St. Albert was Alberta’s first colony. It was founded by the Métis who settled on river lots adjacent to the Sturgeon River followed by the French Canadians who later joined them. Francophone colonization to Alberta increased after 1870. The Lamoureux brothers were among the first in a wave of French-speaking settlers to arrive in Alberta from 1870 to 1920. Despite high expectations of Quebec to send settlers in large numbers, French-speaking settlers in this period came mostly from the United States and Europe. By 1885, French was the language of most non-Aboriginal residents in northern Alberta, but by 1916 it was spoken by only 5% of the population. Today, Francophones make up a little more than 2% of the population, even though the gross number of French-speaking people is increasing significantly, and today Alberta ranks fourth in terms of the largest provincial Francophone population across Canada.
