This post was originally published on July 10, 2012 in honour of the 100th anniversary of the Calgary Stampede. It highlights the place names and geographical features in Alberta named after The Big Four – the ranchers and businessmen that funded Guy Weadick’s 1912 wild west show and rodeo, which grew to become today’s Calgary Stampede. Six years later, the Stampede is once again in full swing – a good excuse to revisit the legacy of the Big Four.
On the west side of Stampede Park, rising from the seething mass of carnival rides, concession stands and humanity that is the Stampede midway is the Big Four Building. This building is named for the Big Four – the four Southern Alberta ranchers and businessmen who funded Guy Weadick’s proposed rodeo and wild west show in 1912. Intended to be a one-time event, the show and rodeo grew to become the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede. To say that the Big Four influenced Calgary’s popular culture would be a great understatement.
However, the legacy of the Big Four extends beyond the boundaries of Stampede Park. They left their mark not only in Calgary, but on the geography of the Province of Alberta. This blog post is the first of three that look at the Big Four – George Lane, A. E. Cross, Archie McLean and Pat Burns – and the places named for them.
George Lane: An American in Calgary
George Lane was born in 1856 just outside of Des Moines, Iowa. From there his life story reads like an adventure novel. As a teenager he and his father searched for gold in the Montana Territory. He then worked as a scout for the United States Army and as a ranch hand before coming to Canada in 1884 as a foreman at the Bar U Ranch (now a National Historic Site). He left the Bar U three years later and set himself up as a cattle trader, often working in partnership with the Winnipeg-based cattle company Gordon, Ironside & Fares. Lane acquired a number of ranches in the Porcupine Hills region of southwest Alberta, including the Flying E Ranch (previously named the Victor Ranch), the YT Ranch and the Willow Creek Ranch; in 1902, Lane and his partners acquired the Bar U Ranch. Lane became known as one of the most successful cattle traders in Western Canada and at one point was raising nearly 20,000 head of cattle on these ranches and adjacent leased crown lands.
Unlike many of Alberta’s ranchers, who saw the arrival of homesteaders as a threat to their way of life, George Lane saw the shifting agricultural frontier as an opportunity. He experimented with irrigation and raised herds of draft horses for sale to the west’s new farmers. Most notably, he switched large parts of his land holdings from cattle range to grain farms, becoming, by 1915, one of Alberta’s two top grain producers.
Lane served a short stint as a Member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, elected as a Liberal in 1913, but quickly resigning to make his seat available for a defeated cabinet minister. In 1919, Lane entertained Edward, Prince of Wales at the Bar U. The Prince was so taken with the region and the lifestyle that he soon purchased a neighbouring ranch, which became the E P Ranch (now a Provincial Historic Resource). In his later years, George Lane continued to promote settlement and investment in Alberta and occupied himself raising his prize winning Percheron horses. George Lane died at the Bar U Ranch on September 24, 1925.
Lane Creek, a tributary of Willow Creek, is named for George Lane. The creek flows southerly and enters Willow Creek in Section 6, of Township 14-29-W4, about 23 km west of the Town of Stavely.
In 1883, John Francis of the Dominion Land Survey, surveyed the Township 14-30-W4. In Sections 13, 24 and 25 he recorded a spring fed creek that was approximately six feet wide and contained about eight inches of water. Francis did not name the creek. The first official recording of the name Lane Creek appears to be on the 1902 edition of the Macleod Sectional Sheet (No. 74), printed by the Government of Canada. The creek flowed through a substantial part of the land controlled by George Lane. The section where Lane Creek joins Willow Creek was co-owned by Lane and his partners Gordon, Ironside & Fares.
Although in use for over half a century, the name Lane Creek was not officially recognized as the name for that stream until May 1957.
To learn about the geographic features named for A.E. Cross, Pat Burns and Archie McLean, see parts 2 and 3 here:
https://albertashistoricplaces.wordpress.com/2012/07/12/the-big-four-part-2-of-3/
https://albertashistoricplaces.wordpress.com/2012/07/17/the-big-four-part-3-of-3/
Written by: Ron Kelland, Historic Places Research Officer and Geographical Names Program Coordinator
Location
National Topographic System Map Sheet: 82 I/04 – Claresholm
Latitude/Longitude:
50° 14’ 22” N & 113° 58’ 52” W (approximate location of head waters) to
50° 08′ 28″ N & 113° 57′ 04″ W (at confluence with Willow Creek)
Alberta Township System:
SW ¼, Sec 7 Twp 15 Rge 29 W4 (approximate location of head waters) to
SW ¼, Sec 6 Twp 14 Rge 29 W4 (at confluence with Willow Creek)
Description:
Flows generally southerly from the for approximately 20 km (11 km straight line) until it joins Willow Creek about 22 km west of the Town of Stavely.
Additional Resources
More information about George Lane and his partnership with Gordon, Ironsides & Fares can be found in:
Evans, Simon M. “Lane, George,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online, edited by John English and Réal Bélanger, Vol. XV, available from http://www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?BioId=41957&query=.
McCullough, A. B., “Winnipeg Ranchers: Gordon, Ironside and Fares,” Manitoba History, No. 41 (Spring/Summer 2001), accessed 9 July 2012, available from http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/mb_history/41/winnipegranchers.shtml.
The Butte Stands Guard: Stavely & District, Volume 1 (Stavely, AB: Stavely Historical Book Society, 1976), pages 14-20, 231-234.
RETROactive 
Was John Quirke who owned the Q brand part of that group