List of Municipal Cemeteries

Calgary and area
​Lethbridge, Medicine Hat & Taber

History of Union Cemetery in Calgary
In 1884, following the incorporation of Calgary as a town,  the new council set about finding land for a Protestant cemetery because the existing graveyard at St. Mary’s Cemetery could not meet the future needs of a growing city.

City councillors chose about fifty acres at Shaganappi Point; overlooking the beautiful river valley - now the site of the Shaganappi Golf Course. Unfortunately, back in the 1800s graves had to be dug by hand and it wasn't long before rocky soil conditions at Shaganappi Point forced council to seek another location. In 1891, Union Cemetery was established on a hill to the south of the city at 28 Avenue and Spiller Road S.E. When Shaganappi Point finally closed in 1892, the process of moving the burials from that site to the new Union Cemetery began.

When Union Cemetery was established in 1891, the cost of a single plot was five dollars, a double plot was ten dollars, and the charge for digging and closing was two dollars. These were significant amounts at the time - especially since the new burial ground could hardly be called convenient. No bridge existed over the Elbow River so funeral carriages had to lurch up and down steep banks and slosh through fairly deep and hazardous water. Pedestrian mourners had to wait until a ferryman rowed them over, a few at a time. And don't forget that Calgary's weather was as unpredictable then as it is today - something that was eventually recognized in 1909, when a mortuary chapel was built to store sealed caskets for the winter.

In 1912, The City erected a sandstone arch in Union Cemetery to act as a grand entrance to this important civic space, directly off MacLeod Trail at 25th Avenue S.E. As Calgary continued to develop, MacLeod Trail was widened and the LRT was constructed. In 2005, the sandstone arch was moved closer to the Reader Rock Garden to increase its visibility as well as to preserve its historic integrity. Today this forms the pedestrian entrance to the cemetery grounds.

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The Calgary Heritage Authority deemed Union Cemetery to be a historically significant cultural landscape that played an important part in the settlement and establishment of Calgary as a city.

Union Cemetery remembers the famous and the not so famous in its chiselled history. Here, you'll find the last resting place of pioneers and settlers whose names are synonymous with Calgary including:

• Bob Edwards (newspaperman and politician)
• A.E. Cross
• William Roper Hull
• James Macleod (NWMP Colonel)
• John Ware (legendary cowboy)
• Rev. Robertson (founder of Knox United Church)
• Esther Honens (creator of the Esther Honens piano festival)
• Lougheed family plots (a distinguished Calgary family)
• William. R. Reader (renowned Calgary horticulturist)

​While sandstone has withstood the test of time as a building material, monuments made from it have not fared as well. The deteriorating sandstone memorials in older areas of Union Cemetery has made some unreadable; and others are so badly worn that their original shape and design are lost forever. It was the sight of these eroding memorials, which prompted Pauline Kearns Ashley and Mary Kearns Trace to begin recording Union Cemetery gravestones in 1986. Their meticulous work, Monumental Transcriptions of Union Cemetery, Calgary, Alberta was complied with every effort to maintain accuracy. Copies can be accessed in The City of Calgary Corporate Records, Archives or in the Local History Room of the Calgary Public Library. Burial registers for Union Cemetery are also available in the Archives.

If you are interested in finding out more about Union Cemetery’s history please join The City of Calgary for one of their historical summer tours.

Information provided by The City of Calgary.