Alberta is filled with communities with unusual names, but in
contrast to names with obvious aboriginal influences, like
Wetaskiwin, are towns and villages like Beaumont, Brosseau,
Grande Prairie, and Lacombe. Over the years most
English-speaking Albertans have transformed these names into
English approximations—Grande Prairie, while retaining the
French spelling, became the Anglicized "Grand" Prairie in
pronunciation. As a
side effect of this Anglicization and the minority status of the
70,000 French speakers in Alberta, few Albertans, even those
living in the subject communities, know the history behind their
hometown.
Some of these communities were helped along and ministered by
the Oblate Fathers, and were named in honour of these men or
their patron saints. Others were named for the animals or the
geography of a specific region, or for the prominent French
individuals of the local population. Their histories vary, but
all of them are connected to the French people in some way.
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