Carlyle's story starts in the early 1880s, when a Métis man named John G. Turriff chose a townsite about 8 kilometres south of today's town, on the east bank of Swift Creek. The first post office opened there on 1 December 1883. Years earlier, in 1874, the North-West Mounted Police had passed just south of the area on their March West along the Red Coat Trail, which today's Highway 13 approximates. Agriculture is what first drew settlers in the late 1800s.
When it looked as though the Canadian Pacific Railway would build its line north of the townsite, the town moved north in 1900 to its present location. The CPR branch line, running from Souris, Manitoba through Carlyle to Arcola, was in operation by 1901. Carlyle became a village in 1902 and a town in 1905. Its first postmaster chose the name to honour the niece of Scottish historian Thomas Carlyle, who settled with her husband and family on a farm in the Arcola district. Carlyle is also one of several southeast Saskatchewan communities named for poets, known as "Poet's Corner."
The Canadian National Railway reached town on 28 October 1909, and the first passenger train came through on 7 June 1910. In 1912 the CNR built a brick roundhouse and a bunkhouse for engineers. The water tower came down in 1969 as diesel replaced steam, and the old CN station, sold in 1976, now houses the Rusty Relics Museum and tourist information centre.
Today Carlyle is the service centre for the southeast corner of the province. Agriculture, oil and gas, and tourism drive the local economy, with oil booming from the 2000s. Visitors come for nearby Moose Mountain Provincial Park, and each December the town holds its Dickens Village Festival, the only one of its kind in Canada.
Written from Wikipedia’s article “Carlyle, Saskatchewan” (CC BY-SA 4.0), and shared under the same licence.