Dead Man's Flats

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More than a century ago in the quiet foothills of Alberta's rocky mountains two brothers built a small life together along the banks of the bow river

What began as a simple frontier story of imagination hard work and opportunity would eventually take a dark and violent turn

One spring in 1904 that quiet stretch of land became the scene of a brutal murder that shocked the small community of canmore

Now the place where it all happened still carries the memory of that crime in its name

Today we discuss that story and the place that is simply called dead man's flats

My name's Ben. I'm Nicole and you're listening to wicked and grim a true crime

podcast

Take a good drink of that

This is my favorite one actually is that well, I don't okay you guys didn't hear it

But Nicole had a massive coughing fit right when I'm trying to record the intro so make sure you're good make sure your voice is all right

Okay, do you

Sometimes when I'm doing like newborn sessions and stuff. I'll be completely fine like all of the graphing them. Just clarity

Yes, sorry. I'm a photographer as my other job right into the lingo

And do you know when you like aren't allowed or shouldn't cough even though you're completely fine

Like you've been completely fine all day, but then you're in a situation and your body just like

Has this need to cough. Oh deaf. Okay. I can demonstrate that exact thing right now. I literally can

Okay, you ready? Okay?

You're itchy right now somewhere. Oh, yeah, I already was I know but like right now someone right now is thinking

Just think about your itchy. There's gonna be somewhere. You're itching. It's probably like you're back or your knee or your elbow something

It's gonna itch, and you're gonna be cursing my name right now because I said it. It's the same thing with coughing or what's

What's worse is think about breathing. Yeah, or blinking or

Where your mouth has your tongue sitting inside of it. Where does your tongue sit? How many people are like?

Probably just getting just irate with us. My bad. Sorry, but it proves exactly what you're saying

Like it's that Murphy's law like when you shouldn't be doing something. That's when it's like well

Now yeah, because when you're reading the intro there like I have to be really quiet and then I and I was fine

But then all of a sudden this like tickle and it just like progressively got worse and I was trying to hold it in and

I just couldn't anymore. Oh well, but anyway, I do that a lot at newborn sessions to you being like I don't want parents

I think I'm sick and I'm not sick, but then my body's like

You're gonna cough

Screw you

Anyways, being sick and where your tongue should sit inside your mouth if you're itchy or not all set aside have an interesting Canadian case for you today

Yeah, now I will say

There is not a lot of detail surrounding this case

So I did the best I could because of the lack of detail this might be a little bit of a shorter episode

But I think it did pretty good. Okay, it's a bit of a

Multitru crime case mixed with a bit of history in there too right on these are both places that I want to well can more

I've never been to and it's like right by bam. That's another place. I don't want to go to like how have I not been to these places

I've only driven through because I I have gone to Calgary comic and entertainment expo many times because I'm a bit of a nerd

And you're not so I've driven through there of a way to Calgary many times without you

So I've been through these places and I know exactly where this is

Haven't been to the place, but I've been through it. Okay. Well, let's hear about this

So if you step back in time more than a century the Rocky mountains would feel very different than the art today

Long before highways cut through the valleys and travelers pass through by you know the thousands the mountains were a lot quieter

The forests were thicker the towns were smaller and much of the land between them while they remained wide open and

Untouched very vast and untamed

Now in those days

People came west chasing opportunity

Some arrived with dreams. You know striking it rich in the mines

Others hoped to carve out a much more simple life on the land raising animals farming what they could and building homes

Whenever the valleys allowed it

Now life in the mountains could be peaceful and beautiful

But it was also very isolated

Cabin stood miles apart and news traveled extremely slow and when something happened in those remote places

It often unfolded far from the eyes of the outside world

Most days would pass very quietly, but every so often

Something would happen that people simply couldn't forget

It may be a single random moment or maybe a violent act even a story whispered between neighbors until the land itself

began to carry the memory of it and

Sometimes

Those stories linger long enough that the place where they happened eventually makes you know

What it's way into history even potentially

It's name of the land itself

Now long before this place became a rest stop along the trans Canada Highway

The Bo Valley area in Alberta Canada was already an important route through the Rocky Mountains

For thousands of years indigenous groups including the Stoney, Dakota used the valley as a natural corridor through the rugged landscape

Later came explorers, fur traders and settlers all following the same path carved by the Bo River as it wound through the mountains

And by the late 1800s the region was beginning to change

The arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1883

Opened the valley to large numbers of newcomers

Cole was soon discovered in the surrounding mountains and the small settlement of Kenmore quickly grew into a busy mining town

Workers arrive from across Canada and even Europe drawn by the promise of a steady job in the mines and the chance to build a new life on the frontier

But despite the growing industry nearby

Much of the surrounding land remained quiet and isolated

Now just south east of Kenmore the Bo River flattened out as it flowed past the base of Pigeon Mountain

Here the river spilled across a stretch of low open ground an area that the locals simply referred to as the flats

In the early 1900s, it was very peaceful dotted with small homesteads and farms that were far removed from the noise of the mines

It was on this quiet stretch of land along the banks of the Bo River that a small dairy farm once stood and it was here

In the spring of 1904 that a violent crime would take place and give the landscape the ominous name of dead man's flats

But long before the story of dead man's flats unfolded in the Canadian Rockies

It began thousands of kilometers away in rural France

The Marit family lived in the Overn region a rugged area of mountains and farmlands in central France

Their parents Pierre and Anne Marit were cattle farmers raising their children in a modest rural life built around hard work and survival off the land

Now Pierre and Anne had a total of six children

Though two of them unfortunately died young which was not the most uncommon for the time

The four surviving siblings were Jean, Louis, Francois and their younger sister, Eugenie

Like many young men in the area of France, the brothers spent time in the military

Several of them served in the French army gaining experience that would later shape their lives in rather unexpected ways

The Francois in particular had a difficult military history

At some point during his service he was discharged from the army

Though the exact reasons are not entirely clear in any sort of surviving records

But that might highlight some things later on

Now life in rural France at the end of the 19th century could be difficult

Opportunities were limited and many young men dreamed of leaving for a place where fortunes could be made

News of opportunity overseas especially in North America soon spread quickly through villages and farming communities

For the Marit brothers that promise of opportunity

Eventually became too strong for them to ignore

And by the late 1890s two of the brothers made a decision that would set the entire story into motion

They would leave France behind and try their luck in Canada

It was in 1898 when the two brothers Jean and Louis left France and set out for North America

Like thousands of other immigrants at the time

They arrived with very little money in their pockets

But with the hope that Canada offered a chance at a much better life

Their journey eventually brought them to the Bo Valley area in Alberta

A remote but rapidly developing place in the Rocky Mountains

The small mining town of Canmore had begun to grow after the coal was discovered in the surrounding mountains

And the Canadian Pacific Railway made it easier for everyone and supplies to reach the region

Now when John first arrived in Canmore

He found work as a night guard at the Dynamite storage area

Used in the local coal mines

It wasn't glamorous work

But it was steady and it gave him the chance to get established in the new region and country

Then over time

John began building something of his own

It was along the Bo river flats not far from the base of Pigeon Mountain

There he started operating a small dairy farm

The land there was relatively open compared to the surrounding mountains

And the nearby river made it very suitable for farming

Life here in the flats was quiet

The nearest town was Canmore

Which was several kilometers away

And the dairy farm sat in a stretch of alley

Where the river widened and slowed as it passed through on the low ground

That kind of sounds like heaven

It does sound like heaven

Having a little farm in the middle of nowhere

I think a lot of people nowadays kind of dream of having something like that, right?

Well yeah, because I'm a picturing like this piece of land

It like overlooked the river and had like just like a picturesque kind of you, right?

Yeah, basically

Oh, and then they yeah had cows like oh man

Yeah, now the flats is like it is very flat

So like he's probably not too high above the river

It's like very big banks or anything

Like picture if

Even more pretty really

Oh definitely

A picture like that river rising would seem like in Gulf of land

If there's like a major flood or something like that, right?

I don't think that was exactly common

But just an idea on how flat it was

So you have to think like okay, this area was it was shaped by the river

And eventually it kind of flattened out

Carving its way through the mountains

And then slowly it became a smaller stream of water over the years

The decades the the centuries, right?

Okay, because yeah, honestly living by water like that

Could be a little bit freaky

We have some areas in our town that are pretty close to the river and they flood

Like every few years

Yeah, it's occasional

And I'm like that must kind of be stressful and kind of suck out

But the thing is the water is so good for the soul though

Like you just you sit there on a riverbank and you hear the flowing water

Oh

Or the lapping waves of the ocean or a lake

Even just the pond a little splash of the shore or a fish jump

It's just so nice

It just fills your cup

It does

Now John worked hard to build a stable life here

And eventually his brother, Louis joined him

He was helping on the farm while also working in the coal mines nearby

Like many men of the valley, they took whatever they could find for work

The brothers had come to Canada chasing an opportunity and for a time

seemed like they might have found it

But in the early 1900s, another member of the Marit family would arrive in Bo Valley too

It was by 1902

That word of the Marit brothers new life in Canada had made its way back to France

And soon after that

Their younger brother Francois decided to follow them across the Atlantic

When he arrived in the Bo Valley

He joined John on the small dairy farm

On the flats where Pigeon Creek met the Bo River

At first he helped with all the work around the farm

And running a dairy operation in the rugged foothills of the Rockies

It wasn't exactly easy

There were long days of work that was constant

And whether it was milking cows or tending to the land

Or anything else that needed to be up kept on the small operation

It had to be done and they were working at it

However, Francois didn't seem to enjoy the life of a farm hand

After about 15 months of working with his brother

He drifted away from the dairy operation

And began taking odd jobs around the region instead

That is fair

Okay, we have 10 chickens

And I feel like they're a lot of work

That's only 10 chickens though

I couldn't imagine how many cows they have

But also he would have kind of known what this work was like

It's true

He would have had to help I imagine on their farm in France

Yeah, his parents had a bit of a farm as well

So he should have known

It's not like, you know what, working on a farm is any fucking news to him

He should know the labor it takes

Yeah, well maybe he didn't like

I guess it would be different though working for your brother versus

Like your parents per se too

Well, and I think part of it might have been

You know what, he left the farm life for something better

And he goes to farm life

To the same thing basically

Yeah, so maybe it was just that swap

It wasn't what he's expecting

Yeah

And then a lure of

Well, what's to come of these, you know, industries that are progressing

Bigger money, right?

So right, yeah

I mean, next I have written here

Like many men in the Bo Valley area at the time

He eventually found work in the coal mines near Canmore

So the coal mines probably paid a lot better

I mean, it's a lot more hard work

It's a lot more dangerous

But it's the basically the best paying job in the area

Now meanwhile the third brother, Louis

He had his site set on something else entirely

The Klondike Gold Rush

It was a drawing thing for prospectors in the north

And it was pulling them in by the thousands

And Louis soon left the Bo Valley area behind

To try his luck in the Yukon

Now that left John and Francois in the valley together

Now by most accounts the two brothers were very different people

John was seen as responsible and hardworking

The kind of man who built something for himself

Through persistence and discipline

But Francois on the other hand

Well, he was quieter and a lot more unpredictable

Some people described him even as withdrawn

And even a little strange

At first, these differences may have seemed harmless

But as time passed in Bo Valley

The behavior of Francois began to grow increasingly strange

According to later testimony

Francois started to hear things that no one else could hear

He claimed voices spoke to him

One's that he said belonged to his dead parents

Oh shit

Here I just thought he was having trouble adjusting to a new country

But that's a little bit more intense

A little bit more intense

So he said they were coming to him

And speaking to him from beyond the grave

And along with the voices

Also came a constant buzzing sound in his head

That he said he could never escape it

It was always there

Now as time passed

These experiences began to shape

How he saw the world around him

In dark and very strange ways

In fact, Francois became convinced that his brother John

Was plotting to kill him

In his mind

John had built some kind of invisible electrical machine

That he hid somewhere in the nearby forest

Francois said he could hear this strange device

Wirling at times

Even though he admitted he had never actually seen it

Now whether he had seen it in his own eye or not though

It didn't matter because to him this machine was real

And the voices in his head

Reinforced this belief too

According to Francois

The voices of his parents warned him

The John was dangerous

And that he needed to defend himself against John

Before

It was too late

Cool

Okay this is not good

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Who's ready for the truss fall

Now whether the cause of this mental illness in Francois

Was trauma from his early military service

Or something else entirely

The paranoia continued to grow

Doctors who would later examine him

Believed he was suffering from severe hallucinations

Tied to a deep mental disorder

That they couldn't really figure out

Some experts even suggested the condition

May have been linked to his time serving

In the French foreign legion in Africa

Where harsh conditions and years of extreme hardship

Could leave lasting psychological damage

But in the quiet isolation of Bo Valley in the early 1900s

Well, there were a few ways for someone struggling with mental illness

To receive any help

And my likely guess is probably the only way

Was I bet at the bottom of a bottle

Yeah, well I mean even today it's still

It's come ridiculously far

But it's sometimes still somewhat misunderstood

For sure

Back then it's like you're kind of almost who

You're on your own basically

Yeah

Now as Francois fears a deep end

The line between reality and imagination

Began to blur more and more

And by the spring of 1904

The situation had reached a dangerous point

Francois had become convinced that his brother

Was an enemy who needed to be stopped

Then

Tensions inside Francois' mind

Reached a crescendo

The voices he claimed to hear

The buzzing sounds

And his belief that his brother was trying to kill him

Had all become part of his everyday thinking

And on May 10th 1904 something happened

Francois borrowed an axe

From a woman named Ella May Lauder

Now borrowing tools between neighbors of course

Wasn't unusual in small

Frontier communities like Bo Valley

And at the time there was nothing about the request

That seems suspicious

But in hindsight

The moment carried a much darker meaning

Because that very axe would become the weapon he used

In the brutal act that followed

Now whether Francois had already decided

What he was going to do

Or whether the plan formed sometime later that night

Isn't entirely clear

But what is known

Is that the axe stayed with him

After he borrowed it

As night fell over the quiet flats along Bo River

The merit brothers returned to their usual routine

Their small cabin sat in the isolated stretch of land

Where Pigeon Creek met Bo River

Surrounded by forest and open valley

To anyone passing by

It would have looked just like another peaceful evening in the mountains

But inside that cabin however darkness had crept inside

It was in the early morning of May 11th

1904

The quiet dairy farm along Bo River was still wrapped in darkness

And around 5.30 am

Francois Maurit

Got out of bed and retrieved the axe he had borrowed that day before

While his brother Jean was still sleeping

Jean Maurit was 32 years old at the time

He was hard working

He was a dairy farmer who had gone to bed expecting to wake up and begin another day of work on the farm

But he never got that chance

Francois loomed over his brother clutching the axe in his hands

Staring down as his brother slept

And then he attacked him in his bed

The murder was sudden and brutal and it was carried out before Jean had any opportunity to defend himself

And once the attack was over

Francois was left alone in the cabin

With the blood and his brother's lifeless body

That is some savage ass shit

Using an axe as a weapon I just don't think that I could ever

Be okay with that because that I don't know it's visceral

Yeah, the visual of anyone killing someone with an axe just seems ridiculously brutal

Yeah, you want to talk about getting personal in an attack

I think I think hammers and axes are the two that like

Scream

Personal because it's going to be savage. It's going to be bloody. It's going to be brutal and it's gonna hurt

Yeah, and this brother he was just sleeping he had to have wonder though if he had

Well, he would never probably thought his brother would do something like this

But he would have had to have noticed some sort of change in his brother. I'm sure he did notice there's some change

But I don't think yeah, like you say he would never have thought his brother was capable of killing him. No

Now sometimes afterward

He carried John's body outside and brought it down to the nearby bow river

And there he disposed of his brother by throwing his body into the water

Wow

Now the river flowed past the low open stretch of land with a shallow area where the current slowed and spread across the valley floor

So he wouldn't be taken away very fast

In fact, he wouldn't have been taken very far and before long the body would be discovered

But at that moment in the early morning light of May 11th

Only one person knew what had happened still inside that cabin

But afterwards Francois did something that would quickly draw attention to himself

Rather than fleeing the area he went about his morning almost as if

You know what nothing had happened

And at some point after the murder

Francois traveled to Canmore the small mining town several kilometers away where he'd been working in the coal mines

When he arrived

He reportedly began telling people that his brother wasn't going to be coming to town that day

Because he too did some work right he didn't just work full time at the farm right so he was telling people

Yeah, his brother's not going to be coming to work today. He's not he's not coming

now

That was odd

It was odd for him to make a statement like that and it didn't go unnoticed people paid attention when something seemed off or out of place

Especially when someone began offering explanations for things before anyone had even asked any questions

And so before long word reached the authorities

The northwest mounted police the law enforcement that was operating across the Canadian frontier at the time began looking into the situation

Meanwhile along the bow river flats

Jean's body did not remain hidden

After being thrown into the river it drifted to that shallow stretch and was eventually discovered

Once the situation became clear

The northwest mounted police began investigating the killing and their attention quickly turned towards Francois

Okay, here I was thinking he could he could have just gone into town and been like my brother's on well

He's not feeling good. He's gonna, you know, he's at home sick

But then if they're gonna find him anyway because the river gets very shallow

Well, he could have just not said anything maybe dispose of his brother in a different way and potentially got away with it

Yeah, you're talking like the early 1900s on a farm

No one's gonna question if you dig a little bit of a hole and bury something in it

Yeah, or even if he had just gone to work too and like pretended like nothing was out of the normal and then

um

He just said this happened while he was at work or something right like there was I don't you I mean he was attacked with an axe

You know

Who's gonna attack with an axe like like a sort of person that's like I don't know doesn't like his brother

Could happen. Yeah, but you're in a remote area in a cabin

Likelihood of someone else coming in and attacking him with an axe is slim is very slim

So he's gonna be suspect number one right away

So you have to hide the body to try and get away with it. Yeah, but yeah

Like you said just bury a hole. He probably would have gotten away with it. Probably yeah

Where'd I leave off here? Okay, so once the situation was clear the Northwest Mounted Police began investigating and their attention turned to Francois

And later that same morning officers located him at Okalusa Hotel in Kenmore

Where he was placed under arrest

From there Franco was taken into custody and charged with the murder of his brother

For the people living in Bo Valley the crime was shocking

Violent killings were extremely rare in small mountain communities of the early 1900s like this and

Not long after his arrest

Francois was brought to Calgary. He was brought there to stand trial for the murder of his brother

During this time serious criminal cases were you know smaller communities had to deal with these

They couldn't have the capacity to take it on so communities like Kenmore for example

They were often sent to are sent to their

culprits their people who do these crimes to larger regions for the courts and the capacity of them taking care of it

Makes sense so the trial began almost two weeks after the killing

Moving very quickly by modern standards. Well, no kidding. I'm like. I love how streamlined this is and also it was like same day

You killed your brother you arrested exactly

Now what followed in the courtroom left many people struggling to understand what had been going through Francois's mind

During testimony Francoi openly admitted that he had killed his brother

But the explanation he offered while it was very unsettling to everyone

He told the courts that he believed John was trying to murder him using the aforementioned

Mysterious electrical machine hidden somewhere in the forest

According to Francois he heard the strange device for on multiple occasions describing that whirling sound

That convinced him he his life was in danger

Now I do have two quotes that I already kind of alluded to from Francois himself during testimony one being quote

I wanted to kill my brother because John tried to kill me with a worrying electric machine

And quote number two. I never saw the machine, but I heard it several times and I'm assuming

It's safe to assume that this machine just did not exist correct. I think it's safe to assume that yes

He also told the courts of hearing the voices of his dead parents that spoke to him warning him that John was planning to kill him

So in his mind basically the attacked will it was it was an act of self-defense

Other testimony offered different possibility for motives as well one witness suggested that Francois may have been angry that John had refused to pay him for work

That he'd done on the dairy farm

But as the trial continued it became increasingly clear that Francois mental health

would become the central issue of this case

Medical experts were called to testify about his condition and doctors described the voices and hallucinations as signs of

Sirius mental illness

So after hearing the testimony and medical opinions the jury was left with a very difficult task

To decide the fate of Francois Meret

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I think I'll wait inside.

There was very little debate about whether Francois had committed the killings.

I mean, he himself had admitted to attacking his brother with the axe in the first place,

but the real question before the court was whether he'd been mentally capable of understanding

his actions.

The testimony about the voices, the invisible electrical machine, and his growing paranoia

weighed heavily on the case.

At first, the jury found him guilty of the killing.

But under a lot of the time, that was not the end of the matter.

The court still had to decide whether he was legally responsible for the crime, and ultimately

the court ruled that Francois Morett was not guilty by a reason of insanity.

Okay.

So even back then, they kind of took that into consideration, which for some reason surprises

me.

Yeah.

So rather than being sent to prison, he was ordered to be confined to a mental institution

for the rest of his life.

Authorities transferred him to the Brandon Asylum in Manitoba, one of the psychiatric institutions

used at the time to house people considered criminally insane.

For the small community of Bo Valley, the verdict closed the legal chapter of the story.

The man responsible was, you know, removed from society, and that was that.

But the story, well, it's not entirely over from here.

After the trial, Francois Morett was transported over to the Asylum, and very little is known

about his day-to-day life there.

Records from the early 1900s are limited, and much of the detail surrounding his time there

has been lost over the years.

What is known, though, is that he remained confined at Brandon for several years following

the trial.

And Francois was a young man when the crime took place.

But his time in the institution was short.

On October 7, 1909, just five years after the murder of his brother, Francois Morett died

at the Asylum.

He was only 31 years old.

Okay, shit.

I was like, he got out.

He didn't get out, no.

And we don't know why he died, or how he died?

No, not from what I could find.

Okay, that's too bad.

I mean, I imagine treatment at those places at those times were not the best, so my imagination

can only come up with a few stories.

Well, and then true, like, as well, when you get sick, there's less that can be done

and stuff too, right?

Yeah, for sure.

And I mean, honestly, like, who knows, they could have lobotomized them and things

gone downhill after that.

Who knows?

It's a plethora of different things.

Now some later accounts have suggested that he may have taken his own life, though exact

circumstances surrounding his death, they're just unclear, but there are some places out

there that claim this could be true, but it's not really known still.

Now, like many details from the era, the records are simply incomplete, and we may never

know the full truth.

And with his death, the man responsible for the killing at the Bow River Dairy Farm

faded into history, but the story was still not going to end there.

Because while the tragedy between John and Francois was unfolding, at that time, their older

brother, Louis, was chasing an opportunity far to the north.

Like thousands of others at the turn of the century, Louis had been drawn to the clandite

gold rush.

Prospectors flooded into the Yukon, hoping to strike it rich, and for the most of them,

their dream never materialized.

But for Louis, however, it did.

In 1906, reports began appearing in newspapers describing a significant gold discovery at

Baker Creek on the Stuart River in Yukon.

One of the claims there was owned by Louis Merrett.

According to an article printed in the Dawson Daily News on May 11, 1906, the claim

was producing strong results, and the report described, quote, fine pay being pulled

from the ground.

And even mentioned that nuggets were occasionally being found too.

OK, I like that because I feel like this family kind of has really shitty luck.

So I'm glad that I guess one of them is, you know, at least kind of thriving.

Well, he thriving is a good word for it, because by some estimates, Louis Merrett earned

around $420,000 in gold between 1905 and 1906, which is an enormous fortune for the

time.

Yeah.

And you adjust that to a modern value that's roughly 18 million Canadian dollars.

Holy shit.

He struck rich.

He struck your rich.

It's an incredible contrast to the events that took place back in Bo Valley just a couple

years earlier to say.

No kidding.

But Louis' life later became something of a mystery.

People records suggest that he eventually moved to Washington State sometime after 1911,

where he married twice and later enlisted in the United States Army as a field artillery

officer during the First World War.

However, the war ended before he was deployed.

Despite the fortune, he was believed to have made during the gold rush, there is little

evidence that Louis actually lived the life of a wealthy man.

People who later looked into his story found that he worked a variety of ordinary jobs.

And there was no clear explanation for what happened to the gold that he had once earned.

Now another unusual detail about the surviving members of the Marat family also emerged

over time.

Both Louis and his brother, Francois, ultimately chose not to have children, or at least

not biologically.

Instead they adopted.

Now some family researchers have suggested that concerns about hereditary mental illness

may have played a role in the decision, reflecting ideas about genetics or anything like that

circulating that era.

Now whatever the reason, the Marat family story ended up taking dramatically different paths

when you look at it.

One brother died in an asylum after committing the brutal murder of another brother, while

another brother struck rich on gold in the Yukon and then quietly disappeared into history.

But the place where the tragedy happened, the quiet stretch of land along the Bow River

would eventually take on a name that kept the memory of that dark moment, the story of

these brothers all alive.

The years ticked by, but that wasn't going to be the end.

Farm, small homesteads and mining operations remained scattered across Bovali, and the

story of the killing, yeah sure, it faded into history, but it didn't fade from local

memory.

At some point in the early 1900s, locals began referring to the area as dead man's flat.

Obviously when the name first appeared isn't clear, but evidence suggests that it already

had common use well before the mid 20th century.

One clue appears in August 25th, 1924's edition of the Calgary Herald, which used the name

Dead Man's Flats, showing that the nickname had been circulating for decades.

But over time the origin of the name became a subject of debate.

For many believe it referenced the 1904 axe murder of Jean-Marrette, other explanations

began to surface too.

One popular story involved two Stony Nikota trappers who'd been illegally trapping Beaver

in the area when a park warden approached their camp.

With no way to escape, the men, well, they supposedly covered themselves in beaver blood,

lay down on the ground and pretended to be dead.

According to the tale, the warden saw this, ran off to go get help, and the trappers took

the opportunity to escape with their pelts.

Oh gosh, that's actually incredibly smart.

That's quite the story, right?

However, historians have pointed out some problems with this story.

There are no records of such an incident in the park warden's reports ever taking place,

and if two men had played dead, some have suggested the name would have likely been Dead

Men's Flats, not Dead Man's Flats being pluralized.

Okay.

Yeah.

Another explanation surfaced decades later.

In 1954, the Calgary Herald reported a story claiming that a prospector had been murdered

in a cabin near the river, and then that would be where the name Dead Man's Flats came

from, from that killing.

But this explanation also has issues.

The name Dead Man's Flats had already appeared in newspapers decades earlier prior to this,

suggesting that it had been in use long before this supposed prospector's murder took

place.

Because of that, many local historians believe the most likely explanation is still the

simplest one.

The name Dead Man's Flats traces back to the violent killing of Jean-Marette in 1904,

when his brother Francois murdered him through his body into the river, and then it became

known as Dead Man's Flats.

With the name, sticking over time.

Now for decades, that name existed mostly as a local nickname, and that was it.

But things began to change in the mid-20th century.

The construction of the Trans-Canada Highway in the 1950s brought a steady flow of travelers

through the valley.

What had once been a remote farming area gradually turned into a convenient stop for motorists,

truck drivers, and tourists passing between Calgary and the infamous BAMF.

Gas stations, motels, and service businesses began appearing along the highway, and the

areas slowly developed into a small commercial service center.

For a time, the official name of the community was something much less dramatic.

Between 1974 and 1985, the settlement was formally known as Pigeon Mountain Service Center,

referencing the nearby mountain rather than the darker local legend.

But the older name had never really disappeared from local use.

And then officials actually made a decision that surprised some people.

In 1985, they gave the adopted name to the community as the new official name.

It was now officially called Dead Man's Flats.

According to the local historians and municipal leaders, the unusual name was chosen partly

because it was memorable and helped attract curiosity from travelers passing through

both valley.

But not everyone loved the name.

In 2014, a resident asked the municipal district to consider changing it to something a little

more pleasant.

Some people felt the name was too grim for a modern community.

But after discussing the request, local counselors voted unanimously to keep the name.

Hmm.

That's actually impressive.

It is.

We don't really need to hide that bad shit happens either, right?

I mean, well, exactly.

Very aware.

And part of the reasoning was like, you know, historical, the name had been used for however

many generations.

Hmm.

So a lot of people felt it represented, you know, an authentic piece of local history rather

than something that should just be erased and covered up with, you know, a pretty name

because.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Now, as one local official explained at the time, changing it would risk becoming a form

of historical revision, removing a reminder of events that shaped the identity of this

very place.

And so the name remained today, dead man's flats is the small, but growing community that's

tucked along Bo Valley, just seven kilometers south east of Canmore and about 78 kilometers

west of Calgary.

Travelers passing through on the trans Canada highway might stop for fuel, a meal, or

a night at one of the motels before continuing deeper into the Rocky Mountains.

It was once a quiet stretch of farmland along the Bo River has slowly developed into a

service hub for travelers and a residential area for people working in the nearby communities.

According to the 2021 Canadian Census, the area has a population of 377 residents, which

is a significant increase from just 125 people in 2016.

Okay, but just hold, hold, hold the horse here for a sec.

And their address is actually like dead man's flats.

Correct.

Okay.

I can kind of understand that that residents kind of concern, then that it that is a video

re, I suppose.

Okay.

That's where they live.

They live in dead man's flats.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

So with new housing proposals and development plans, the small settlement continues to grow.

But behind the modern buildings, the passing traffic, the history just still remains.

More than a century ago, this quiet stretch of land was the site of a violent act between

two brothers trying to build a new life in Canada.

One of them would die in his bed, killed by an axe, and the other would spend the rest

of his short life confined to an asylum with things going on in his mind that no one understood.

Over time, the details of the crime faded, replaced by legend and competing stories about

how the place got its name.

Some people still prefer the tale of the clever trappers who pretended to be dead to escape

the park warden.

Others pointed the rumors of the murdered prospector, but many historians agree that the name

dead man's flats comes from the murder in 1904 when John's body was thrown into the

bow river near the shallow stretch of land where the river slows and spreads across the

valley floor.

Today, most people passing through the area honestly would never think twice about the

name of the highway sign.

But regardless, the name remains.

And it's a quiet reminder that long before it was a roadside stop in the Rocky Mountains,

this place was once the scene of a crime that gave the land a blood-soaked scar that would

stand the test of time.

And that's the story of dead man's flats, ding dang, ding, dang, indeed.

Brick and dang.

So have you been how often do we end with ding dang?

I just realized that no, no, that's going to be a lot like a betcha's 90% of our episodes.

How am I just realizing?

Well, how else you end this shit?

Really?

Kate, so have you been there?

Did you have driven through?

I have driven through.

I have driven through.

Okay.

See, I want to drive through.

It is like a little bit of a tourist attraction of sorts, the name makes it, the name makes

it that.

For sure.

And when I say drive through, like from my recollection of it, it's just a highway, like

a double lane highway, and you have to go on like an off ramp to the community on the

side of the highway.

Okay.

So like driving through is more like driving by it, I guess.

You have like mountains on the one side, and then there's just like the pull-outs to go,

you can see like gas stations and buildings, and you pass by it, and that's about all

you see, because it's small, it's a small community.

Well, yeah.

See, it makes me want to go visit it, just as a tourist, but the name alone does not make

me want to go and live there, so I can kind of get that.

Well, next time we go to Calgary, let's rent a vehicle if we fly, if we drive, we can

take our own vehicle.

But next time we're in Calgary, let's make a point of driving over to Deadman's flat.

Yeah.

Take some pictures.

I mean, gosh, that's like quite a story though, it's pretty, it's pretty eerie.

It is.

I thought it was kind of more so just the river that spot was named that, or it was like

a tagline of sorts, I didn't realize it was the town's damn name, so.

Well, it was kind of the area of the river, and the area developed its own little community,

and that community is called Deadman's flat.

I mean, it's very unique, give it that, that's kind of cool.

Yeah.

I like how it actually has history in there, and this episode, honestly, half of it was

a history lesson, really.

Yeah.

Well, imagine going anywhere though when people are always like, where do you live, where

are you from, and you have to say that, like, Deadman's flat.

The follow-up questions that would come, you know, would be a lot.

No kidding.

Cool.

But kind of cool, too, kind of unique.

I don't even know how you would really say what you would say, like, you wouldn't want

to go into the, you know, this, this freak, or maybe they can just recommend our podcast

now.

Too shay.

Too shay.

I'm actually curious, how many of you have heard of this place and this story before?

Of course, if you're local to the area, you probably know it, but if you are outside

of 100 kilometers of this place, I want to know if you've heard of this story before.

I mean, if you're still close to it, I want to know, too, but primarily I want to know

if you are away 100 kilometers from where it exists, have you heard of it?

I'm thinking we're probably about what, like, 800 kilometers are so away.

I think we're a little, we're probably about 700, I'm guessing.

Okay.

And I have not heard of this at all.

No.

No.

I have, but only because I've driven through it and I've seen the sign.

I haven't heard of the story.

I've just remembered the sign and then I came across the story the other day and I was

like, oh snap.

Hmm.

Cool story, not cool that the brother killed the brother, but it is a very interesting

story.

It is.

But anyways, let us know what you think and let us know if you've heard of it before.

I like covering these little small Canadian ones sometimes.

It's fun.

Thank you for being here.

Don't forget to check with the description of this podcast.

Leave a review for us because it's just us doing this and we do it for you.

So your support goes a long way and reviewing the podcast, telling other people to check

it out.

It goes a long way, too.

So thank you very much.

You guys are amazing.

And until next time, stay wicked.

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