Where the Langevin Bridge got its name
Fourth Avenue Flyover and Langevin Bridge, Calgary. Photo by Jill Browne, February 22, 2011.
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Home: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Winter. Snow. If you’re getting tired of hearing me say it, imagine how I feel.
I have been hearing robins over the past week or two, but today I saw my first one. Poor guy, up there in the spruce tree in the snow.
The picture is from February, though the day looks much the same as today. We were going east on Memorial Drive, stopped at the light at Edmonton Trail, and I took this picture of the 4th Avenue flyover. You can also see the older Langevin Bridge behind it.
The Langevin Bridge is named after the same gentleman as the Langevin Block on Parliament Hill, Sir Hector-Louis Langevin. He was a Conservative Member of Parliament from Quebec, and one of the Fathers of Confederation. He was also the Minister of Public Works and left office because of a scandal. His department was the subject of an inquiry in 1891, and he stepped down that year.
It strikes me as odd that a Quebec politician from any party would have a bridge named for him in Calgary. Even in the early days, we had more than enough luminaries to cover the infrastructure.
Langevin was the minister who petitioned Parliament for a bridge across the Bow River, and that is why his name is on it. So says a brochure from the City of Calgary, “A Snapshot of Calgary’s History”. The petitioning was in 1885. The bridge was built in 1910, twenty-five years later.
You can just tell there’s a lot of juicy 19th century politics behind the scenes here. I wonder who in Calgary felt such loyalty to Langevin as to put his name on the Calgary bridge so long after the fact, and why.
jill