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British Columbia Tourism Region : Kootenay Rockies
Description From Owner:
Lussier River
- This expanse of low ground separating the Kootenay River from nearby Columbia Lake (source of the Columbia River) was originally named McGillivray's Portage by David Thompson, who passed this way in 1808.
- Its present name commemorates the canal, parts of which can still be seen, completed in 1889 by William Adolph Baillie-Grohman, British sportsman and capitalist.
- This canal was part of a perfectly feasible scheme to divert some of the water of the upper Kootenay River into the Columbia system and thus to lower the level of Kootenay Lake sufficiently to reclaim the rich alluvial plain adjacent to Creston.
- Unfortunately, under pressure from the CPR, concerned about its Columbia River crossings, and from settlers around Golden who feared that their hay meadows would be flooded,
- the Canadian government so modified the original plans as to render the canal more costly and limited in usefulness. Baillie-Grohman finally abandoned the whole project in disgust.
- In 1894 the Gwendoline and in 1902 the North Star successfully passed from the Kootenay River to the Columbia using Baillie-Grohman's canal.
- Findlay Creek - Findlay (or more correctly Finlay) was a part-Indian son of Jaco Finlay, an associate of David Thompson. A prospector and fur trader, he found gold on this stream in 1863.
- Lussier River - Named by David Thompson in 1808 after one of his men, who had lost his kit in the Moyie River.
- Pert Peak - Commemorates one of the early riverboats on the Upper Columbia. Originally named the Alert, she was a fifty-foot bateau, rowed or poled by four men, and capable of carrying fourteen tons of freight.
- In 1890 she was fitted with a one-cylinder engine and side paddles and renamed the Pert.
- With permission from G.P.V and Helen B. Akrigg 1997 British Columbia Place Names. UBC Press.
Address of this page: http://bc.ruralroutes.com/CanalFlats