By World War I Calgary had become a thriving community of over 50,000 people and the second largest city on the Prairies. Enterprises related to the beef processing industry had continued to grow and new railway lines had greatly expanded Calgary's commercial hinterland, thereby enhancing the city's role as a service and agricultural processing centre. The remarkable expansion of the regional rail network also meant substantial new employment in the metal trades affiliated with large railway maintenance and repair facilities. Associated with this development, the city underwent a frenzied real estate boom and frantic oil speculation on the eve of World War 1. While the war had dampened this activity, everyone in the city was optimistic that this headlong expansion would continue in peacetime.
The period's vitality is suggested in this busy 1918 street scene. The sandstone structures lining both sides of Stephen Avenue (now Eighth Avenue) stand as testimony to the accuracy of the city's increasingly advertised title "The Sandstone City of the Plains." Perhaps the measure of change and development is revealed most strikingly by comparing this photograph with one of the same avenue taken a generation earlier (see illustration 6 , Stephen Avenue looking east; the 1918 view is looking west). Horse-drawn wagons and buggies of the earlier period had given way completely to electric trollies and motor cars. This change had a profound impact on the community's spatial, economic and social development.
Note that despite the busy vehicle and pedestrian traffic, traffic lights have not yet made an appearance. Current fashions in dress are also apparent in this scene. See the newsboys in the foreground on either corner of the street. The signs on the street lamp standards at the intersection read: "$50.00 Fine for Spitting on Sidewalks."
