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About the CPS
Our Mission:
"To optimize public safety
in the City of Calgary"
Interpretive Centre - First Stop - The Early Days of Policing in Calgary
Stepping back in time
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The first exhibit transports visitors back in time to the early days of Calgary
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Push open the old-fashioned saloon doors that mark the museum entrance and you are immediately taken back to a century ago. You can hear that familiar old-time piano melody in the background mixed with the sounds of a busy establishment typical of the late 1800s and early 1900s in Calgary. There are glasses tinkling, and people are talking and laughing. You've arrived in early Calgary when the town was young and spirited and just beginning to grow.
Some things don't change
Soon after you enter this exhibit you realize many of the issues the police dealt with in the early days are similar to the ones they deal with today. What's different is how they deal with them. Gambling, prostitution, drunkenness and street fighting were among their biggest concerns. These problems still exist today, but police no longer rely on their fists to deal with the offenders.
A cultural mix
Throughout the display are artifacts, including photos and other things from the past reminding us that Calgary has always been home to a variety of cultures. If you took a walk along Main Street in the 1880s, you would have found businesses run by people of British heritage as well as a camp of the area's native people. By the end of the decade, a small group of Chinese had settled in the community and 30 years later, people of Eastern European and African ancestry began to arrive. Often people did not like one another simply because they had different ways. This caused problems within society.
Police mirror society
An original charge-book from 1919 is on display, and the record shows several charges of drunkenness and fighting. At first glance, it's shocking to see the words used by the police to describe the offenders. But remember, many words and ethnic references that are considered hateful today were acceptable to society at that time.
Take a few more steps into the display to see how attitudes toward the cultural mix have changed. A century ago, only a British-born man would have qualified to be a police officer. There were few expectations. Of course he had to be law-abiding and relatively smart. But he also had to know how to fight. The display reminds visitors that the Police Service of today has changed significantly. It is made up of men and women from many cultures who are highly trained in all aspects of law enforcement, with emphasis on multiculturalism and cultural relations.
A visit with Chief English
Now, let's take a minute to visit with Chief English. He's at his desk and he loves to chat with everyone who walks through his door. His office is tiny, but it's probably not much different from the first police headquarters built in 1885 on Drinkwater Street in Calgary. The police had the second floor of the small building, which served as office, town jail and courthouse.
Chief English likes to boast he's good with his fists and that's probably why Town Council hired him in the first place. Calgary was a tough town in those days, and prostitution and gambling were rampant. The town needed his style of law enforcement to keep everyone in line.
For 18 years Chief English kept law and order in Calgary, and the way he tells it, "the criminals sat up and took notice when I was in charge." There wasn't a single murder the whole time he was in office. And, just as he tells visitors to the centre, "that's not a bad record" when you consider the town grew from 3,000 to 30,000 people and the police force changed from a chief and three constables in 1890, to a chief and 47 constables in 1909.
A play on words
Click here for our play on words. Then check your answers.
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