It was 100 years ago on March 1st, 1910, that Strathcona Provincial Park was created — the first provincial park in British Columbia. It was created following an expedition led by Price Ellison in the summer of 1910. Thus was the first of Clayoquot Sound’s large intact wilderness watersheds (the Moyeha River) protected. The Megin River was added to Strathcona in 1993.
This excerpt from the October 1910 report by Price Ellison to BC’s Premier Richard McBride only rings truer 100 years later:
Owing to the great increase in population and industrial enterprises all over the world, many countries have considered it necessary, within the last decade, to set aside as reserves large or small tracts of country, in order that the present and future generations may have these enclosures as recreation grounds and view the grandeurs and beauties of nature in an unaltered form, and at the same time to act as game preserves, and thereby prevent the total extinction of different species of animals.
… A large tract of land set apart, as a reserve, or otherwise protected, is by no means a dead loss to the country from a commercial standpoint, so long as it contains scenery worthy of the name, as it not only attracts people from the surrounding country, but thousands and thousands of tourists flock into it annually, thereby providing occupation to a large number and besides leaving a large amount of money in the country.
To learn more about the 2010 replication of Price’s expedition, see http://www.wildisle.ca/strathcona-park/expedition/.
