Carving the Western Path

Book excerpt: The sparsely populated southern Interior of British Columbia was rich in resources and ripe for settlement in the late 1800s. The agricultural lands of the Okanagan and Nicola valleys, and the precious metals and coal of the Kootenays, lay largely unused or undiscovered: the challenge was getting to these places. Transportation was the key that opened the way to these riches, providing hope for the future for stout-hearted settlers—people for whom hope was the greatest of treasures. In this final book of his bestselling Carving the Western Path series, former Deputy Minister of Highways and Public Works R.G. Harvey tells the stories of the road through the Okanagan Valley, the highway alongside Kootenay Lake and the Crows Nest Railway. He also looks at how the challenge of moving people and cars over water was met, from river ferries running on human power or the force of currents to the 1,000-hp ferries on interior lakes. Harvey's stories about BC's fascinating transportation history speak of technical matters, but also of human resolution and determination in meeting nature's challenges.