Section Two

The gold rush town of Barkerville
in the Cariboo in 1868
A-02050
However, it was the discovery of gold along the Fraser River and in the Cariboo in the 1850s and 1860s that led to the first large influx of people hoping to strike it rich in the gold fields of British Columbia.

The search for gold drew thousands of people from many parts of the world. Most did not make a fortune, but many stayed to work in mines, or settle down as farmers or ranchers in many parts of the province.

Panning for gold was the simplest methods of extracting gold from a mountain stream, with no need for expensive equipment. Hand rockers could be easily constructed from materials available at the site, and increased the efficiency of gold extraction.

Cariboo miner in 1868 with a
hand rocker for sorting
gold from gravel
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The water flume and wheel
used to power mining operations
at the Davis Claim at Williams Creek
in the Cariboo in 1867
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Underground gold mining
in the Cariboo in 1938
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Lode mining, that is digging shafts horizontally or vertically in to the ground or a mountain side, to find the ore was more labour and capital intensive but tapped the larger deposits of ore and prolonged the life of mining towns.

As gold and other metals were discovered towns sprang up to serve the mines and miners in such places as Barkerville, Kimberley, Rossland, Atlin, Kaslo, Greenwood, and numerous others. While the mines lasted the communities in the region prospered. When the ore ran out and the mines shut down some towns, such as Barkerville in the Cariboo, and Sandon in the Kootenays, were more or less deserted to become ghost towns. Other communities survived on new industries or new mines in the area.

The development of the mineral potential in British Columbia was limited in the beginning by the lack of local smelters. Smelting is the process that separates the valuable metal from the waste rock. The nearest smelter to British Columbia in the late nineteenth century was in the United States. This meant that any of the ore excavated in the province either had to be transported out of the country for processing and profit generation, or left in the mine unprocessed and unprofitable.

Gold miners at Rossland, 1900
D-03653
Smelter at Trail, 1929
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Smelter at Nelson in 1896
A-02069
In 1896 a smelter was established in Trail and other smaller ones followed in various locations. The large smelter at Trail is still in operation today, but instead of gold it now smelts lead and zinc from mines throughout the British Columbia interior, not just the mines at Rossland.

The large underground copper mine
at Britannia on Howe Sound, 1927
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Once the gold ran out mining companies switched to mining other metals such as, copper, silver, lead and zinc.

Craigmont open pit copper mine
near Merritt in 1948
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In recent years the ore has often been extracted by digging large open pits, rather than digging small shafts into the ground.

Miners at work in the Sullivan
lead and zinc mine at Kimberley, 1930
B-05317
The Sullivan mine at Kimberley is the classic underground mine. It was the world's largest lead-zinc mine for many years after the discovery of the ore in 1892. It is still operating today and produces not only lead and zinc but also silver, bismuth, cadmium indium, gold and antimony.

Processing molybdenum at the
Endako mine in the Bulkley region
I-26327
The Lornex and Bethlehem open pit mines in the Highland Valley in south-central B.C. produce copper while in the northwest of the province molybdenum is extracted at the Endako mine. There is also a small molybdenum processing plant at Kamloops.

Despite being a key contributor to British Columbia's wealth, mining has faced numerous problems over the years. Mines have been closed or opened with the ups and downs of world metal prices, and unlike forestry, fishing or agriculture, minerals are not a renewable resource. Once an ore body has been mined out, it is gone forever.

There has also often been environmental concerns caused by the location of mines and by the effluent and emissions from mines and smelters. However, mining and smelting remain important industries in British Columbia with annual revenues of approximately 2.25 billion dollars.

Some remnants of the early mining industry have become important tourist attractions. The two best known are the gold rush town of Barkerville and the closed mine at Britannia Beach, now a museum.





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