Prince Rupert B.C. to Bothell, Washington

North Pacific Cannery, Prince Rupert

THE LONGEST RUNNING CANNERY IN BC HISTORY

North Pacific Cannery’s history is unique and is comparable to few if any of the other canneries on the west coast of North America. North Pacific Canning Company was formed on November 28, 1888. It had almost 90 years continuous salmon production and fish processing until ending in the late 1970s.

In these isolated locales, accessible only by boat or rail, there was a need for staff housing to provide lodging for the workers, who would live on site through the canning season. At most of these canneries, labour was divided according to race and culture, with Japanese fishing and net mending, First Nations fishing and working on the cannery line, Chinese on the cannery line and cooking, and Europeans fishing and managing. This multicultural but segregated arrangement is characteristic of the early north coast canneries. North Pacific has much of its village intact, although all of the First Nations and Chinese houses, as well as most of the Japanese buildings, have been lost through obsolescence and neglect.

North Pacific Cannery National Historical Site History

Kitwanga to Quesnel

Silver Lake Campground

Arriving in Bothell, Washington: daughter Julie, son Ben and grandson Drake