This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations .(November 2019) |
The North Pacific Cannery (NPC) located near Port Edward, British Columbia, Canada, is one of the longest standing canneries in the Port Edward area. NPC was founded in 1889 by Angus Rutherford Johnston, John Alexander Carthew, and Alexander Gilmore McCandless. [1] The plant stopped processing salmon in 1968, becoming a reduction plant until its closure in 1981 after 80 years of operations. [2] [3]
The North Pacific Cannery was built at the mouth of the Skeena River on “Cannery Row”. The 183 acres of land was purchased for $32 by Carthew. In order for the North Coast Marine Museum Society to preserve NPC, it had to receive funds up to $4 million, which was succeeded by the canneries 100th anniversary in 1989. [4] NPC has 25 buildings that can be toured, including a visitor centre, canning loft, First Nations and Japanese bunk houses, European house, and the Mess House, which has been turned into a small café. [1] [4]
Year | Event |
---|---|
1888 | North Pacific Canning Company Ltd formed |
1889 | John Alex Carthew received a crown grant to purchase 183 acres for $32 in December |
1891 | Carthew sold plant to Henry Ogle Bell-Irving |
1892 | Bell-Irving sold plant to Anglo-British Columbia Packing Company Ltd. |
1892 | “The Big Slide”- A landslide destroys First Nations housing killing at least nine people |
1900 | One-line cannery |
1908/1909 | First Nation and Chinese worker housing removed for the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway |
1908/1909 | First Nation housing moved to pillars over the Skeena River, while Chinese housing was moved close to the mountains |
1910 | Cold storage plant created |
1914 | Grand Trunk Railway (GTR) completed linking NPC and other canneries to the nation |
1914 | GTR now referred to as The Canadian National Railway |
1918 | Can making factory created; created and supplied cans to other canneries in the surrounding area |
1920 | Mild Cure plant closed |
1923 | Two-line plant. Powered by steam, water, gasoline and fuel oil |
1936 | Can making factory closed |
1937 | Reform lines installed; flat cans are turning into cylinder shapes and given top and bottoms |
1954 | Cold storage dismantled |
1955 | Reduction plant installed; creating fish meal and fish oil |
1959 | Road built along the Skeena River linking NPC and other canneries to Highway 16 |
1966 | NPC becomes a part of the Village of Port Edward |
1968 | Final year of canning salmon |
1969 | The Canadian Fishing Company Ltd. become new owners of NPC in January |
1972 | One canning line restored for one season due to fire destroying Canadian Fishing Company in Prince Rupert |
1979 | North Coast Marine Museum Society formed; created in order to sponsor the restoration of NPC |
1980 | British Columbia Packers Ltd. purchase NPC plant |
1981 | NPC Plant closed |
1985 | Reduction plant machines are shipped to Mexico |
1987 | On July 7 ownership transferred from BC Packers to Village of Port Edward |
In 1979, five local Port Edward community members formed The North Coast Marine Museum Society in order to save the North Pacific Cannery. [5] NPC was not the first cannery looked at. Inverness Cannery, located next to NPC, was considered initially in 1973 but a fire destroyed the plant causing the Board of Directors to move the plans onto NPC. [6] The North Coast Marine Museum Society originally started as The North Coast Fishing Exhibit which displayed artifacts from the fishing communities in the Prince Rupert, BC mall. [6] In August 1985 the North Coast Marine Museum Society moved all of their artifacts to the cannery. [6] In 1987 the BC Packers handed over the keys to the North Pacific Cannery and by gifting the cannery $840,000 and $10,000 worth contribution for the restoration of the plant, NPC was considered a national historic site. [2] [7]
Prince Rupert is a port city in the province of British Columbia, Canada. Its location is on Kaien Island near the Alaskan panhandle. It is the land, air, and water transportation hub of British Columbia's North Coast, and has a population of 12,220 people as of 2016.
The Tsimshian are an Indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Their communities are mostly in coastal British Columbia in Terrace and Prince Rupert, and Metlakatla, Alaska on Annette Island, the only reservation in Alaska.
The Royal British Columbia Museum, founded in 1886, is a history museum in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. The "Royal" title was approved by Queen Elizabeth II and bestowed by HRH Prince Philip in 1987, to coincide with a royal tour of that year. The museum merged with the British Columbia Provincial Archives in 2003.
North Coast is a provincial electoral district for the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, Canada. It was created by 1990 legislation which came into effect for the 1991 election, largely out of the previous riding of Prince Rupert.
Port Hardy is a district municipality in British Columbia, Canada located on the north-east end of Vancouver Island. Port Hardy has a population of 3,902 as of the 2021 census.
Bella Coola is a community in the Bella Coola Valley, in British Columbia, Canada. Bella Coola usually refers to the entire valley, encompassing the settlements of Bella Coola proper, Lower Bella Coola, Hagensborg, Salloompt, Nusatsum, Firvale, and Stuie. It is also the location of the head offices of the Central Coast Regional District.
The British Columbia Coast, popularly referred to as the BC Coast or simply the Coast, is a geographic region of the Canadian province of British Columbia. As the entire western continental coastline of Canada along the Pacific Ocean is in the province, it is synonymous with being the West Coast of Canada.
Princess Royal Island is the largest island on the North Coast of British Columbia, Canada. It is located amongst the isolated inlets and islands east of Hecate Strait on the British Columbia Coast. At 2,251 square kilometres (869 sq mi), it is the fourth largest island in British Columbia. It was named in 1788 by Captain Charles Duncan, after his ship Princess Royal.
School District 52 Prince Rupert is a school district in British Columbia, serving the communities of Prince Rupert, Port Edward, Metlakatla, and Hartley Bay, which are within the territory of the Ts’msyen Nation.
Port Essington was a cannery town on the south bank of the Skeena River estuary in northwestern British Columbia, Canada, between Prince Rupert and Terrace, and at the confluence of the Skeena and Ecstall Rivers. It was founded in 1871 by Robert Cunningham and Thomas Hankin and was for a time the largest settlement in the region. During its heyday it was home to an ethnic mix of European-Canadians, Japanese-Canadians, and members of First Nations from throughout the region, especially Tsimshians from the Kitselas and Kitsumkalum tribes. In the Tsimshian language, the site of Port Essington is called Spaksuut or, in English spelling, "Spokeshute", which means "autumn camping place". This also became the Tsimshian name for the town of Port Essington, and was conferred on Spokeshute Mountain, which stands above and behind the community. It sits on the traditional territory of the Gitzaxłaał tribe, one of the nine Tsimshian tribes based at Lax Kw'alaams. In 1888, the anthropologist Franz Boas visited Port Essington, interviewing Haida and Tsimshian individuals and establishing a working relationship with Odille Morison, the Tsimshian linguist, who lived in Port Essington.
The District of Port Edward is a district municipality of approximately 577, located in the Range 5 Coast Land District of British Columbia, Canada. It is situated on the Tsimpsean Peninsula, at Porpoise Harbour, near the southern end of Chatham Sound, close to the mouth of the Skeena River, 15 km (9 mi) southeast of Prince Rupert.
Porcher Island is an island in Hecate Strait, British Columbia, Canada, near the mouth of the Skeena River and southwest of the port city of Prince Rupert. The locality of Porcher Island is located near the island's northern tip at Humpback Bay, 54°05′11″N130°23′23″W. Stephens and Prescott Islands are located off its northwestern tip.
Wales Island is an island on the North Coast of British Columbia, Canada, situated east of the Dixon Entrance at the entrance to Portland Inlet.
The United Fishermen and Allied Workers' Union was established in 1945 in British Columbia through the merger of the United Fishermen's Federal Union and the Fish, Cannery and Reduction Plant and Allied Workers Union. It represents fishermen, shoreworkers, and workers in fish processing and transport, and fought for improved wages and working conditions in the industry as well as the imposition of fishing quotas and licensing requirements. The union survived raiding wars with the British Columbia Gillnetters Association in 1952 and the Seafarers' International Union in 1953. Suspected of being under communist influence, it was suspended by the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada in 1953 and refused admittance to the Canadian Labour Congress until 1972. For example, a longtime president of the UFAWU, Homer Stevens, ran as the Communist Party candidate in the Burnaby-Richmond-Delta riding in the 1970s. The union also had a section in Nova Scotia. The UFAWU joined the Canadian Auto Workers in 1996. The UFAWU was an integral part of the working class fight from 1945 to 1967 and brought fishermen, shoreworkers and tendermen together to fight for one cause during this era which made helped make significant progress on equality within the workplace.
For more than 35 years, from 1923 to 1958, the Union steamship Cardena sailed the British Columbia Coast, carrying passengers, groceries, dry goods, industrial cargo, mail and sundry other supplies to the 200 or so mining, logging and fishing communities that once dotted the province's coastline during the early years of the 20th century. On her return voyage, at the peak of the summer fishing season, Cardena routinely carried thousands of cases of canned salmon to the railheads at Prince Rupert and Vancouver for shipment across Canada and around the world. And so it went for the better part of half a century; a regular and reliable marine service that made Cardena a coastal institution, remembered with affection and regard by the countless men, women and children who inhabited those tiny outports in a bygone era.
Arrandale is a settlement in British Columbia, located approximately 74 km north of Prince Rupert.
The Monterey Peninsula anchors the northern portion on the Central Coast of California and comprises the cities of Monterey, Carmel, and Pacific Grove, and the resort and community of Pebble Beach.
Princess Beatrice was a steamship built for and owned by the marine division of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR). The ship served from 1903 to 1928 in the coastal waters of British Columbia. The ship also operated on Puget Sound on a route from Victoria, British Columbia to Seattle, Washington. Princess Beatrice was the first ship to operate in the year-round steamship service between Seattle and Victoria that was run by CPR from 1904 to 1959. This ship should not be confused with an earlier Princess Beatrice, built in Scotland in 1874, which served on the Atlantic coast of Canada.
Kildonan is an unincorporated community in the Alberni Inlet-Barkley Sound region of the west coast of southern Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The former steamboat landing and ferry dock is on the east shore of Uchuchklesit Inlet, which branches northwest of the lower reaches of Alberni Inlet. Adjacent to Pacific Rim National Park Reserve, the locality is by road and ferry about 120 kilometres (75 mi) southwest of Port Alberni.
The Museum of Northern British Columbia is a museum in Prince Rupert, British Columbia, Canada.
54°11′40″N130°13′29″W / 54.1944°N 130.2248°W