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By the time Hamilton sold the mine at Taber, he knew many railway and Government officials who were willing to assist him and tell him of various coal properties which were available. The C.P.R. was needing a steady supply of coal for its steam engines. As a composite result, he purchased some thirteen thousand acres of coal land in what was to be the Passburg area. The Leitch Collieries Ltd. Coal Co. was incorporated, in 1907.

But he had made many lasting friendships also with men who had worked for him or with him, and who wanted to take their chances with him in the new adventure. One of the first of these was Jack Kerr, his trusted pit boss, and Jack's brother Bill who opened the first general store on the Passburg townsite.

Snuggled into the hills at the eastern end of the Pass was a flat floored plain, like the level bottom of a cup. Good grass grew there, and there was water from both creek and river, besides a couple of springs. Cattle rustlers had found that they could run bunches of stolen cattle down into the flat and that they would stay there for a considerable time rather than climb the hills out. It became a gathering place for stolen stock, which was then driven across the line for sale in the States. To counteract this the N.W.M.P. established a post on the spot. (To this day it is known as the Police Flats). They built a roomy low barn out of heavy logs, close to the creek which at that time ran across the flat, and a small frame dwelling for their own accommodation. Into this frame building Jack Kerr moved his wife and small son Jim, when they first started to prospect for a development site. Mr. Hamilton would come out by train from Lethbridge to Burmis — a box car flag stop — and walk the two miles along the railway track to the Flats.

Other workmen soon followed. There was Fred Lacoste, possibly known since bush logging jobs in Quebec. He was an excellent man with an axe, when it came to building bridges, and the great amount of timber work required around a mine. There was Gus Lacoste and his large family. His father, Napoleon Lacoste, had farmed near the Coalfield's mines. He was a good man with heavy horses and construction. There was Norman Rowell who came to work at the mine store in Coalfields when he was twenty-one. He had followed also to Taber but when no store was opened there, went back to Wapella, Saskatchewan where he met his wife. He purchased the Passburg store from Bill Kerr and stayed as long as the mine operated.

And there was a carpenter from Taber — James Redfern, and last but not least, a Presbyterian minister, Rev. Jas. Lang. He had built a church at Coalfields, close to the mine, with unfailing support from the Hamiltons. After coming to the Pass, he built a church at Passburg, and then others at Burmis and Hillcrest. He was a scholarly, well educated man with a great pioneering spirit. He was a tradesman painter, and always painted his own churches and helped builders in many other ways. The Hamiltons drove him where he needed to go, to visit or preach — always kept a vacant bedroom just for him to come to any time. He usually ate at their table, when around, but many other people fed him and tried to be good to him. Mrs. Hamilton supplied him with honey for his throat which became raspy, and butter for his work worn-gnarled hands. There is no record of his receiving any regular salary, anywhere.

These people probably represented a fair sample of the types who pioneered in the West. They were self sufficient, resourceful, competent and dependable. There was no corner grocery store, or shopping centre, and at first no telephone service, no station, — the Soo Spokane train had to be flagged down at certain locations where in the course of time the railway deposited token stations in the form of old boxcars, beside the track. It was a day when men sealed verbal agreement with a handshake, when doors were never locked, when men trusted others and could be trusted themselves. Doctors and hospitals were scarce and generally distant and social aid or compensation of any kind had not been invented.

This article is extracted from Crowsnest and its People: Millennium Edition (Coleman, Alberta, Crowsnest Pass Historical Society, 2000.) The Heritage Community Foundation and the Year of the Coal Miner Consortium would like to thank the authors and the Crowsnest Pass Historical Society for permission to reprint this material.

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