The I. G. Baker Company incorporated the area around the fort as a part of its larger transportation network on the Whoop-Up Trail; and built a trading post and storehouse a few hundred metres away from the fort. The commercial opportunities provided by the transportation network also attracted the Hudson's Bay Company, who relocated their trading post at the Ghost River to the Elbow River across from Fort Calgary. The outpost initially also housed a mission of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, although they later relocated upriver in 1875. By 1877, a permanent church was established at the I. G. Baker Company post. During the latter half of the 1870s, the area found itself as a stopover route for travellers going from Fort Benton, Montana to Fort Edmonton.