Last week (July 22) marked 25 years of marriage for my wife and I and this weekend we are travelling the backroads of our province (avoiding Covid) to celebrate. Today we were able to check off another couple of ghost town locations out of the 50 or so I have marked out on a map. This one is Hackett. Which according to my research was surveyed in 1924-25 by CPR railroad. Hackett never really thrived until the 30’s – 40’s and was a little hamlet with 2 grain elevators, a general store and a post office. For 20yrs Hackett was an important point for shipping but by the 1940’s better roads nearby led to a syphoning off of business to towns like Stettler, Hannah and Castor. By 1950 the general store was forced to close and the building moved away. The last grain elevator closed in 1971 and has since been removed. There is little left (other than Google maps) to show Hackett even existed. The following images show a satellite image of the farm with the former roads of Hackett superimposed. Another photo shows where the original railroad went through, all that remains is the raised bed the rails were on and a finally a photo of the farm that now exists overtop where Hackett once stood. This was a great day. I’ll have another post up later of another Town Leo, that we tried to find but again is all but gone. There is word however, that some of it was moved to Byemor which we shall visit tomorrow. Stay tuned!
Until next time – Tim
Quick update… the next day I located the original Hackett railway sign at the Stettler Museum.
