Edmonton tourist information

Edmonton has always been a city proud of its cultural accomplishments. As the city has grown, so has the cultural scene. Today, Edmonton is a proud home to many features which add to its cosmopolitan flair.

Many events are anchored in the downtown Arts District, centred around the newly renovated Churchill Square (named in honour of Sir Winston Churchill).

• The Francis Winspear Centre for Music was opened in 1997 after years of planning and fundraising. Called one of the most acoustically perfect concert halls in Canada, it is home to the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra and hosts a wide variety of shows every year. It seats 1916 patrons and houses the $3 million Davis Concert Organ, the largest concert organ in Canada. An interesting aspect of the hall's design is its separation into acoustically separate areas each of which are insulated from each other through acoustical barriers built into the structure. Patrons and artists can see these in the form of double-door 'sound locks.'
• Across 102nd Street is the Citadel Theatre, so named after the Salvation Army Citadel in which Joe Shoctor first started the Citadel Theatre company in 1965. It is now one of the largest theatre complexes in Canada with five halls each specializing in different kinds of productions. For instance, the Maclab Theatre features a thrust stage surrounded by a U-shaped seating arrangement, while the Shoctor Theatre is a traditional stage setup.
• On the University of Alberta grounds is the 2534-seat Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium, which recently reopened after being out of commission for a year during heavy renovations carried out as part of the province's centennial celebrations. Both it and its southern twin in Calgary were constructed in 1955 for the province's silver jubilee and have played host to many concerts, musicals, and ballets. The Edmonton Opera uses the Jubilee as its base of operations. On the front of the building is a quote from Suetonius' Life of Augustus: "He found a city built of brick - left it built of marble."

Museums and Galleries
There are also over 70 museums in Edmonton of ranging sizes. The largest is the Royal Alberta Museum (formerly the Provincial Museum of Alberta, it was renamed by Queen Elizabeth II during her 2005 visit) which houses over 10 million objects in its collection. The main building, located on the river valley west of downtown in Glenora, was opened in 1967 and is now in the early stages of large-scale redevelopment.

The Art Gallery of Alberta is the city's largest single gallery. Housed in an inconspicuous production of 1970s architecture, the AGA collection has over 5000 pieces of art. Fundraising is currently underway for a new building designed by Randall Stout. Independent galleries can be found throughout the city, especially along the 124th Street corridor.

The University of Alberta operates its own internal Museums and Collections service.

Festivals
Edmonton plays host to several large festivals each year, hence its local nickname as 'the Festival City.' The following highlights some of Edmonton's larger festivals.

• The Works Art & Design Festival, which takes place from late June to early July, showcases Canadian and international art & design from well-know, award-winning artists, as well as emerging and student artists.
• The River City Shakespeare Festival - Since 1989 the Free Will Players have staged this annual event, which takes place every summer from late June to mid-July. The festival includes full-scale professional productions of two plays by William Shakespeare, as well as Camp Shakespeare - a summer drama camp for youth ages 8–16.
• The Edmonton International Street Performer's Festival[35], taking place in mid-July, showcases street performance artists from around the world.
• For two weeks in July, Capital EX (formerly called Klondike Days) provides rides, music and other entertainment. Klondike Days (or K-Days) was originally an annual fair and exhibition which eventually adopted a gold rush theme. In early 2006 it was decided that the festival would be renamed 'The Capital City Exhibition' (or Capital Ex). Activities include chuckwagon races, carnival rides and fairways, music, trade shows and daily fireworks. Since 1960, the Sourdough Raft Races have also been a popular event.
• The Heritage Days Festival is an ethnocultural food festival that takes place in Hawrelak Park on the Heritage Day long weekend (which includes the first Monday in August).
• The Edmonton International Fringe Festival, which takes place in mid-August, is the largest Fringe Theatre Festival in North America, and second only to the Edinburgh Fringe festival in the world.
• In August, Edmonton is also host to the Edmonton Folk Music Festival, one of the most successful and popular folk music festivals in North America.
• The Edmonton International Film Festival, which runs from late September to early October, is now in its 19th year and is one of Canada's primary film festivals.
• In early November, Edmonton plays host to the Canadian Finals Rodeo and Farmfair. This is the crown jewel in Canada's rodeo circuit and second only to the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas in prestige.

The first inhabitants gathered in the area, which is now Edmonton, around 3000 BC and perhaps as early as 10,000 BC, when an ice-free corridor was opening up as the great ice sheets covering much of Canada melted. They took advantage of the timber, water and wildlife in the region and thus made their presence in the area for thousands of years.

700 People and a Gold Rush
The Calgary and Edmonton Railway reached the area in 1891 with a terminal in Strathcona on the south side of the North Saskatchewan River. Edmonton officially became a town in 1892 with a population of 700. The city boomed during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1897 as thousands of eager prospectors heading north via the "All Canadian Route," stopping in Edmonton for supplies. The town of Strathcona grew faster than Edmonton until 1905 when the Canadian Northern Railway opened its transcontinental line through Edmonton.

9000 People and Goverment Representatives
By 1904, Edmonton had 9,000 residents and was incorporated as a city that same year. Alberta became a province in 1905, and the city was officially declared the provincial capital in 1906 after having won out over contenders including Calgary, Red Deer and even Banff due to having the highest number of government representatives. Initially the Alberta Legislature met in the Mackay Avenue School, while the Legislature Building was being erected on the north shore of the North Saskatchewan River. By 1907, the University of Alberta was established across the river in Strathcona, which also became a city that year. The city of Edmonton originally occupied only the north side of the North Saskatchewan River, as Strathcona encompassed the entire south side.

Black Gold
sThe first major oil discovery for Edmonton and the rest of the province was made on February 13, 1947 near the town of Leduc to the south. Although oil reserves were already known as early as 1914 to exist in the southern parts of Alberta, they produced very little oil compared to those around Edmonton. Additional oil reserves were also discovered during the late 1940s and the 1950s in the Edmonton area near the towns of Redwater and Pembina. Because most of Alberta's oil reserves were found to be concentrated in central and northern Alberta, the city became home to most of Alberta's oil production and refining.

269,000 People and Oil
The subsequent oil boom gave Edmonton new status as the Oil Capital of Canada. During the 1950s, the city nearly doubled in population from 149,000 to 269,000. After a relatively calm but still prosperous period in the 1960s, the city's growth took on a renewed vigour with high world oil prices, triggered by the 1973 oil crisis and the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The oil boom of the 1970s and 1980s ended abruptly with the introduction of the National Energy Program in 1981. The population had reached 521,000 that same year. Although the National Energy Program was later scrapped by the federal government in the mid-1980s, the collapse of world oil prices in 1986 and massive government cutbacks kept the city from fully recovering economically until the late 1990s. Unsurprisingly, the city did suffer from high unemployment rates until then.

What a Big Mall!
In 1981, the largest shopping mall in North America, West Edmonton Mall, opened. The mall is one of Alberta's most popular tourist attractions, and contains an indoor amusement park, a large indoor waterpark, and a luxury hotel in addition to its over 800 shops and services.

Tornado
On July 31, 1987, a devastating tornado, ranked as an F4 on the Fujita scale, hit the city and killed 27 people. The day became known as "Black Friday". Then-Mayor Laurence Decore cited the community's response to the tornado as evidence that Edmonton was a "city of champions", which later became the city's slogan.

As Oil Recovers, so Does Edmonton
The city entered its current period of economic recovery and prosperity by the late 1990s, helped by a strong recovery in oil prices and further economic diversification. While oil production and refining remains the basis of many jobs in Edmonton, the city's economy has managed to diversify economically, producing even more jobs. The downtown core and parts of the inner city, after years of extremely high office vacancy rates and neglect, have recovered to a great degree. It is still undergoing a renaissance of its own, with further new projects underway or about to become reality, and more and more people choosing to live in or near the downtown core.