with the core camp being at what the Blackfoot called “sik-oko-toks” or “the black rocks,” where outcroppings of coal would someday give rise to the birth of the Coalbanks mines, and eventually; Lethbridge. What the spies failed to understand was that they had merely located the middle core of what was essentially a much larger encampment stretching twenty miles, from Forts Kipp to Whoop-Up. The Bloods were only a small part of much more than 200 lodges of an amassed Blackfoot Confederacy. The botched reconnaissance would be a fatal error for the Cree-Assiniboine invaders.
Based on the scouts’ faulty interpretations, it was decided that the attack was to be upon the sixty lodges at the Black Rocks. A temporary war camp was set up by the Crees on the Coyote Flats, scant miles from the target. In the dim pre-dawn hours of October 25, the several hundred members of the War Party followed Pyami Coulee, a feeder drain leading to the Belly River Valley, and then south to the scene of their attack.
The Cree-Assiniboine party attacked the Blood camp, located above the coulees along the Belly River, not far in distance from the St. Mary’s River, and unknown to the attackers, a short ride away from the Fort Whoop-Up camp of the Peigan. A brother of Red Crow, destined to become the Blood chief, was killed, as were two or three women. The Blood warriors commanded by Bull Back Fat and Button Chief, immediately counter-attacked, and engaged the enemy on the plains between the oxbow, of the Oldman River. Big Brave, a Peigan warrior said:
“The Crees took their knives and slit the teepees of our village down the sides and then rushed in. When the Crees rushed into the teepees, they took everything they could lay their hands on, killing the women and children, and this made me mad. That was why I fought so hard that day.”
Soon the Blood allies camped nearby were alerted to the dangers faced by their brethren. As the attack started, female messengers scampered off to the south, swimming the Belly River to alert the Piikani of the attack and bring them to the assistance of the Blood. One of the women of the camp picked up a tomahawk and single-handedly killed four Cree attackers. Among the Whoop-Up camp were the Blackfoot Metis, Jerry Potts, later to be a Scout for the Northwest Mounted Police, and brothers Alex and Charles McKay, known respectively as Unborn Calf and The Bear. Jerry Potts, no stranger to gunfights in both the red and white man’s world, did not hesitate to offer his services to the Peigan, and to his aboriginal roots.
A group of Piikani, led by Big Leg, Black Eagle and Heavy Shield were encamped near Fort Whoop-Up as well. The Piikani were still stinging from an attack by the US Army on the Marias River earlier that year. Blackfoot warriors had had enough of invading aggressors, and soon the Crees were to suffer for the humiliations of the Baker massacre. Assistance also came from a small camp of Piikani at nearby Fort Kipp.
In scattered twos and threes, warriors for the defense of the Bloods appeared singing war songs, praying that if they were to die, to die as soldiers. Big Brave carried a shield that had been blessed by his Medicine Man, and sang as he carried the shield: “My body will be lying on the plains. “ When the allies arrived to reinforce the defense, the Cree realized they were now outgunned and outnumbered. Before long the assembled defenders had the Cree backed into the ravines, known locally as “coulees,” where the hunters became the hunted. The fight became most intensive as the Cree used the coulees as breastworks, with which to snipe at the charging Blackfoot. Cree ponies were run into the bottom of the ravines, as their riders established a defensive position.
The Piikani secured a smaller coulee to the south, as the Bloods and Blackfoot attempted to control the high ground above, eventually they too were forced into the coulees. For four hours, the Crees and Piikani battled between their parallel positions, exchanging shots at any visible target. In later years, based on interviews with participants, Mounted Police Surgeon George Kennedy wrote: “A head, a hand, anything was enough to shoot at.” Two Piikani scouts were sent out on horseback, to ascertain numbers, and were quickly put out of commission. Some Peigan were able to get to the narrow tops of the coulees, and dropped heavy rocks onto the heads of their enemy.
Calf Shirt was a seasoned Blood warrior, well-trained in the arts of fighting and of revenge parties. He had just returned from a hunt when his father told him of the battle already in progress. Immediately he switched from hunter to defender, as his father painted him for war. Before departure, however, he promised his father that should he fall to a Cree arrow, he would not remove it. Calf Shirt got on to the battlefield in time to find the Crees trapped in one of the many coulees stretching from the prairie to the river. Among the beset Cree were a tall warrior, and another draped in a calfskin robe. The pair had already killed several Blackfoot, and Calf Shirt was warned away from them.
True to his religious convictions, he grasped a knife that had been among the prized possessions in his Bear Medicine, bundle, an iron weapon, with a rare double edge. With only the knife in his I hand, and shouting a war song, Calf Shirt rushed the Cree stronghold. The tall defender deftly put an arrow into Calf Shirt’s wrist, but the rushing Blood would not relent. Recalling the promise to his father, he ignored the wound, and with his injured hand, grabbed the bow of his enemy and fatally thrust his knife into the archer’s midriff. Before the bowman’s calf-skinned companion could aim his rifle, he too fell before Calf Shirt’s spiritual weapon.
During the cross-coulee exchange, an estimated dozen Blackfoot were killed, with no known numbers available for the Cree. The fight was probably more evenly matched at this juncture than at any time during the entire battle. Soon that would change. Eventually; as Cree cover fire dwindled, the Piikanicharged over the ridge of the coulees and overwhelmed the Cree position, forcing the attackers to retreat in a mass towards the Belly River.
As the Crees fled, Jerry Potts ordered a Piikani charge down the hill. Potts later stated: “You could fire with your eyes shut and be sure to kill a Cree.” Big Brave recalled “I could not hear for the roar of the guns, and could not see for the smoke.” Surgeon Kennedy’s findings confirmed the din heard in the valley “…filled with dust and smoke, the air resounded with the report of rifles and the deafening war cries of the Blackfeet, while thick and fast came the death yells of the Crees.”
As the charge progressed, the Cree warriors reached the river and in attempting to cross were shot down indiscriminately by the Peigan. Blood warrior Prairie Chicken jumped his horse directly off a cutbank into the Belly River to pursue his enemy; as the waters turned red with blood. Among the Cree killed at this point were two blond-tressed mixed-bloods, the Cree-Scot Métis, Yellow Hair and Curly Hair, sons of a Hudson’s Bay trader, Hugh Sutherland. The Sutherland boys had been the most ardent to go on the warpath against the Blackfoot, and many young Cree warriors had been magnetically attracted to the words of these two blue-eyed fair-haired warriors. Before the excursion, Yellow Hair had told James Sanderson, “I have never been taught anything but fighting. “ In the end the Sutherland boys went out swinging, fighting with their knives even after they had been mortally wounded by Peigan bullets.
Big Brave was one of the warriors who would not allow the Cree to retreat. “The Blackfeet made an onrush for the Crees and 1 ran over two of them before they got to the river. As they were crossing the river, 1 jumped off my horse and stabbed one of the Crees between the shoulders. He had a spear and I took that away from him. I jumped off my horse again and just as I returned, there was a Cree who raised his gun to fire at me. I ran over him and he jumped up and grabbed my horse by the bridle. I swung my horse’s head around to protect myself and took the butt of my whip and knocked him down. When I struck him he looked at me and I saw that his nose had been cut off. I heard afterwards that a bear had bitten his nose off. After that I knocked him down and killed him.”
The accounts of the warriors make plain that the fate of the retreating Cree was entirely in the hands of the defenders. No quarter was given, none was taken, and the Peigans and Bloods were able to kill virtually at will. Mike Oka, a Blood youth at the time of battle, said “Many of the enemy never reached the east shore of the Oldman River. They were killed and butchered in the water. I never saw so many scalps in all my life as on the next day in a victory war dance.”
Several Crees made it across the river, still pursued by the Piikani. But on the east side of the river, the Cree were faced with a wide open plain, making it easy for their pursuers to hunt them down. With little chance of regaining lost ground and running for their lives, the would-be attackers were surrounded and fifty Cree were killed at that point on the wide open plain. Some accounts state that in their zeal and confusion, some Blackfoot may have been inadvertently gunned down by their own comrades.
The surviving Cree hurried across the plains into a clump of trees where ten of the group abandoned their horses, deciding to take cover and make a stand. The stance could not hope to be successful, and was effected merely to allow fellow warriors time to escape. The pursuers moved in and the Cree, armed only with a single revolver and wet gunpowder for their muzzleloaders, died like warriors as their horses were gathered. What remained of the Cree-Assiniboine party withdrew downstream into the heavily wooded Belly valley, and escaped.
The defending Blackfoot-Blood-Peigan pany suffered about 40 killed, 50 wounded. Despite his heroics, Calf Shirt repeatedly refused to allow his companions to remove the arrow from his wrist. He finally had to be tied to a travois and be dragged back to camp, where the shaft was cut and the head removed with brass tweezers. Big Brave was one of many soldiers who came home victorious. “When we returned I had taken nine different scalps.” But this was the last time, the Blackfoot Confederacy would be able to attain such glories in battle.
While actual numbers are difficult to ascertain, sources state that 300 of the attacking Cree-Assiniboine party were killed, a high estimate, with the lowest being at 70. The combined casualties of the Bloods and Peigans were about 40 dead, and 50-60 wounded. The result of the battle mirrored the difference between the Cree and Blackfoot Confederacies. The attack was unsuccessful largely due to the poor scouting work done, the unfamiliarity with the surroundings and the fact that the Cree had not yet gained the access to the weaponry available to the Peigans and Bloods. While the Cree with traditional ties to the Hudson’s Bay, came armed with bows, spears and muzzle-loading North West trade guns, and a few revolvers. With ties to American trade, the Blackfoot nations by this time possessed the Henry, Spencer and Winchester repeating rifles. The following year a peace offering was made by the Cree to the Blackfoot, and that year the bands agreed to a treaty, ending forever the centuries-old rivalry.
In I874, the North West Mounted Police established Canadian government sovereignty in Blackfoot lands, and in I877 the once warlike Confederacy was solidified in peace by Treaty Number Seven with the Queen and the Canadian government. That peace was demonstrated in I885, when the Cree and mixed blood Metis Rebellion against the government erupted. Blood, Piikani and Blackfoot leaders were invited to join the uprising, and with growing discontent towards government officials, the Plains Indians had every reason to fight. But chiefs like Red Crow remembered the I870 sneak attack, and wanted nothing to do with risking his tribes’ positions for any Cree causes. The Blackfoot Confederacy stayed out of the Northwest Rebellion largely due to the memory of the Belly River battle.
Little today remains of the battle site, as the early coal mines and communities built virtually atop it, destroying many of the stone cairns that had been erected by the Blackfoot to commemorate fallen comrades and enemies. In I887, Jerry Potts toured the site with businessman Charles Magrath, who gathered much information on the I870 battle, combining it with accounts received by North West Mounted Police Surgeon George Kennedy, who in later years treated some of the Blackfoot participants for complications of war wounds. The I870 Belly River battle, known as the last major inter-tribal battle fought in North America, is commemorated today in the name of Indian Battle Park.
Magrath himself, took a personal interest in the battle, and commissioned a painting by Charles M. Russell, entitled “The Battle of Belly River.” The painting today is in a private collection and largely unavailable to the public. The site is referred to by the Blackfoot Confederacy as “Assinietomochi” or “where we’ slaughtered them. “ A winter count, or painted buffalo skin by the warrior Crop-eared Wolf, depicts the scene as’’ Assinay-itomosarpi-akae-naskoy” or” Assiniboins-when we defeated them-Fort Whoop-Up.”
Over a fifty-year career, John J. Healy left his mark on the Canadian and American west– as a soldier, trapper, prospector, trader, explorer, horse dealer, scout, lawman, editor, speculator, merchant, historian, and politician.
As general manager of the mercantile giant, the North American Transportation & Trading Company, J.J. Healy had a relationship to London himself, as the young scribe met one of the primary merchants of the Klondike Gold Rush in Dawson City, Yukon Territory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klondike_Gold_Rush
Healy himself was a frustrated writer, though more real world pursuits kept him from producing more than columns in the Benton Record of Fort Benton, Montana, and the many letters written to Tappan Adney, a Harper’s contributor, and another literary light stemming from the midnight sun world of the Klondike.
When Healy did put pen to paper, he wrote sharply, frankly and to the point; always in crisp sentence structure, if with the Victorian tendency to run on. Johnny spoke of a habit of reading into the night–of Washington Irving’s fur trade tome, –a documentation of the early expeditions of the American Fur Company into the Pacific coast. He could quote the poetry of Rudyard Kipling in an whiskey-fuelled stupor. In his career, he met Harper’s feature writer, Julian Ralph as well as Adney. And as we will see, Johnny Healy inspired JackLondon. That sense of literature and the research he put into his career captured a sense of history and place, combining his literacy with real world experience.
Jack London
Healy had literary enemies as well, primarily with the media of Dawson City (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawson_City) who loved to hate him and his mercantile policies. After a trip to Chicago, in which it was rumored that his company had fired its manager, Healy returned to Dawson in July of 1899, astounding the enemies who believed him gonefor good. He even granted an interview to the hated Nugget. Changes were at hand he mused, but said little else. Back at his desk, he was energetic and optimistic.
A crowd of gold rush sourdoughs outside the North American Transportation and Trading Company’s store and warehouse complex in Dawson City. NATT manager Johnny Healy is near the lamp pole, in buffalo coat and wide-brimmed hat. University of Washington Library
After years of intermittent absences, Johnny’s young adult daughters Nellie and Alfreda were are at his side. “They had a wonderful time…all their friends were glad that their future was so promising. The supposition was that Mr. Healy had finally got a paying mine and the family could have a carefree life from now on.”
Alfreda in particular captivated the gold rush scene on a frontier bare of women. Of her attendance at a prestigious New York finishing school, the sexist society columnist gushed: “Miss Healy’s beauty is striking. Her hair is black and becomingly worn brushed to the sides and gathered in a knot. Her brown eyes usually twinkle merrily, but a moment can change them to seriousness. Her figure and carriage are fine.”
Despite the debutante image, Alfreda was a tomboy and adapted to the north. “I was promised a dog team as soon as I learned to drive. I started with one and found him hard to manage. I added to the numbers until I had five large Malamutes…I could drive them very well and without the use of profane language. Men never seemed able to do that.”
Alfreda had the Healy genes for identifying rich mineral deposits. She acquired some property on Bonanza Creek, and superintended the work on her own claim, living in a cabin and working a shovel, making a tidy nest egg for her education. She was an independent woman, unwilling to hide behind misrepresentations as a gold rush heiress. “Indeed, when I go East within a few years, it will be under the guise of a poor girl. If the right man comes along than and wants me real bad, probably I will take him, knowing that it is not my money he is after.”
Alfreda Healy Montana Historical Society
Alfreda turned heads, but one man saw inspiration beyond infatuation.
Jack London was a young roguish, rambling sailor–typically ill to mineral fever. He spent only a year in the Klondike, and came home with only a $4 souvenir gold nugget. Even before his departure, London changed his skill set, bound to make his fortune from the notebooks filled with diary entries, and musings about the land and people–the foundations of some of the greatest works of the English language.
Son of the Wolf, a collection of short stories, was London’s first book on the north, but his novel A Daughter of the Snows disappointed both writer and publisher, and the female lead character offended Victorian literary critics.
Frona Welse’ was a tough, independent firebrand using her education to her advantage, and standing up to men¬–including her father, ‘Jacob Welse’. Alaska historian William Hunt concludes from the novel that ‘Jacob’ Welse, the wily old trader, had a role model–John Healy. “A captain of industry and a splendid monopolist, he dominated the most independent aggregate of men ever drawn together from the ends of the earth.”
London anticipated the liberated woman, of the future, but he was no prophet–he’d met such women in Dawson City. ‘Frona’ was obviously Alfreda, coming of age when London noticed her in the flower of womanhood, and characterized her spirit. “You won’t understand me; you can’t. I am no woman’s rights’ creature; and I stand, not for the new woman, but for the new womanhood. Because I am sincere; because I desire to be natural, and honest, and true.”
Jack London
A Daughter of the Snows stymied London’s career briefly, and he was forced to sell off the rights to the book to pay bills. But London had a back-up plan.
The follow-up, Call of the Wild immortalized Jack London–his true gold found in the mythology of the rarified north. Even if A Daughter of the Snows robbed the avatars of Johnny and Alfreda Healy of literary immortality.
It should not be any surprise to any who know me, either personally, or virtually, that Fort Whoop-Up in Lethbridge, Alberta is a place that means an awful lot to me, and a living museum that continues to impress an awful lot of people who visit it annually.
What does not impress me, is that it seems to be a place that is in a state of constant threat by the forces who should be standing steadfast behind the facility and the organization that administers it. Without going into that extremely political process, I submit for your perusal, this letter that supports the bid by the Fort Whoop-Up Interpretive Society (FWUIS) under the Request For Proposal open-bidding process. (Yes, FWUIS has to apply for the job that it has done for nearly 43 years.)
In a quarter-century of my association with Fort Whoop-Up Interpretive Society (FWUIS), I have been a volunteer, a board member, secretary, vice-president, representative, employee, and ultimately historian of the Fort’s very rich legacy. From this experience, I have been fortunate to become a published author of many non-fiction narratives surrounding this subject. Quite simply, Fort Whoop-Up has changed my life. I have made the greatest friendships of my life while there. My family has long been involved in the Fort; my daughter was very nearly born there and has never known a time when the place was not a part of her life. And come to think of it–neither can I.
Historical Background and Relevance to City Heritage
In some 200 years of contact with Euro-American society, the Blackfoot Confederacy adapted to many influences entering its realm. From trade to the firearm to the horse to first contact to changing hunting habits, the Blood, Peigan and Siksika became a formidable force in both trade and military domination, but could not resist the westward movement or the colonial changes of North America. Just as our region became a part of the Dominion of Canada, a small-business push from the south brought the first staying influence into Blackfoot culture.
In the winter of 1869, John Healy and Alfred Hamilton of Sun River, Montana, opened a trading post at the confluence of the St. Mary’s and Oldman rivers to deal primarily with the Blood tribe in trading buffalo robes and other furs in exchange for traditional trade goods, items of interest, and, of course, alcohol. The ribald reputation of Healy and Hamilton’s enterprise led to Fort Hamilton being known primarily as “Fort Whoop-Up,” a nickname that became the primary identity of a second, expanded post constructed in the summer of 1870. In dealing with the Blood, and also the Peigan, the Siksika, the Pend’oreille, Crow, Kootenai, Assiniboine-Stoney, Sarcee, Sioux and Metis–and as a store for other settlers and traders–the Fort was prosperous and was the first permanent Euro-American settlement on the prairies south of Edmonton or west of Winnipeg.
In the fall of 1870, a winter camp of t the Bloods were attacked in the valley of the Oldman River by a formidable fighting force of a Cree-Assiniboine-Salteaux alliance from the east. Peigan and Siksika allies rallied to the Bloods’ aid and overwhelmed the invaders, but also received the aid of trade partners at Fort Whoop-Up, in what has become known as the last grand intertribal battle in North America.
In 1874, parochial concerns of sovereignty led the Canadian government to assign the North West Mounted Police to investigate Fort Whoop-Up, show the flag and initiate negotiations with the Blackfoot Confederacy in preparation for Treaty Number Seven. Contrary to the popular opinion that the Police had closed the post and halted the liquor trade, the truth is much more interesting.
In establishing Fort Macleod as a regional headquarters, the NWMP utilized Fort Whoop-Up as a temporary quarters site, drew supplies from the post, consulted with Fort personnel on local conditions, and even established a permanent outpost within the walls of Whoop-Up itself–a detachment that served local law enforcement until 1889¬–effectively, Lethbridge’s first police precinct. Under police supervision, Dave Akers, the eventual owner of the post, continued to do business with members of the Blood tribe, even into the years of the treaty.
Along the way, the Whoop-Up Trail, connecting with the Missouri River, was instrumental in the success of the NWMP, as the Montana merchants associated with the robe trade became suppliers and contractors to the Police, the federal government, the Canadian Pacific Railway and the needs of Treaty Number Seven, as well as fostering the ranching industry, early homesteaders and the supplies required by the coal mining industry of early Coalbanks. The Whoop-Up Trail and the Great Falls & Canada Railway that paralleled the route created dozens of southern Alberta and northern Montana communities.
Civically, many firsts can be attributed to Fort Whoop-Up. It was a trader named Nicholas Sheran who first exploited the coal deposits of the Oldman River coulees–deposits that were later noticed by the Galt family whose own enterprise initiated the founding of the town of Lethbridge and all that has come from that. Trader Donald W. Davis was the first Member of Parliament from Alberta, and Senator James Gladstone, first aboriginal Parliamentarian in Canada, descended from Fort Whoop-Up’s builder William Gladstone. In fact, the names of the traders themselves still resound among the southern Alberta community.
Even while the traders, Mounties and original Blackfoot customers were still alive, the fight to retain this history was begun. Journalists, authors and archivists flocked to the surviving figures of the era to salvage their words, and in 1912, organizers of the first Calgary Stampede built a replica of Fort Whoop-Up and invited remaining traders and Mounties to meet the public. Over many decades, Stampede founder Guy Weadick called for the era to be commemorated. His torch was taken up by many parties, including historian Alex Johnston, the Lethbridge Chamber of Commerce, the Kinsmen Club, and even by Boy Scout troops of Montana and southern Alberta, who marked out the Whoop-Up Trail as a project during the 1950s.
Modern Fort
The purpose of this lengthy recounting is to provide awareness that this rich, vibrant and true history is precisely what Fort Whoop-Up has exhibited and told to millions of visitors in nearly fifty years of public display.
In 1967, the Kinsmen undertook the construction of a replica of Fort Whoop-Up in Indian Battle Park as a Canadian Centennial project. Operation of the facility progressed to the Whoop-Up Country Chapter of the HAS, (the current Lethbridge Historical Society) for a few years. Finally, in 1973, the Fort Whoop-Up Interpretive Society, a non-profit volunteer organization was created to operate the city-owned facility on a fee-for-service basis. On several occasions – in 1985, in 1997 and 2009, the Fort expanded its display area and completed a matrix for a full long-term historical experience. In fact, the Fort has grown to meet and exceed expectations and potential, and has made great strides to become a world-renowned historical attraction.
Today, the Fort is a year-round operation as a cultural and interpretive museum, and a well-attended historical attraction. The summer time program is busy, accented by self-guided or guided tours through the Fort’s well-appointed period rooms, the Thunder Chief and Crowshoe exhibits, the Shockley firearms gallery, and brought to life by costumed interpreters, livestock and horse-drawn wagon rides.
Community Involvement
Each spring, FWUIS partners with the local MS Society to host their annual run, with hundreds attending in all manner of weather to support the cause, and that is just a smattering of what goes on in our Fort to involve the community. February Family Day and Canada Day sees us throw open the doors to offer day-long events so city residents have a place to enjoy a fun and culturally interesting day in the city. Statistics prove that local visitation accounts for a very large percentage of our annual attendance.
During the Christmas season, the Fort teems with life–through school educational visits, evening school parties, private staff or service group bookings, night-time wagon/sleigh rides and other forms of seasonal functions. Our horse-drawn hay rides are popular each year at the BRZ Bright Lights Festival in Galt Gardens, supported by the City and downtown merchants. These events offer the community contact with our Fort and aid in raising our profile within the local millieu.
Through Christmas, our Gift Shop is proactive in offering unique seasonal items in a non-stressed shopping environment. Late November and December has proven to be one of our busiest months of the year, helping us in many ways to achieve our attendance and fiscal goals.
First Nations Contact
Fort Whoop-has been recognized by the Blood and Peigan Nations as an important link in their own historical story. Nation members are an important part of the family and offer incredible value to our site. The make-up of our governing society benefits from the participation of several members of the aboriginal community. Our volunteer corps teems with many who see this Fort as a part of the experience and history of their people. FWUIS has employed many aboriginal youth and students over its 42 years, and many maintain contact with us on a long-term basis as volunteers and patrons.
The Thunder Chief collection is a significant and valuable body of artifacts chosen by its owner to remain in southern Alberta in order that his people may visit them and remain connected, while being displayed to the many visitors. The acquisition and display of this collection was not done lightly, and the local Blood and Peigan are continually involved in order to ensure that the artifacts are properly interpreted. This professional and open exhibit receives overwhelmingly positive comments from our visitors.
The Fort’s gift shop stocks cultural and crafting supplies to serve band members. Their patronization assists the Fort in the maintenance of a revolving inventory. Visitors are impressed by the strides we have made in keeping the interpretation of this facility balanced between so many disparate aspects, recognizing the virtues of a constant indigenous presence.
Education
The Fort welcomes hundreds of students annually to participate in educational programs teaching local history to the Lethbridge public and separate districts, and other communities of southern Alberta. Schools also attend from Calgary, Edmonton, central Alberta, and south-eastern BC, purely to learn of this Fort due to its placement in the school curriculum.
Aboriginal students from the city and nearby reserves attend to assist in learning the Fort’s significant part in their own culture. International students and English as A Second Language students from both the University and College have become regular visitors, taking our story and experience to every country around the globe.
The most satisfying thing derived from our education programs is when young visitors return as children with their parents and siblings in tow; then again as teenagers; or even as adults themselves¬ with their own significant others and children. Fort Whoop-Up leaves a generational impression.
Tourism
The name of Fort Whoop-Up has brought countless throngs of visitors and tourists through Lethbridge. The aggregation over 42 years quite possibly reaches into the millions. Aggressive marketing through Travel Alberta and other agencies brought the name to the forefront of travellers. Many media sources have presented features on the Fort – including Canadian Cowboy Country TV,Antiques Roadshow, PBS, American Road magazine and True West magazine.
But the best marketer has been the word of mouth, as many do inquire of the place, and indeed come to see it, based on the recommendation of others. Tourists find the variety and the experience compelling and vast, and depending upon interest, our visitors leave with smiles on their faces and good feelings about the city and our area. While they are here, they may also visit the Galt Museum, Nikka Yuko and the Southern Alberta Art Gallery, and patronize our malls, stores, service stations, hotels, food service outlets and countless other businesses.
Overcoming Adversity With Community Support
None of the achievements come without some hardship. In 1995, we were hit by the so-called “Flood of the Century”. Natural conditions have continued to plague operations on many occasions, but thanks to City assistance and the incredible volunteer commitment of the FWUIS, long-term damage was avoided, the hardships were overcome and the Fort always rose again to open its gates to the public.
Most impressive in these challenges was the swift and immediate reaction of the Lethbridge general public at large upon learning that their facility was at risk. The volunteer turnout, the lending of services and equipment and just the support that was received was truly humbling. Lethbridge quite simply cares about this facility and will put their backs into supporting it.
Volunteer Involvement and Perseverance
The Fort Whoop-Up Interpretive Society means, quite simply, many things to many people. For the city at large, the Fort is a gem in the operations of the city’s many facilities. As a feature landmark, most southern Albertans could not imagine a time without it. It is a community, an extended family, a public servant and custodian of an incredibly vast, colourful and significant part of North American history.
Fort Whoop-Up is an institution recognized locally, regionally, provincially, nationally and internationally. The good will it has brought as an ambassador for Lethbridge is incalculable. The RCMP, to cite one example, has recognized Fort Whoop-Up as a significant component of their Heritage Center in Regina. Countless other illustrations exist.
There is quite simply no agency, group, individual or initiative that can operate this facility as well as the Fort Whoop-Up Interpretive Society. I couldn’t feature anyone who could maintain this level of excellence and service, and still offer such an attractive draw to the site. FWUIS is, without a doubt, a sturdy group of multi-taskers who meet all challenges and succeed.
Cities the size of Lethbridge are envious as to what we have built here: taking a real-world historical concept and bridging it into a jewel of a site. 2017 is the year of Canada’s sesquicentennial–AND the 50th anniversary of this city’s Centennial project.
What a monumental achievement it would be to realize that the special little dream the Kinsmen Club and the Lethbridge Historical Society had in those simpler times¬ remains in the valley, with the spirit and intent still intact and its current world-class status in place.
What an optic it would be for the Kinsmen, the LHS, and so many other organization and individuals who have been along on this half-century ride to be there to wish the FWUIS well and honor the hundreds of volunteers, living and past, who have dedicated themselves to this facility’s many facets of culture and service.
All it would take for that to happen would be to allow the Fort Whoop-Up Interpretive Society to keep doing what it does so very well.
Gordon E. Tolton, Historian and Author, Healy’s West: The Life & Times of John J. Healy
A very nice review came in today from “Wild West”–a widely circulated magazine from the Weider History group, that focuses on North American frontier heritage.
Healy’s West: The Life and Times of John J. Healy, by Gordon E. Tolton, Mountain Press Publishing Co., Missoula, Mont., 2014, $20
Reviewed by Jon Guttman
Some Westerners became legends, others led legendary lives but never made it into dime novels or onto the big screen. John Healy was one of the latter, though Canadian author Gordon Tolton aims to redress that with a picaresque biography spanning two nations and two centuries.
Of all the trials and tribulations on which Healy himself commented, the only part of his life on which he said virtually nothing was his childhood in Ireland. The author’s recap of British injustices and the economic ripple effects of the potato famine will at least give the reader an inkling of why. From his family’s arrival in New York, Healy assessed the seemingly boundless possibilities of the New World and set his ambitions westward—traveling on the taxpayer’s dollar as a soldier on the 1857 expedition to Mormon Utah. After leaving the Army and meeting renowned mountain man Jim Bridger, Healy guided wagon trains on the Oregon and Bozeman trails, learned to apply his Irish gift of gab to talking and bluffing his way out of trouble with Shoshones, and then tried panning for gold in what became Montana.
That was just the start of his remarkably diverse career as an entrepreneur, lawman and politician, during which he clashed with the monopolistic Hudson’s Bay Co., hunted down numerous outlaws without ever drawing blood (which may explain why he never made a name for himself in certain circles), mastered the art of “how to win friends and influence people” when trading with Bloods and Piegans, outfitted prospectors in Alaska and the Klondike and in his later years entertained a wild idea (even by present-day standards) of running a 44-mile railroad tunnel beneath the Bering Strait. The tracks he envisioned would cross Canadian and American territory and connect with Russia’s Trans-Siberian Railway, to the benefit of all three countries. By 1905 that scheme had collapsed for a variety of financial and political reasons. While recounting the remarkable Western adventures of a man who seized at opportunity with nearly unerring instinct, the author notes: “That same resolve proved useless in the boardroom. Such determination caused him to overreach, when even his temper and ethics could strike no victory against the powerful or the impossible. The door he opened for so many was often slammed on him, and sometimes he walked right into it.”
Still, Healy was an enthusiastic embracer and multifaceted agent of “Manifest Destiny,” and his life runs intriguingly parallel to the history of two developing nations. Although Healy’s attitude toward Indians would be considered racist by present-day standards, he did say, “I admire the Blood Indians, I fought them for years, and when they became my friends, I could trust them absolutely.” For those who have never heard of the man, Healy’s West should prove enlightening. For those already familiar with Healy, the reward is a further introduction to this unsung Westerner.
John Motherwell is a retired civil engineer living in Victoria, BC. I first became acquainted with John when he was searching for biographical information on John J. Healy, as he was researching the impact of merchant companies during the Klondike Gold Rush and beyond. John’s own work has seen the publication of Gold Rush Steamboats: Francis Rattenbury’s Yukon Venture in 2012, a detailed and well written
account of a Victoria architect and his enterprise on the Yukon River.
In reviewing my book, Healy’s West: The Life and Times of John J. Healy, Motherwell writes:
“I must say that I think Healy’s West is an excellent book which should be read by everyone interested in the early development of the Plains west or the Yukon. I particularly take note of the extensive research with which you support your book, which I very much like because it lends an immense amount of credibility and authority. I think you have presented Healy as he really was, warts and all, loved by some and hated by others. I have never felt that the Klondike Nugget’s treatment of him was anything more than an attempt to stir up controversy, where none was truly justified, in order to sell a few more papers. The measure of the Klondike Nugget’s integrity was Eugene Allen’s furtive escape at night by dog team over the winter ice to US territory to avoid having to pay his creditors.”
As I believe I mentioned to you once, I was never happy with earlier biographies of Healy,
because I thought [they] gave insufficient recognition of the circumstances which influenced Healy at many critical times in his life. I have read too many historical books by modern authors who judge historical figures according to modern standards, and this is simply neither fair nor logical nor honest. Healy could no better have divined business conditions in the Yukon as they are now any better than we can predict, with absolute certainty, what social conditions in Canada will be in 2114. So I think you have done an excellent job and I hope the book sells well.”
Healy’s West: The Life and Times of John J. Healy
Gordon E. Tolton
Through his incredibly varied career, the 19th-century entrepreneur John J. Healy left an indelible mark on the Canadian and American west. At different points in his storied life, Healy was a soldier, a trapper, a prospector, an explorer, a horse dealer, a scout, a lawman, a newspaper editor, a capitalist, a historian, and a politician. He defied classification while defining the lifestyle of a frontier adventurer and buccaneer capitalist in the late nineteenth century.
In Healy’s West, Gordon Tolton cuts through the mythology and controversy of this larger-than-life character, giving us the most complete and truly balanced account of Healy’s life ever published.
An entertaining and critical portrayal of the west’s most charismatic figure, Healy’s West is a must-read for any history buff.
Gordon E. Tolton is a historian, re-enactor, author, and raconteur. A frequent site host at the Fort WhoopUp National Historic Site in Lethbridge, Gord is the author of four previous books of Prairie history, including Cowboy Cavalry: The Story of the Rocky Mountain Rangers and Prairie Warships: River Navigation in the Northwest Rebellion. He lives in Coaldale, Alberta, with his wife, Rose.
“Tolton’s meticulous research reveals unexplored perspectives and little-known details.” —Canada’s History
PUBLICITY For more information, to receive a review copy, or to schedule an interview with the author, please contact Heritage House at 250-360-0829 or info@heritagehouse.ca.
“The world has been my school, the mountains, plains and valleys were my books. The study of man and his methods my guide as to right and wrong.” – John J. Healy
We are very close to the debut in stores of “Healy’s West: The Life and Times of John J. Healy”
Jack London
Ranger Gord's Round-Up 