Interactive timeline · 4,000 BCE to 2026
From Wanuskewin to a river city of bridges: 6,000 years in 32 moments.
32 moments6 eras56 sourcesAbout ↓
4,000 BCE – 1875
Hunters camped and wintered along the South Saskatchewan for thousands of years; the Cree and Métis were the main peoples of the region by the 1800s.
Two archaeological sites in Saskatoon known as the Gowen sites show that hunting peoples were here about 6,000 years ago. The South Saskatchewan River valley offered water, wood, shelter and bison, drawing people to the area again and again.
Layered settlement sites at Tipperary Creek, now within Wanuskewin Heritage Park north of the city, show regular winter habitation by Indigenous peoples. Archaeologists have uncovered campsites, tipi rings, bison kill sites and a medicine wheel there.
In the fur trade era the region was occupied mainly by the Cree and the Métis. Bison were central to their economies, and the disappearance of the herds in the 1870s threatened Plains peoples with hunger. Bones from the vanished herds were later shipped out from Saskatoon as freight.
1876 – 1899
Treaty 6 was signed, Dakota refugees settled nearby, and a temperance colony founded Saskatoon.
Cree, Assiniboine and Ojibwe leaders signed Treaty 6 with Canada at Fort Carlton on August 23, 1876, and at Fort Pitt on September 9. At Carlton, Treaty Commissioner Alexander Morris negotiated with the head chiefs Mistawasis and Ahtahkakoop, and the First Nations won terms not in earlier treaties, including a medicine chest to be kept at the Indian agent's house and a 'famine and pestilence' clause. Saskatoon lies within Treaty 6 territory.
Dakota people who had come north from the United States as refugees settled at the Moose Woods reserve, south of present-day Saskatoon, in 1881. Their leader, Chief Whitecap, would soon play a part in choosing the site of the new town.
The Temperance Colonization Society of Toronto received a federal land grant for an alcohol-free settlement. In 1882 a survey party led by Commissioner John Lake arrived and, on the advice of Chief Whitecap, chose a site on the high east bank of the South Saskatchewan River. The name Saskatoon likely comes from the Cree word for the saskatoon berry, which grew there in abundance.
Temperance colony settlers began arriving in 1883; Trounce House, built that year, is Saskatoon's oldest surviving house. Isolation and poor crops slowed growth. A ferry began carrying people across the river in 1884 and ran until the first bridge opened in 1907.
The 1885 resistance led by Louis Riel, fought at nearby Fish Creek and Batoche, discouraged settlement in the young colony. The Marr Residence, built in 1884, was used as a field hospital for wounded soldiers and still stands in Nutana.
After colony leaders lobbied for a rail link, a line from Regina to Prince Albert crossed the river at Saskatoon in 1890. The station was placed on the flatter west bank, and a new commercial centre grew there and took the name Saskatoon, while the original east-bank settlement became Nutana. The town shipped buffalo bones, cattle and grain.
1900 – 1928
Barr colonists, railways and the university turned three river villages into a booming city.
The west-bank village of Saskatoon, with 113 people, was incorporated in 1901. In 1903 more than 1,500 Barr colonists from England arrived and bought supplies before heading to the Lloydminster area; some stayed and founded a third settlement, Riverdale (now Riversdale). An American-backed land company also bought over a million acres between Regina and Saskatoon for settlement.
The three villages amalgamated in 1906 to form the city of Saskatoon, with about 4,500 people. Its charter set up a commission form of government led by the mayor and an appointed commissioner.
The Traffic Bridge, the city's first road bridge, opened in 1907 and replaced the river ferry. The river through the city is now spanned by seven road and rail bridges.
The legislature passed the University of Saskatchewan Act in 1907, creating a full university open to women as well as men, and Saskatoon was chosen as its home in 1909. The College Building, completed in 1912, is now a provincial and national historic site.
John Diefenbaker's family moved to Saskatoon in 1910, and he studied at the University of Saskatchewan before becoming a lawyer and, from 1957 to 1963, Canada's 13th prime minister. After his death in August 1979, a funeral train carried him across Canada for burial in Saskatoon beside the Diefenbaker Canada Centre at the university.
At the height of the real estate boom in 1912, Saskatoon was Canada's fastest-growing city, with an estimated 28,000 people, and it became a hub for all three transcontinental railways. Firms such as Quaker Oats, Robin Hood Flour, Massey-Harris and Rumely arrived, and streetcars began running in 1913. Inflated land values led to a bust when recession and war followed.
In 1919 Keng Wah Aviation trained young Chinese Nationalist pilots in Saskatoon. The school is an early chapter in the history of the city's Chinese community and of aviation on the Prairies.
Early aldermanic elections let men vote in each ward where they owned property. In 1920 women gained the vote in civic elections, and the ward system was abolished at the same time; it was later restored in 1973, abolished again in 1988 and brought back in 1991.
Gordie Howe, later known as 'Mr. Hockey,' was born in Floral, Saskatchewan, and is counted among Saskatoon's best-known sports figures. He became a 21-time NHL all-star, and statues of him stand in Saskatoon. Other Saskatoon sports figures include 1928 Olympic high-jump champion Ethel Catherwood.
1929 – 1957
The Depression hit Saskatoon hard; wartime training and postwar growth followed.
A late-1920s boom ended with the Great Depression, which The Canadian Encyclopedia describes as hitting Saskatoon harder than any other English-Canadian city. Its dependence on wheat, lack of water power and distance from markets limited industry. The city acquired land when owners forfeited properties for unpaid taxes, and adopted its first zoning plan in 1929.
During the Second World War, Saskatoon was home to one of the schools of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. After the war the city received immigrants including war brides, along with growing numbers of people moving in from farms.
Singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell moved to Saskatoon with her family as a child, recovered from polio there, and was encouraged in her writing by a Grade 7 English teacher. Jazz pianist John Ballantyne also grew up in the city, which has a strong arts and writing community.
A strong farm economy and migration from the countryside made Saskatoon one of Canada's fastest-growing cities in the 1950s. Its boundaries were greatly expanded between 1955 and 1961, including the incorporation of the railway town of Sutherland in 1956. In 1957 the city began a 'land bank' by buying available properties.
1958 – 1989
Potash, uranium and research diversified the economy, and the riverbank was protected.
Potash mines opened near Saskatoon from 1958, and uranium mines in the north added to growth through the 1960s and 1970s. Sources describe the start differently: The Canadian Encyclopedia dates the first nearby mines to 1958, while the Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan says sustained provincial production began in 1962 after flooding problems were solved. By 1970 ten mines were operating in Saskatchewan.
The removal of the rail yards and their pedestrian overpass from the city centre in 1964–65 opened land for a downtown shopping mall. Landmarks such as the Centennial Auditorium (1968) followed.
After citizen campaigns in the mid-1970s, the Meewasin Valley Authority was created in 1979 to conserve the South Saskatchewan riverbank and oversee development along it. Its trails and parks are now among the city's best-known features.
1990 – today
Inquiries examined police treatment of Indigenous people, while the city grew into Saskatchewan's largest.
Neil Stonechild, a 17-year-old Indigenous youth, was found frozen in a field in Saskatoon's northwest industrial area on November 29, 1990, partly clothed and wearing one shoe, after a night when it was about −28°C. His friend Jason Roy said he had last seen Stonechild bleeding in the back of a police cruiser. Saskatoon police closed the file within days, and the family's concerns went unanswered for a decade.
⚖️ Established fact
Established factThe provincial Commission of Inquiry led by Justice David Wright reported in October 2004 that Stonechild was last seen in the custody of Constables Larry Hartwig and Bradley Senger, that he died of cold exposure, and that injuries on his body were likely caused by handcuffs. It called the original investigation 'superficial and totally inadequate.' The two officers have denied having Stonechild in custody.
Saskatoon hosted the 1990 World Junior Hockey Championships; the Saskatchewan Place arena had opened in 1988. The Hilltops junior football club, Canadian champions 13 times, and the University of Saskatchewan Huskies are among the city's best-known teams.
After three years of planning, Wanuskewin Heritage Park opened north of the city in June 1992 under the leadership of First Nations people. It preserves and interprets the archaeological sites of the northern plains peoples, and about 14,000 schoolchildren a year take part in its programs.
Rodney Naistus, 25, and Lawrence Wegner, 30, were found frozen in Saskatoon's southwest industrial area near the Queen Elizabeth power station in late January and early February 2000. Darrell Night then said that on January 28 two officers had driven him to the same area and left him in about −22°C weather wearing only a jean jacket. Such drop-offs, in which police drove Indigenous people out of town and left them to walk back, were known as 'starlight tours.'
⚖️ Established fact
Established factConstables Dan Hatchen and Ken Munson admitted driving Night out of town and were convicted of unlawful confinement on September 20, 2001; the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal upheld their eight-month sentences in 2003. Inquests found that Naistus and Wegner died of hypothermia but could not determine how they came to be where they were found; whether police were involved in those two deaths has not been established.
Saskatchewan's justice minister called an inquiry in February 2003 after years of demands, and hearings began in Saskatoon that September. Justice David Wright's report, released October 26, 2004, found that Stonechild had been in police custody the night he died and criticized the police service for a defensive, self-protective attitude that lasted into the inquiry. On November 12, 2004, Police Chief Russell Sabo fired Constables Hartwig and Senger.
⚖️ Established fact
Established factThe commission of inquiry made findings against the Saskatoon Police Service and its original investigation and issued eight recommendations, including better race relations training. The Stonechild family sued the police service and officers in November 2005.
Demand for potash and uranium, research at Innovation Place and agricultural biotechnology fuelled a boom in 2007, when house prices rose by more than half. By the 2021 census Saskatoon had 266,141 people, the most in Saskatchewan, and Indigenous people made up 11.5 per cent of the population.
After Manitoba and Alberta, the Government of Saskatchewan apologized to survivors of the Sixties Scoop, the removal of Indigenous children from their families by child-welfare authorities. Premier Scott Moe credited the Sixties Scoop Indigenous Society of Saskatchewan for its work consulting survivors.
⚖️ Officially acknowledged
Officially acknowledgedIn January 2019 Premier Scott Moe apologized on behalf of the people and government of Saskatchewan, saying the province had failed survivors, their families and their communities.
About this timeline
Hunting peoples camped along the South Saskatchewan River at least 6,000 years ago, and the Cree, Métis and Dakota lived in the region when a Toronto temperance society chose the site for a dry colony in 1882. Three riverside villages merged into the city of Saskatoon in 1906, which grew on railways, grain, the university and later potash. Its recent history includes the 'starlight tours' scandal, in which an inquiry found that an Indigenous teenager who froze to death in 1990 had last been seen in police custody.
4 moments on this page carry a government record note.
FAQ
The Temperance Colonization Society chose the site in 1882 and the first settlers arrived in 1883. Saskatoon became a city in 1906 when it merged with Nutana and Riversdale.
The name is thought to come from the Cree word for the saskatoon berry, which grew abundantly along the river.
It was founded by the Temperance Colonization Society of Toronto, which received federal land to create a settlement free of alcohol.
The term describes police driving Indigenous people to the edge of the city in winter and leaving them to walk back. Two officers were convicted for doing this to Darrell Night in 2000, and a 2004 inquiry found Neil Stonechild had last been seen in police custody before he froze in 1990.
Archaeological sites at and near Wanuskewin show Indigenous peoples used the Saskatoon area for about 6,000 years.
Written from the sources linked on each moment: the Canadian Encyclopedia, the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Parks Canada, Library and Archives Canada, the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, provincial and city archives, and others. Where governments acted wrongly, we say so and note whether it has been officially acknowledged, is established by the record, or is disputed. Spotted an error? Tell us and we will fix it.
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