Official Name: | Balgonie |
Settlement Type: | Town |
Pushpin Map: | Saskatchewan#Canada |
Pushpin Map Caption: | Location of Balgonie in Saskatchewan |
Coordinates: | 50.488°N -104.269°W |
Subdivision Type: | Country |
Subdivision Name: | Canada |
Subdivision Type1: | Province |
Subdivision Type2: | Treaty |
Subdivision Name1: | Saskatchewan |
Subdivision Name2: | Treaty 4 |
Subdivision Type3: | Census division |
Subdivision Name3: | Division No. 6 |
Leader Title: | Mayor |
Leader Name: | Lain Lovelace |
Leader Title1: | Administrator |
Leader Name1: | Karen Craigie |
Leader Title2: | Governing body |
Leader Name2: | Town Council |
Established Title: | Post office Founded |
Established Date: | 1883 |
Established Title2: | Village incorporated |
Established Date2: | 1903 |
Established Title3: | Town incorporated |
Established Date3: | 1907 |
Area Total Km2: | 4.96 |
Population As Of: | 2016 |
Population Total: | 1,765 |
Population Density Km2: | 355.8 |
Postal Code Type: | Postal code |
Postal Code: | S0G 0E0 |
Area Code: | 306 |
Website: | Official website |
Footnotes: | [1] [2] [3] |
Balgonie is a town in southeast Saskatchewan. Situated at the intersection of Highways 10, 46, and the Trans-Canada Highway, the town is part of the White Butte region and neighbours Pilot Butte, White City, and McLean. As well, it is located 25 kilometres east of the province's capital city, Regina. As of the 2016 census, Balgonie had a population of 1,765, an 8.3% growth from 2011.[4] The town is governed by the Balgonie Town Council and is surrounded by the Rural Municipality of Edenwold No. 158.[5] Balgonie is located in Treaty 4 territory.
Balgonie has a Subway restaurant, two gas stations, an outdoor pool, and an ice arena. It is also home to Greenall School.
Balgonie was named for Balgonie Castle in Scotland. In 1882, the first train ran through the area on the Canadian Pacific Railway, and a post office was established in 1883.[6] In 1884, Sir John Lister Kaye established a model farm near the railway in Balgonie, with the town being the easternmost point of the old 76 Ranch lands.[7]
A school was built in 1891, and Balgonie was incorporated as a village in 1903 and as a town in 1907.
One of Balgonie's most famous residents was William Wallace Gibson (1876–1965), who created the first Canadian-built airplane. Gibson successfully flew his airplane in Victoria in 1910.[8] Gibson was the subject of the 1991 stop-motion animated short The Balgonie Birdman, directed by Brian Duchscherer and produced by the National Film Board of Canada.[9]
The town's population plummeted during the 1930s and 1940s, but the completion of the Trans-Canada Highway in the late 1950s brought new growth.
In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Balgonie had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of 4.76km2, it had a population density of in 2021.[10]