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Frank Samuel Perry was a former newspaperman, Captain in the army, a lawyer, a Provincial Court judge, County Court judge and justice of the British Columbia Supreme Court.

Frank Perry, the son of Florence (Smith) Perry and H.G.T. Perry (Liberal MLA, Speaker of BC Legislature, Mayor of P.G., etc.) and brother to Sidney Perry, was born in Vancouver on November 22nd, 1917. Frank married Janet Horton (legal secretary) on May 29th, 1947. They had three daughters: Elaine Perry, Barbara (Perry) Desmarais and Leslie Perry. – Frank, in his mid to late teens was the editor of his father’s newspaper, The Prince George Citizen. At the outbreak of WWII, Frank joined the army and became a Captain. When he returned he pursued a career in law. He graduated from UBC and then opened up a law practice in Prince George. He battled with John Diefenbaker in court, a case which Frank lost, but helped to raise Diefenbaker’s profile.

In the 1950’s Frank, a City Barrister gave advice to Prince George’s mayor, Gordon Bryant. In 1956 Frank (with the Liberal Party) ran in the 25th British Columbia election. He lost to Ray Williston. In 1969, Frank was named Queen Counsel and a year later he was appointed a Provincial Court judge. In 1975, Frank was promoted to County Court judge in the Cariboo. In 1991, he became a B.C. Supreme Court judge. In 1992 Frank retired. Frank died in Prince George of heart failure on May 2, 2002.

Herb Daum was the webmaster of the Cassiar Community Website.

John Kent Sedgwick was born in Weston, Ontario on March 13th, 1941. In 1964 he graduated from the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, with a Bachelor of Arts in Geography. During this time, he also wrote an undergraduate thesis titled “Effects of Land Use on Night Temperatures in London, Ontario.” In 1966 he graduated with his M.A. in Geography from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. His M.A. thesis was titled “Geomorphology and Mass Budget of Peyto Glacier, Alberta.”

Kent Sedgwick came to Prince George in 1970 and held a position as a Geography Instructor at the College of New Caledonia. He was also a frequent guest lecturer for history courses at the University of Northern British Columbia, and later, from 2003 until 2009, an adjunct professor at UNBC for geography. His expertise was in physical geography, particularly glaciation, hydrology, weather and climate, and alpine studies, and historical geography as well as cartography. He also taught courses on wildland recreation. After teaching at CNC for nearly a decade, in 1983 he became a Senior Urban Planner for the City of Prince George. In his professional relationship with the University of Northern British Columbia, he also contributed to research on the Upper Fraser as part of the UNBC-led Upper Fraser Historical Geography Project between 1999 and 2002.

Alongside his professional work, Kent Sedgwick was extensively involved in the community. During his teaching career he conducted more than 50 field trips for students and other professionals, including the Federation of BC Writers (2000); the Western Division of the Canadian Association of Geographers (2003); and the BC Heritage Federation (2003). He was also the treasurer and later the president of the Alexander Mackenzie Voyageur Route Association. Sedgwick also worked directly with the Huble Homestead / Giscome Portage Historical Society. Significantly, Sedgwick worked with the Huble Society, June Chamberland and Curle Witte to transcribe and edit the 1909-1919 diaries of Albert Huble.

He was a Member and Chairmen of the Heritage Advisory Committee for the City of Prince George from 1978 until 1983, and then was the secretary to the committee while employed in the Planning Division from 1983 until 2006. Through the Heritage Advisory Committee, he aided in many projects to protect and acknowledge local history and heritage. These projects included an inventory of heritage buildings in Prince George; research on the origins and desecration of the L’heidli T’enneh cemetery at Fort George Park; confirmation for rezoning various lots in Prince George; and developing tours of downtown Prince George. Kent Sedgwick also aided the Prince George Retired Teachers Association with conducting research on previous and current schools within Prince George and region.

Kent Sedgwick was well-known for his enthusiasm and passion in local history and for conducting meticulous research on the history of Prince George and the Central Interior. He had also compiled and edited works of local history, both on his own and aiding others in their writing. His own written works were recognized with the Jeanne Clarke Memorial Local History award in 1991 for his extensive efforts to preserve Prince George’s history. He received the same award for his book Giscome Chronicle: The Rise and Demise of a Sawmill Community in Central British Columbia (2008). Some of Sedgwick’s other published works include Lheidli T’enneh Cemetery, Prince George: A documented history (2012); Hotels, Hoteliers and Liquor Stores : The story behind a Prince George heritage building (2011); Monumental Transformation: The story of Prince George’s national historic monument (2009); Pan Am and All That: World War II aviation in Prince George, British Columbia (2008); and Reflections on Architects and Architecture in Prince George 1950-2000: An interview of Trelle Morrow (2007).

Kent Sedgwick passed away on December 6, 2011, after a long struggle with cancer.

Louis Dixon was a Justice of the Peace.

Marcus Smith was born in Ford, Northumberland UK on 16 July 1815. After a local education, he started work in railway construction in 1844. He worked his way up to become a railway engineer and was responsible for building 230 miles of railway. He also worked on railway construction in France and the United States before coming to Canada in 1850. Between 1850 and 1860 he was employed in survey and construction work on the Great Western Railway, Hamilton and Toronto Railway and the Niagara and Detroit River Railway. He was engaged in railway work in South Africa, 1860-1864. Returning to Canada, he was resident engineer for the Restigouche Division of the Intercolonial Railway from 1868 to 1872 under the Chief Engineer, Sanford Fleming.

When Fleming became Chief Engineer of the Pacific Railway in 1872, Smith was put in charge of route surveys from the Rockies to the Pacific Ocean. Smith was also acting engineer-in-chief between 1876 and 1878 during Fleming's absence. When the Canadian Pacific Railway was formed in 1881, Smith joined the CPR engineering staff, doing location work and inspecting contractors' work. Smith left the CPR in 1886 and became a consulting engineer and inspector for the federal government on projects such as railroads in the Maritimes. He retired from government work in 1893. Marcus Smith then did preliminary estimates for the Montreal, Ottawa and Georgian Bay Canal, Trans-Canada Railway and Hudson's Bay & Pacific Railway up to 1898. He died on 14 August 1904 in Ottawa.

Marcus Smith's most notable project was surveying a western route for the Canadian Pacific Railway in the 1870s. His proposed route went through Prince George to Butte Inlet on the coast. His son Arthur Smith was Deputy Attorney General of BC before heading the Land Registry Office until his retirement in the 1930s. His daughter Anne Clarice worked as a social worker and was Secretary to the Canadian Council on Child and Family Welfare for a time.

Reverend R.W. Large (M.D.) was a Methodist minister and doctor on the Northwest Coast of British Columbia from 1898 to 1920. He worked at the Methodist hospital and mission in Bella Bella until 1906. He then went on to work at Rivers Inlet Hospital in Ocean Falls until he moved to Port Simpson in 1910, where he worked until his death. Reverend Large was the only known observer to document the community of Bella Bella from 1898 to 1906. Reverend Large's son R.G. Large followed in his father's footsteps and was a doctor at Port Simpson, Port Essington and later Prince Rupert.

Ron A. Sebastian is from the Gitxsan and the Wet'suwet'en Nations. His name is Gwin Butsxw from the house of Spookw of the Lax Gibuu Clan (Wolf Clan). In the early 1970s, Sebastian studied carving and design at the Kitanmaax School of Northwest Coast Native Art at ‘Ksan Village, Hazelton, B.C. His work, which includes wood carvings (masks, bowls, bent boxes, rattles, talking sticks, rhythm canes, murals and totem poles of all sizes), graphic art, and gold and silver jewellery, can be found in museums and private collections throughout North America, Europe and Japan. His larger pieces include three murals, carved together with Earl Muldoe, for the main lobby of Les Terrasses de la Chaudiere, new home of the Department of Indian Affairs in Hull, Quebec ; a cedar panel carved together with brother Robert E. Sebastian for a new school in Takla Landing ; a round mural carved for the Smithers Dze_l_K'ant Friendship Center ; and a totem pole carved for the front of the Two Rivers Art Gallery in Prince George. In 1992, Sebastian carved an elaborate pair of Chief's chairs and a talking stick with a base stand for UNBC. These carvings are used on special occasions (such as Convocation) by the President and Chancellor. The mace, ceremonial chairs and the doors to the University Senate were carved by Ron A. Sebastian, and were presented in early 1992, in time for the inaugural Convocation. The mace/talking stick includes thirteen traditional Indian crests, which represent all the tribes/clans of northern British Columbia. They are, from top to bottom: Wolf, Black Bear, Beaver, Wolverine, Caribou, Mountain Goose, Frog, Raven, Thunderbird, Fireweed, Killer Whale, Owl, and Eagle. In the centre is an additional human face representing all peoples. The mace/talking stick rests in a base of red cedar, carved in the form of a salmon, which is meant to indicate all the people in the region. The chairs include, at top and bottom, a human mask and sun, representing mankind but particularly students and counsellors, while the other symbols again represent the various First Nations peoples in the University’s region. The Chancellor’s Chair includes representations of the thunderbird, frog, beaver, grouse, fireweed, owl, eagle, and killer whale, with arm rests carved in the shape of a wolf. The President’s Chair includes representations of the grizzly bear, wolf, caribou, black bear, crow, frog, moose, and mountain goose, with arm rests carved in the shape of a raven.

Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; born 21 April 1926) is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms, and head of the 54-member Commonwealth of Nations. In her specific role as the monarch of the United Kingdom, one of her 16 realms, she is also Supreme Governor of the Church of England.

Elizabeth was born in London, and educated privately at home. Her father acceded to the throne as George VI in 1936 on the abdication of his brother Edward VIII. She began to undertake public duties during the Second World War, in which she served in the Auxiliary Territorial Service. On the death of her father in 1952, she became Head of the Commonwealth and queen regnant of seven independent Commonwealth countries: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Pakistan, and Ceylon. Her coronation service in 1953 was the first to be televised. Between 1956 and 1992, the number of her realms varied as territories gained independence and some realms became republics. Today, in addition to the first four aforementioned countries, Elizabeth is Queen of Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize, Antigua and Barbuda, and Saint Kitts and Nevis.

In 1947 she married Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, with whom she has four children: Charles, Anne, Andrew, and Edward.

Her reign of 60 years is the second-longest for a British monarch; only Queen Victoria has reigned longer. Her Silver, Golden, and Diamond Jubilees were celebrated in 1977, 2002, and 2012, respectively.

Mayor of Prince George, 2008-2011
Manager of Public Relations for the Prince George Spruce Kings Hockey Club, 1996-1999

Jean Weller was the wife of Dr. Geoffrey R. Weller, the founding president of UNBC.

B.W. "Bud" McKilvington was born in Vermont but moved to northern Alberta and eventually settled in the Chilcotin district of B.C., where he had a number of jobs over the years. He was an outdoorsman and hunter who appreciated the writings of Eric Collier and began a correspondence with him after the publication of Collier's book.

R.A. Harlow was born in Brewer, Maine on March 22, 1889 and died in Kelowna, BC on July 4, 1978 at 89 years of age. At the time of his death, Harlow was a retired roadmaster for CNR.

R.A. Harlow was a member of the surveying party for the Grand Trunk Pacific (GTP) Railway c.1911 and later worked on the Pacific Great Eastern (PGE) Railway as a Resident Engineer. While with the PGE, he was part of the engineering party which, on April 7, 1914, set the finish point stake and measured the required distance to the starting points for the two track-layer crews (East vs. West) who would race to the finish line. The West end crew cut and placed the last rail in place on the line after which PGE President E.J. Chamberlain drove in the last spike. After this historic driving in of the “last spike” on the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway one mile east of Fort Fraser, R.A. Harlow was then commissioned to take a small can of white paint and a brush and inscribe the following notation onto the flange of the 11ft. last rail: “Point of Completion April 7th, 1914”. This marked piece of rail was later taken up, shipped to Winnipeg and sliced into quarter-inch-thick pieces which were polished, suitably engraved and distributed among railway officers as paper-weights. One of these commemorative pieces is at the Prince George Railway and Forestry Museum. Aside from his involvement with the driving in of the “last spike”, R. A. Harlow was also intrinsically involved with the arrival of the first PGE train into Prince George from Squamish in 1952.

Dr. Paul Sanborn is a Professor in the Faculty of Environment with the Department of Ecosystem Science and Management at the University of Northern British Columbia. Sanborn joined UNBC in 2002 after eleven years as a regional soil scientist with the British Columbia Ministry of Forests. At UNBC, his research program has built on established local field studies of site productivity, nutrient cycling, and soil rehabilitation, and developing a new emphasis on the role of soils as a recorder of long-term environmental change in northwestern Canada.

Howard Foot, the youngest of the four sons of Claude Foot, was born in 1939. He was raised and educated in Prince George.

Howard's father Claude arrived in Prince George in 1906. He worked for the Hudson Bay Company and came from Quesnel by a scow that was pulled up river by Indigenous people; the trip took 17 days. Claude Foot later worked for the provincial government for 33 years and married Kate Renwick.

After high school, Howard Foot went into the entertainment promotion business. He started out with the blessing of the Prince George city council with a program called Teen Town. The idea was to involve teenagers in community events. Howard Foot was contacted by a U.S. promoter and promoted entertainment concerts all around B.C. for rock and roll stars like Gene Vincent, Buddy Knox and Eddie Cochran. He also promoted car shows, boxing matches, teen dances and an aquatic show at the old outdoor pool on Watrous Street.

Howard Foot married Trudi Nelson in 1963 and had two children, Reg and Renee. Trudi passed away in 1994.

Howard worked in advertising at CKPG for eight years (one year in radio and seven years in television). He then spent 20 years working for Ron East at radio station CJCI. During that time a workmate introduced him to Jeannette DeWalt; they married in 1996.

Good Morning Prince George was a daily coffee shop newspaper that Howard bought and ran for five years.

Howard started the Nukko Lake Water Ski School in 1979. He is credited with being the first promoter of water skiing in Prince George. After 35 years, Howard left the school to his son Reg and nephew Brian to run. Howard skied competitively and won numerous medals at the Kelowna Regatta, the B.C. Provincials and the B.C. Summer Games. He was one of the first people inducted into the Prince George Sports Hall of Fame, in the sport building classification, for his contribution to the sport of water skiing both provincially and for Prince George.

Howard served on the Forest Expo board for nearly 10 years and served on the Sports Hall of Fame selection committee for many years. He also served on the board of the North Central Seniors Association.

Bill Stowell completed his BSF in Forest Management in 1977. Bill Stowell has had an active forestry career with companies across British Columbia. Between 1981 and 1986, Bill worked as Woodlands Manager for Babine Forest Products Ltd. in Burns Lake, BC. His following employment in 1991-1994 was with Weyerhaeuser Canada Ltd. as a Log Trader in Merritt and Princeton, BC. He moved on to become a Log Trader with Tolko Industries Ltd. for the period 1994-2010. From 2010 onwards, Bill worked as a Fibre Manager for Fusion Fibre Ltd. in Merritt, BC. Bill Stowell also worked as Forestry Manager for Upper Nicola Band between 2014 and 2018.

T.M. (Mike) Apsey graduated from the University of British Columbia in 1961 with a degree in forestry. After holding various positions in the private sector, he became Deputy Minister of Forests for British Columbia in 1978. After six years, he became President and Chief Executive Officer for the Council of Forest Industries, 1984-1998. In 2002, Mike was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada.

Bertha Schenk was from Georgetown, Ontario.

Celia Schreiber was an active member of the Mexican community in Prince George.

Chander Suri was the Regional District Planner for Fraser Fort George Regional District

Daphne Syson met George Baldwin when both were students at UBC. They married 2 October 1954, and moved to Prince George in October of that same year. Soon after her arrival, Daphne became Secretary of the Alaska Music Trail Concert Association, later renamed the Prince George Concert Association. At the same time, she also served as Secretary for the Prince George Historical Society and the Studio Society. She remained on the executive of the Alaska Music Trail group for ten years, serving as President for two. She was Charter Member of the Canadian Federation of University Women, and later served as President. When the oldest of Daphne's four children wanted to join the Brownies, she became Brown Owl for four years, then served three years as a District Commissioner. After serving as both member and Chairman of the Public Library Board, Daphne served as a member of the Mayor's Task Force to study the direction of libraries in Prince George. She was later appointed Director of the BC Library Development Commission. She served as Director of the Community Interest Account of Radio Station CJCI, was member and chairman of the Prince George Heritage Commission, and was later appointed Director of the BC Heritage Trust. She was a Director of the Prince George Community Foundation. In 2001, she was appointed Director of the UNBC foundation by the Provincial Government. Throughout her time in Prince George, she was extensively involved with St. Michael and All Angels Anglican Church.

Dr. Bob Ewert was born in Prince George in 1927 and graduated from the Prince George Junior/Senior High School. Following studies at UBC and McGill Universities and surgical training in Detroit, Dr Ewert returned to Prince George in 1961 as the city’s first consultant specialist. Dr. Ewert was a dedicated surgeon with strong ties to the community and a vision for a modern, well-equipped hospital with a full complement of specialists. His roots in the community and commitment to the development of medical services in the North stemmed from his father, Dr. Carl Ewert, who arrived in Prince George on a paddle wheeler in 1913. He came in response to the physician shortage in Prince George and the surrounding area at that time, and practised as a general practitioner in Prince George until his retirement. Bob Ewert remained in Prince George until his death in 2002 at the age of 74. Bob’s family, many of whom are still in the Prince George area, made a generous donation to the University of Northern British Columbia to dedicate and furnish the Bob Ewert lounge, which has become a revered space for students and staff working in the new medical building. The Northern Medical Society created the annual Bob Ewart Memorial Lecture in celebration of the birth of the Northern Medical Program at the University of Northern British Columbia.

Dr. Fish held a PhD in Sociology and joined the University of Northern British Columbia as a founding Dean in 1992 after 23 years with the Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Manitoba. While at the University of Manitoba he was involved in the development of the Northern Medical Unit that provided health services to First Nations throughout Northern Manitoba and the Keewatin District of the North West Territories. He maintained his interest in the health of First Nations and in the transfer of health services to the First Nations upon his arrival in British Columbia. Dr. Fish had extensive experience in developing countries where he worked with communities to develop community-based health programs within the context of social and economic development.

Mike Evans (PhD McMaster 1996) taught at the University of Northern BC, the University of Alberta, and then joined Okanagan University College, later UBC Okanagan (2005). His primary research relationships are with people in the Métis community in Northern BC, the Métis Nation of BC, the Urban Aboriginal Community of the Okanagan Valley, and the Kingdom of Tonga (in the South Pacific). Dr. Evans has been involved in several community based research initiatives, and in particular has a long-term relationship with the Prince George Métis Elders Society. Together with Elders and community leaders in Prince George he put together a Métis Studies curriculum for UNBC and a number of publications including What it is to be a Métis (Evans et al 1999), A Brief History, of the Short Life, of the Island Cache (Evans et al 2004).

He is currently working with the Elders Society and Stephen Foster and Colleagues from UBC Okanagan, UNBC and the University of Alberta on a participatory video project. As Research Director for the Métis Nation of BC, he serves on the Métis National Council National Research Initiative, helped form the Research agenda for the Métis Nation of BC, and has worked extensively with colleagues at the MNBC on a number of research projects over the last few years. He has supervised graduate students working on urban aboriginal issues and topics related to community based Métis history and geography across Western Canada. He is currently Associate Professor and Head in Community, Culture, and Global Studies at UBC Okanagan.

Erika Lambert was a grade one teacher at the Ron Brent School in Prince George

Playwright born in Anatone, Washington, 1910, died near Williams Lake, British Columbia , 1984 (where she had lived since 1953). Her father was a teacher in small community schools in southern Alberta. In 1926, the family moved to Montana and, in highschool, she acted in plays.

Ringwood graduated from the University of Alberta with an Honours English degree, working part time as a secretary for the Department of Extension's director of drama, Elizabeth Sterling Haynes , and then working at the Banff Centre for the Arts as registrar. It was in Banff that she wrote her first play, The Dragons of Kent in 1935. In 1938, while studying playwriting in North Carolina, Ringwood created the spooky one-act masterpiece Still Stands the House (premiered in North Carolina), one of the most frequently performed plays in the history of Canadian theatre. In 1939 the play won at the Dominion Drama Festival. She returned to Alberta in 1939 and was director of dramatics at the University of Alberta. In that same year she married John Brian Ringwood and they subsequently had two children.

Ringwood also wrote frequently for radio. She and Elsie Park Gowan were approached by CKUA to write a series of history plays, in order to reach an isolated Alberta audience with little opportunity for further education. The series, entitled "New Lamps for Old", featured the "great names" in history -- Socrates, Beethoven, Cromwell, Florence Nightingale, but focused more on their social and personal lives than on their heroic achievements.

While in Edmonton during the war, she received a grant from Robert Gard of the Alberta Folklore and Local History Project to write Alberta folk plays: Jack the Joker (Banff 1944), about the life of the colourful Calgary newspaper editor, Bob Edwards; The Rainmaker (Banff 1945), set in Medicine Hat during the drought of 1921; and Stampede (University of Alberta 1946), about the Black cowboy and rancher, "Nigger John". Her other plays include the satiric comedy about miserliness, Widger's Way (University of Alberta 1952); children's plays The Sleeping Beauty (Cariboo Indian School, Williams Lake, British Columbia, 1965), and The Golden Goose (Cariboo Indian School 1973); and a trilogy entitled Drum Song about the tragic lives of Native women based on Euripides' Greek tragedies (University of Victoria 1982). Her popular comedy, Garage Sale premiered at the New Play Centre - now Playwrights Theatre Centre in 1981).

Like Gowan, Ringwood also wrote historical pageants to celebrate community anniversaries: an Edmonton pageant on Methodist missionary John McDougall and chief Maskapetoon to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Methodist Church in 1940; Look Behind You Neighbour, with music by Chet Lambertson, for the 50th anniversary of Edson, Alberta in 1961; and The Road Runs North, commissioned for the Williams Lake centennial in 1967.

In 1941 she received the Governor General's Medal for Outstanding Service in the development of Canadian drama, and in 1982 published the first volume of her plays, becoming the first Canadian playwright to become anthologized. The theatre in Williams Lake is named in her honour, and an award for drama, given by the Alberta Writers Guild, is named for her.

H.G.T. (Harry) Henry George Thomas Perry is considered a founding father of Prince George. –Born March 18th, 1889 in Whitwick, Leicestershire, England, he was educated at Coalville Belvoir Road Wesleyan School and at Loughborough Grammar School. Perry was married to the former Florence Annie Smith of Leicestershire, England. They had two sons, Frank (later Judge Perry of Prince George) and Sidney (pharmacist). - H.G.T. Perry came to Canada in 1910 and to Prince George, British Columbia in 1912, on the BX Sternwheeler. He first established Perry's Shoe Store (a menswear establishment) and later established a real estate and insurance business. He founded the local faction of the Liberal Party in Prince George & Peace River area. He was the first President of the Fort George District & PG Local Liberal Associations from 1912 until he retired to Victoria c.1958. He was elected School Trustee in Fort George (P.G.) from 1912-1914. In addition, Perry was a director for the Prince George Theatre Ltd. and Chairman of the Joint Committee for Incorporation of PG. - Perry first served as President of the Board of Trade (1914) before entering civic politics and served as Prince George Mayor (1917-1918; and 1920) before entering provincial politics. He was also the owner and editor of several regional newspapers, including the Fort George Tribune, The Prince George Citizen, The Nechako Chronicle and the Prince Rupert Daily News. Perry went on to provincial politics running for the Liberal Party and was Speaker of the BC Legislature for Fort George from 1920-1928 & 1933-1945. During his political career he served also as Secretary and Chairman of the Municipal and Agricultural Committees of the Legislature and was a Deputy Speaker of the Legislative Assembly from 1924 to 1928. Perry served also as Provincial Minister of Education from 1941-45. Perry also served as President of the BC Branch of the Empire Parliamentary Association in the BC Parliament and attended its overseas conference of delegates in the UK during King George V Silver Jubilee Year in 1935. - HGT Perry is best known as Chairman of the provincial government’s Post-War Rehabilitation Council (1942-45), the first of its kind in Canada. Mr. Perry left provincial politics after an election defeat in 1945. Known as the “golden tongue orator”1 HGT Perry is also remembered for other improvements he oversaw as a provincial minister: improving educational facilities and teachers salaries in rural schools; for establishing Home Economics and Spanish courses at UBC; for instituting the Cameron Commission; for advocating for the rights of the Japanese, and others, during WWII, and is known as “the man who saved and extended the PGE.”2 In addition to these accomplishments, he played an instrumental role for many infrastructure projects: development of a highway south to the Cariboo Region; building of the Peace River Highway; reservation of one million acres of land in Central B.C. for veterans; creation of a Library distribution centre; and the extension of the Pacific Great Eastern Railway. Harry Perry died in Victoria, of a heart attack, in 1959 at the age of 70.

Jack Corless was the son of prominent businessman Richard Corless who owned many businesses in Prince George including an undertaking parlor and a Hudson-Essex Car Dealership. In his youth, Jack was a prominent local athlete whose position on the Prince George Lumberman hockey team was well known by many locals. The Corless family home was located at 1276 4th Avenue in Prince George, and remained so until 1947. Upon his retirement, Jack Corless self published two autobiographical publications entitled “Lucky Jackie: Diapers to Rifles” and “Lucky Jackie: Zombie to Decorated.” The first monograph describes Mr. Corless’s childhood years in Prince George c.1920s-30s while the second describes his years overseas in the Royal Canadian Army during WWII.

Joanne Hewlett was involved with the Interior University Society.

In 1931 John D. Galloway wrote “Placer-mining in British Columbia”.

John Owen Wilson, Q.C. was born in Nelson 7 November 1898. He moved to Prince George with his family in 1914. He worked as an office boy at his father (P.E. Wilson)'s law firm until 1915, when he enlisted. He served at the Battle of the Somme, the Battle of Vimy Ridge, and the Battle of Passchendaele. After working on riverboats and as a surveyor, Wilson attended the University of British Columbia. He was called to the BC Bar and returned to Prince George to practise with his father in 1922. He married Ruth Pine in December of that same year. Wilson served as Secretary of the Board of Trade of Prince George and of the Agricultural Association in the following years. He also became involved with the Liberal Party of BC, serving as campaign manager for first Harry Perry and then Gray Turgeon. Wilson was appointed to the County Court of Cariboo 13 January 1939, and subsequently moved with his wife and three children to Ashcroft. As Cariboo County Judge, Wilson held court in Quesnel, Wells, Barkerville, Williams Lake, and Lillooet. He was appointed to the BC Supreme Court in 1944,and to the BC Court of Appeal in 1962. In 1963 he became Chief Justice of the BC Supreme Court. He retired from the Bench and returned to the practice of law ten years later. He was appointed Queen's Counsel in 1974. He passed away in 1985, and was honoured posthumously with the Law Society Award 19 November 1992. Material donated to the Archives by R.H. Guile who was J.O. Wilson's nephew ; he worked at Russell & DuMoulin with Wilson for ten years

In 1930 Norah Banbery left Wolverhampton, England, setting sail from Liverpool to Canada to follow what had become for her a perennial obsession" since childhood - the desire to explore the Canadian West. Lured by the attractive posters from the Canadian Pacific Railway that displayed "long vistas of golden wheat…(and) range lands ... alive with grazing cattle…" Norah, along with hundreds of other Europeans, set sail to find work and a new life in a new land. In the 1930s and 1940s Norah wrote articles about farm life in Canada for the Wolverhampton newspaper, Express and Star, and later began her memoir about life in the Red Rock region. She died at the Jubilee Lodge, a senior's home in Prince George in 1991, at the age of 90 years. Her memoir "A Man's Country" recalls her early years in Meota near North Battleford, Saskatchewan where she met her husband Irwin Doherty [alias Jim Martin in the manuscript], an Irish immigrant farmer. It follows the Doherty's move to British Columbia to homestead on 160 acres of land in Red Rock, south of Prince George along the Fort George Canyon on the Fraser River. Norah's account of life in Red Rock recalls experiences similar to that of other farmwomen in isolated Western Canadian communities in the Depression era. These were often days spent cleaning, cooking, and most significantly rationing, penny-pinching and finding ingenious ways to create a comfortable household in a log cabin. Yet Norah's account also provides a personal view of life as a young woman in a new land. She talks about her longing for female companionship and also her attraction to the land and the people that she met. Her story provides a woman's perspective of "living off the land" in a time when many still considered the area to be, as Norah states, "A Man's Country".

Parker Bonney was born in 1889 in New Brunswick. In 1911, he graduated from the University of Washington with a forestry degree. He moved to Canada in 1913 and worked as a student in the Nass region. Parker Bonney worked for the Prince George Forestry Division starting from 1913. He was one of the first people to completely survey the Nass River Watershed and the Headwaters of the Skeena. He became the district forester for Prince Rupert in 1926, residing in Ocean Falls, B.C. until 1945. Later on in his life, Parker Bonney worked as a forestry engineer with Alcan and with Columbia Cellulose. Both Bonney Lake and Bonney Creek are named in his honour due to his contributions to the Northern BC forestry industry. Parker Bonney resided in North Vancouver until 1977 when he passed away.

Prentiss Nathaniel Gray was born 2 July 1884 in Oakland, California. He graduated from the University of California in Berkeley in 1906, distinguishing himself academically, athletically and socially. As captain of the University Militia, he was sent on guard duty to San Francisco following the 1906 earthquake and fire. Unable to campaign because of this, Gray was nevertheless elected President of Associated Students in his senior year. Following graduation, he began working for his father’s shipping business, the California and Oregon Coast Steamship Company. He married Laura Sherman in Washington 27 May 1908. Their eldest child, Barbara was born in Northern California in 1914, and their son, Sherman was born in New York in 1918. In January 1916 he was hired as part of the American relief effort to oversee the food supplies for Antwerp. He remained in Belgium after the American declaration of war to conduct the final inventory and to balance the books, and was decorated with dozens of medals from different countries as a result. In 1920, Gray established P. N. Gray & Co., an export-import grain business. In 1923, Gray, with no banking experience, organised, staffed, and launched the J. Henry Schroder Banking Corporation in New York. During the 1920s, Gray quickly ensured Schroders prominence in the underwriting business. In the 1930s, he successfully shifted the focus of Schroders to financing foreign trade, and by the 1940s, the New York Schroder Bank was twice the size of the original J. Henry Schroder & Co. in London. Gray had an informal agreement with Frank Tiarks, managing partner of Schroders in London, that his vacation time would be unlimited as soon as the New York bank made its first one hundred thousand dollars profit. Gray’s hunting trips became longer and more elaborate as time progressed, culminating in a full year’s safari in Africa. Gray established an official measurement and scoring system for trophy animals, serving as the first editor of the Boone and Crockett Club’s Records of North American Big Game. Gray was fascinated with hunting from an early age, and began recording his trips in detail for his interested sisters during a hunting trip to the Stikine River and Cassiar Mountains in 1904. He continued this tradition throughout his life, documenting his expeditions in writings, illustrations, and photographs. Following his death at age 50 in a boating accident in the Florida Everglades, Gray's hunting and exploration journals and photographs were published by the Boone and Crockett Club in the form of two books, "From the Peace to the Fraser: Newly Discovered North American Hunting and Exploration Journals, 1900 to 1930" and "African Game-Lands: A Graphic Itinerary in Kenya and Along the Livingstone Trail in Tanganyika, Belgian Congo, and Angola, 1929". Gray Pass, a low-altitude pass through the Rockies, was named in his honour following his discovery of it during an expedition through Peace River country.

During the 1980s, Rip Kitchen supplied the Bear Lake community newspaper with monthly accounts of the history and growth of the area. As one of the pioneer residents of the Crooked River community, Kitchen told stories about its early history in a column entitled "Crooked River Chronicles," detailing the construction of both the railroad and the Hart Highway. From his restoration of early farm equipment and other work around the popular heritage site to his service on its Board of Directors, Kitchen contributed in many ways to the work of the Huble Homestead/Giscome Portage Heritage Society. Kitchen was also active with the Prince George Railway and Forestry Museum. Kitchen received the Jeanne Clarke Memorial Local History Award 16 February 2003.

Roy Stewart was President of the Interior University Society at one time. The Interior University Society was incorporated in 1987 after organizational efforts initiated by Tom Steadman, Bryson Stone and Charles McCaffray. The society’s objectives were to promote the establishment of a university in Prince George, B.C., later to be known as the University of Northern British Columbia. The first president of the society was Prince George lawyer W. Murray Sadler. The Society launched a membership campaign in 1987, retained the services of Dr. Urban Dahllof to undertake a feasibility study, and conducted a survey to determine the support level in northern B.C. for a university. In October, 1988, the society’s proposals and studies were presented to the provincial cabinet. In 1989, an Implementation Planning Group was established, chaired by Horst Sander. The planning group completed its study and reported to the government in December of 1989, recommending a full-status university be established in the north.

Stuart S. Holland was Associate Engineer for the Department of Mines.

George Pedersen is a Canadian academic administrator. He was the president of Simon Fraser University (1979 to 1983), University of British Columbia (1983 to 1985), University of Western Ontario (1985 to 1994), interim president of the University of Northern British Columbia (for three months between Geoffrey Weller and Charles Jago), and founding president of Royal Roads University (1995-). He served as chancellor of the University of Northern British Columbia from 1998 until 1999. As chancellor, he has given degrees to 3,100 UNBC graduates.

Born in Three Creeks, Alberta, Pedersen received his B.A. from the University of British Columbia, an M.A. from the University of Washington, and his Ph.D. in Education from the University of Chicago in 1968. In 1992, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada for being "devoted to the cause of higher education." In 1994, he was awarded the Order of Ontario. In 2002, he was awarded the Order of British Columbia. In 2005, he was appointed Chair of the Board of Governors of Emily Carr Institute.

His career in education began as a school teacher in North Vancouver in 1952, and within a decade he was promoted to principal at both the elementary and secondary levels. The draw of further studies took him far from home, to the University of Chicago, where he completed his PhD and earned ten scholarships in the process. He laid the groundwork for Simon Fraser University’s downtown campus, engaged in bitter battles over adequate post-secondary funding, and passionately advocated for greater aboriginal access to university, for which he was honoured by the Nisga’a.

Born August 5th 1908 in Vancouver to James Walton and Clara Mary Chapman. The eldest of 5 sons, he was raised in Victoria. He was a teacher and author; he wrote “A montage of chapmannals : over nine decades”, ca. 2000.

William Andrew Cecil (W.A.C.) Bennett, PC, OC was the 25th Premier of the Canadian province of British Columbia. With just over 20 years in office, Bennett was and remains the longest-serving premier in British Columbia history.