$5 · Spokeshute Skeena River Memory

Spokeshute Skeena River Memory by E. A. Harris Paperback, 1990, 237 pages. Book is in fair condition with creases and shelfwear on the cover, some pages dogeared. Previous owner’s partial name tag on inside page. Spokeshute, on the British Columbia coast, became the site of Robert Cunningham’s trading post, Port Essington, in 1871. By 1893, when he registered a town site plan with the provincial government, Cunningham had expanded his operations to include a salmon cannery, a sawmill, and a profitable retail business. These enterprises, plus the canneries owned by other entrepreneurs, provided employment for a population that expanded from 200 in the winter to over 1000 in the summer. Cannery closings during the 1940s eliminated employment, people moved away, and Port Essington, sometimes called Spokeshute, declined. A series of destructive fires, in the 1960s, destroyed the town. Harris reminisces with affection about his family and the community life that existed in the frontier town from its earliest days to its final destruction in 1965, and he shares with the reader the experiences of the family after it moved from Spokeshute. The book is organized topically and chronologically around the Harris family. Although the family moved from Spokeshute when the author was 13, his memories of a childhood spent in the community provide the basis of the book. He has also used as sources his mother’s diaries, articles she and others have written on Spokeshute, and books on various aspects of the history of British Columbia. This is local history of the finest sort. Harris writes well, and has illustrated the book with his own sketches and with photographs. See pictures Pickup in Langford Cross posted