Explorers

European exploration of this area began with Alexander Mackenzie’s overland travel up the Peace and Parsnip Rivers en route to the Pacific Ocean in 1793, on behalf of the North West Company.  Fellow explorer John Finaly returned four years later to explore the northern tributary to the Peace River, later named the Finlay River.  No record remains of the expedition except as reported by Samuel Black, Chief Trader of the Hudson’s Bay Company.  He ascended to the source of the Finlay River in 1824, noting that “he had studied Finlay’s chart” and determined that Finlayt had likely on made it as far as the Ingenika River, about 130 km north of the Finlay River’s confluence with the Peace.

Early exploration focused primarily on identifying travel and trade routes through the region.  The first Canadian Pacific Railroad survey was done in 1871, with the Pine Pass through the Rocky Mountains surveyed by C.P.R. engineer J. Hunter in 1877.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, exploration included mineral prospecting expeditions (e.g. Edward Ruzicka and company, 1900).

In 1897, as the Yukon gold rush erupted, Inspector Moodie led a North West Mounted Police patrol to establish a route from Edmonton, AB to the Yukon through the Rocky Mountain Trench.

The B.C. Department of Lands began surveying in the Rocky Mountain Trench in 1912.  Mr. F.C. Swannell was the first surveyor sent to the area.

The sensational Bedeaux Sub-Arctic Expedition ventured up the Muskwa and Kwadacha Rivers in 1931.