Lac Ste. Anne to abandon their nomadic lifestyle. He therefore sought out a new mission site more suitable for agriculture, and in 1861 a settlement was established along the Sturgeon River at Saint Albert, Rupert's Land. A broader mission In 1864 he was tasked with evangelizing the Cree Plains Indians, and from 1865 to 1872, he travelled extensively throughout the prairies. It was during this time that he brokered a peace between the Cree and the Blackfoot. In 1872 Lacombe was sent to Fort Garry (modern Winnipeg, Manitoba) to promote the colonization of Manitoba, and to this end travelled throughout eastern Canada and the United States. He became the Vicar of Saint Boniface, Manitoba, in 1879. It was during this period that he began his association with the Canadian Pacific Railway and extended his ministry to the navvies working on the right-of-way. Among those navies was Yellowhead and his Iroquois followers who worked across Canada on the Canadian Pacific Railway, until the railway was through the Rocky Mountains at Banff, after which Yellowhead appealed to Father Lacombe to assist him in acquiring a land base. The Michel Reserve, land to the north of St. Albert, was arranged by Father Lacombe, and given to Yellowhead's Iroquois followers. In 1882, he relocated to Calgary following the retirement of Father Constantine Scollen from the southern Alberta missions. When the CPR was preparing to lay track through Blackfoot territory against their wishes, he negotiated an agreement with the Blackfoot leader Crowfoot that allowed the railway to pass through Blackfoot land. Crowfoot was given a lifetime pass to travel on the railway by CPR president William Van Horne, as was Lacombe. When the North-West Rebellion erupted in 1885, Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald enlisted Father Lacombe's assistance in assuring the neutrality of the Blackfoot Indians. Although Cree braves commanded by Poundmaker and Big Bear were involved in the fighting, Crowfoot, believing the rebellion to be a lost cause, kept his warriors out of the conflict. Lacombe eventually wrote a biography on Crowfoot upon his death. Final years For the remainder of his life, Lacombe played a major role in founding schools throughout the West, such as St Mary's School in what is now the Mission District of Calgary. His last major travels were to Europe in 1900 and 1904, where he visited Austria and met Emperor Franz Joseph I. He also traveled to Galicia