Journeys & Transformations: British Columbia Landscapes

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NATURE

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FIRST PEOPLES

· An Important Heiltsuk Site

HISTORY

· Remote Places: Ocean Falls

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Remote Places: Ocean Falls

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Town and mill

Ocean Falls in 1917. BC Archives I-50625.




		Distant from the busy commercial centres of Victoria and Vancouver, the pulp and paper community of Ocean Falls emerged, step by step, as an important centre of coastal British Columbia. The timber cruisers spent weeks searching for the proper site to build their pulp mill and found it at the head of Cousins Inlet just across from Dean Channel, where Alexander Mackenzie touched the Pacific Ocean. The timber they needed was all around them, but water for papermaking and as a source of power drew them to the site of Oceans Falls.


The critical water supply at Ocean Falls. BC Archives I-52861.

		Water played a critical part in the life of Ocean Falls. Linked to the outside world by the weekly boats, lashed by heavy rains, with the ocean in front and Link Lake above, it is hardly surprising that fishing, boating and swimming were among the leading recreational activities in the community. The company built an indoor swimming pool, and it is perhaps for its swimmers that Ocean Falls is most famous. This was especially so during the late 1940s and early 1950s when Lenora Fisher, Alan Gilchrist and Sandy Gilchrist, among many, swam in numerous international competitions including the 1952 Olympics at Helsinki.

Remote Places: Ocean Falls -


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