Banff Upper Hot Springs

About this audio guide

This guide to the Banff Upper Hot Springs in Banff, Alberta traces the November eighteen eighty-three discovery of the springs by three Canadian Pacific Railway workers, Frank McCabe and the McCardell brothers, and the dispute over who would own them. It follows the Canadian government's move to protect the site, the railway's push to turn it into a tourist draw, and the bathhouse a doctor named Robert Brett opened here in eighteen eighty-six. Along the way it connects the pool's heat to the same ice age forces that carved the surrounding peaks.