Rocky Mountain Rail - Jasper 14th August

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Jasper, Alberta


Jasper was born in 1911 as a rough and tumble railway construction camp called Fitzhugh. Two years later a real town began to emerge from the jumble of tents and shacks, and the name was changed to Jasper. That same year, the new park superintendent Lieut. Col. S. Maynard Rogers, built an impressive stone and log administration office and residence near the railway station, and the town was on its way. The first facilities designed for park visitors were established in 1915 in the form of a tent camp on the shore of nearby Lac Beauvert; the Canadian National Railway acquired the site and built the Jasper Park Lodge there in the early 1920s. In those early years, outfitters led horse trips to remote beauty spots as Maligne Lake, the Tonquin Valley and the Columbia Icefield, where tourist were first housed in tent camps and, later, in log cabins and lodges.
Today, the population of Jasper is around 5,500, and it operates as the headquarters and main service centre for Jasper National Park.

Jasper National Park is the largest national park in the Canadian Rockies, spanning 10,878 km² (4200 mi²). It is located in the province of Alberta, north of Banff National Park and west of the City of Edmonton. The park includes the glaciers of the Columbia Icefield, hot springs, lakes, waterfalls and, of course, mountains. Wildlife in the park includes elk, caribou, moose, mule deer, white-tailed deer, mountain goat, bighorn sheep, grizzly bear, black bear, beaver, Rocky Mountain pika, hoary marmot, gray wolf,mountain lion, and wolverine.

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