Turner Valley

In 1887, brothers James and Robert Turner homesteaded in the Millarville area. They cut the hay and grazed their cattle down toward the South Fork of the Sheep River, and the area came to be known as Turner's Valley. However the townsite of th eTurner Valley we know today did not emerge until the late twenties.

Coal had been mined in the region south-west of Calgary since 1888. After 1910 the prospect of gas and petroleum finds led to exploratory drilling aroung the Turner Valley area, primarily under the impetus of Calgary money. Using the drilling tools of the era and a wooden derrick, in May 1914, “Dingman No.1” struck a gas reservoir with a high natural gasoline (naphtha) content. The proven existence of a naphtha field started Turner Valley's first boom and while shortlived, it prompted a brief spurt of town growth. Workers came from as far away as the British Isles and the United States. These “roughnecks” set up their tar-paper shacks on any vacant piece of land and the population multiplied enormously; but within three months, the outbreak of the First World War brought the frantic drilling activity to a brief halt.

Turner Valley's second boom came in 1924, when the Royalite Oil Company, which had succeeded the original Calgary consortium, brought in “Royalite No. 4”. Unlike the period of the first discovery, the whole country was in the throes of a major post-war recession, and this time the local boom was slow in coming. At the same time, operators were wary of costly drilling programs when the field appeared to have only a narrow productive range. Despite these limitations, the settlement of Turner Valley continued to grow and on February 25, 1930 it was incorporated as a Village.

Although small in size, the new village was not without typical boomtown forms of entertainment. At high risk during long working hours, the roughnecks were prone to wild and often expensive entertainments. Nevertheless, a family character began to emerge in the settlement with the almost certain guarantee of long-range stability. More socially palatable activities such as baseball, hockey, curling, golf, the hunt club, and family “get-togethers” came to dominate local recreational and social life. Children of both ranchers and oil workers attended the local schools, and joined local chapters of the Scouting and Guide movement in Canada.

Oil workers and their families came and went with each successive boom, while the permanent population proved to be the mainstay of the economy. Turner Valley continued a slow growth pattern throughout the years, and on September 1, 1977, it was finally incorporated as a Town.