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Home > History of Development > Leduc: Causes and Effects > 1947: Oil Strike! > Future Changed

Leduc: Causes and Effects

Future Changed 

Diamond Drills, n.d.Alberta's oil revenue made it possible for the provincial government to start an aggressive infrastructure program. By early 1956, road crews had completed 9,386 kilometres of paved highways, multi-lane highways, paved shoulders and several bridges. Housing boomed to accommodate the influx of people. Oil eventually changed Albertans forever. Farmers turned into oilmen, Edmonton became the Oil Capital of Canada virtually overnight, and Alberta turned into a wealthy, resource-rich province.

Oil and natural gas has made Alberta one of Canada's most prosperous provinces. All economic sectors of the province have benefited from the oil and gas boom of the 1960s and 1970s. Not only have Calgary and Edmonton enjoyed the prosperity; new cities were formed. Cities, such as Red Deer, Lethbridge and Medicine Hat profited from this lucrative time.

The discovery of the Leduc oil field in 1947 fostered the revelation that oil could be recovered from the Plains of Alberta. This discovery became the base upon which Alberta and Canada built its oil industry, and the nation would become an exporter of oil. By the time Imperial Oil finally shut down the Leduc oil field in 1984, it had produced an excess of 240 million barrels. Alberta became Canada's energy province, and fuelled the economic growth that created the prosperity of present-day Alberta.

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