00:00So, how did a flat, treeless prairie, once called the Pilo Bones, become a capital city?
00:06It's a story of power, profit, and a whole lot of luck.
00:10In the 1880s, the new Canadian Pacific Railway was the nation's lifeline.
00:15A new capital for the vast Northwest Territories was needed, and it had to be on that railway line.
00:21This spelled the N for the old capital, Bat-Dud.
00:24The decision fell to Lieutenant Governor Edgar Dudney.
00:27He bypassed several promising locations and chose a barren, featureless patch of land he happened to own.
00:33The spot was derided as a flat, treeless plain with just one small, unreliable creek.
00:39Critics were outraged, accusing Dudney of choosing personal profit over public good.
00:44The biggest problem. Water.
00:46The so-called Pile O'Bones Creek was a disaster.
00:49It froze solid in the harsh winters and ran dry in the summer.
00:52The mighty railway had to ship water in on train cars, just to keep the fledgling capital from dying of
00:58thirst.
00:59It was a settlement on life support.
01:01Then, in 1883, just as the project seemed like a colossal failure, a drilling crew got lucky.
01:08They struck a deep, reliable source of fresh water, tapping into a massive underground aquifer.
01:14The settlement was saved.
01:16With its future secured, the Pile O'Bones was officially renamed Regina, in honor of Queen Victoria.
01:24When Saskatchewan became a province in 1905, Regina, against competitors, was officially named the provincial capital.
01:32From a controversial water-starve settlement, it transformed into the proud capital city we know today.
01:37The Pile O'Bones Creek was a disaster.
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