Timber! Boom!

The vast forests of British Columbia are significant to the Indigenous communities who have cared for and used them since time immemorial. When settlers harvested large amounts of timber, using the area’s seemingly endless resource and clearing room for their communities. The Fraser Valley has been described as “BC’s largest clear-cut."

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Large amounts of settlers first came to the Fraser Valley during the 1858 gold rush. They needed timber to build houses, boats, and wagons. The first sawmill in the lower mainland was built to serve these miners on the Fraser River at Yale that same year. A second sawmill was established just a year later at Hope. Both of these mills were powered by running water turning a water wheel.

During the first years of the gold rush, miners would reach the gold fields of British Columbia’s interior by taking a boat up the Fraser River to the Harrison River, going down the Harrison until they reached Harrison Lake, crossing over the lake to the town of Port Douglas, and then taking a wagon from there to Lillooet. The town of Port Douglas also had a sawmill to supply the miners and the meet the lumber needs of the growing population. The town prospered until the Fraser Canyon wagon route was completed in the early 1860s.

In this early period of sawmill development, conditions were difficult for lumber businesses. There were few customers to sell product to, and transportation was often limited to waterways as good roads had not yet been developed. This is why prior to the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway; almost all logging and sawmilling operations were located directly next to rivers and lakes.