“You lucky sod.” That’s how an old friend reacted to the news that I was moving to Jasper and the editor’s chair of the Fitzhugh — but that’s what you would expect from a flatlander who sees Jasper as a resort town in the mountains, a haven from big city life with drop-dead vistas that draw thousands of visitors every year from every corner of the world.

Friends in Yellowknife, where I lived and worked as an editor after leaving Edmonton a decade ago in search of a northern adventure, were supportive, but questioned my decision to live anywhere else. You’ll miss summer, they said. True, but in Yellowknife, that event is still two frigid months away. On the other hand, as I write this, the temperature in Jasper is about the same as it is on the frozen shore of Great Slave Lake.

The two places are really quite similar. Jasper is surrounded by snow-capped mountains; so is Yellowknife, although the last ice sheet ground them down from mile-high giants to low hummocks of rounded granite. Yellowknife and the Northwest Territories are self-governing, but only in theory. In practice, on the big issues, Ottawa calls the shots through Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. In Jasper, it’s Parks Canada that causes town politicians to grind their teeth — or so I’ve been told. 

The demographics are similar, although Yellowknife is four times as large and has a contingent of young professionals, employed by government and transportation companies, who come for a summer and stay for a lifetime. 

Many of the people on Jasper’s streets are young and face the same challenges as their contemporaries in Yellowknife: where to live and how to pay the rent while working in the service industry. The same conundrum confronts merchants in both communities: how to draw and retain employees from a workforce limited by geography and an economy where there are so many better-paying alternatives.

Industry has laid its iron hand on both communities. Jasper feels the rumble of the railway and deep in its heart, Yellowknife will always be a hard rock mining town. Neither place is old by any standard, but both have active historical societies that do their best to keep the memories of the past alive.  

There are significant differences, of course. Yellowknife gets tourists — fishers, hunters, aurora watchers, and those souls who look at a map and just have to drive to the place at the end of the road — but nothing like the legions who descend on Jasper and continue to shape the town with their personal quests for thrills and souvenirs.

Several years ago I acted as guide for some Mexican friends on a ramble through the Rocky Mountains, from Waterton through Kananaskis, Banff and Lake Louise to Jasper. This town was their favourite; it felt closer to nature, less handled by commerce. It’s mine too, and for much the same reason. I look forward to adding my voice to those who write Jasper’s story. So call me a lucky sod.- JD